Abstract:
“自……外”,“自……之外”,“自……以外”, and “自……而外” were the four fixed patterns in ancient Chinese. In ancient, medieval and modern Chinese, these patterns share one usage, expressing the relation of “not taking into account”, which is equivalent to “除……外”(except) in modern Chinese. This usage was developed from the pattern of expression “If this is not taken into account, all other mentioned formerly are naturally not, either”. In addition,“凡诸”, also a fixed expression in ancient, medieval and modern Chinese, means “with all the multitude included”, “with all the multitude taken into account” or simply “all the” in the few cases as attribute. The expression was evolved from the pattern “with both A and B included”.
