Suí-period (late 6th century) phonologist, míng Cí 詞, zì Fǎyán 法言 (the zì by which he is universally known); native of Wéijùn 魏郡 (modern Línzhāng 臨漢, Héběi). Held minor office under the Northern-Qí, Northern-Zhōu, and Suí. The principal compiler of the Qièyùn 切韻 (5 juàn, Rénshòu 1, 601), the foundational rhyme-book of the Chinese phonological tradition: in 583 he had hosted the eight scholars Liú Zhēn, Yán Zhītuī, Wèi Yuān, Lú Sīdào, Lǐ Ruò, Xiāo Gāi, Xīn Déyuán, Xuē Dàohéng at his home for a discussion of how to reconcile the conflicting regional rhyme-books of Lǚ Jìng et al.; eighteen years later he completed the Qièyùn on the basis of those notes. The Qièyùn survives only in fragments (Tang manuscripts from Dunhuang and Turfan) but is the textual ancestor of every later canonical rhyme-book — Sūn Miǎn’s 孫愐 Tángyùn (751), the Yuánběn Guǎngyùn KR1j0054 (10th–early 11th c.), Chén Péngnián’s 陳彭年 Chóngxiū Guǎngyùn KR1j0055 (1011), and through these the entire reconstruction of Middle Chinese in modern phonology. CBDB cbdbId 673520 (the entry #81218 is a homonymous Qīng-Republican person of the same name, b. 1844).