Kienning Colloquial Romanized

Kienning Colloquial Romanized Gṳ̿ing-nǎing-hǔ Gâ̤ Tǔ-kióng Lô̤-mǎ-cī Kienning Romanized, Jianzhou Romanized, Jian'ou Romanized
The Kienning Colloquial Romanized Book of Genesis Chapter 1, published by the British and Foreign Bible Society.
Type	Latin alphabet (modified)
Languages	Jian'ou dialect of the Northern Min language
Creator	Missionaries: Miss L.J. Bryer, Hugh. S. Phillips and Mrs Minnie Phillips
Time period	1896 — 1922

The Kienning Colloquial Romanized Alphabet (建寧府土腔羅馬字, Gṳ̿ing-nǎing Lô̤-mǎ-cī), is Romanization system adopted by Western Missionaries to compile the Kienning dialect (modern day Jian'ou City) of the Northern Min language in the Fujian Province of China.

During the last decade of the 19th century, Western missionaries from the Church of England Zenana Missionary Society arrived in Kienning Prefecture (which also comprises the present day Nanping City) to evangelise. However they soon realized that the majority of the residents in the region did not comprehend Mandarin speech nor the Foochow dialect when Foochow Christians tried to preach to them, hence the missionaries studied an existing Chinese publication titled The Eight Tones of Kien-chou (建州八音) and in 1896 the missionaries devised a new Latinized alphabet system for the Kienning dialect, which emulated the Foochow Romanization system. Amongst the early translators were Miss L.J. Bryer and other ladies of the Zenana Mission with the help of native teachers, translated the New Testament into the Kienning Romanized Colloquial writing system by 1895. It was seen through the press by Miss B. Newcombe and published by the British and Foreign Bible Society in London in 1896.

By 1898, the English missionary couple Hugh S. Phillips and Minnie Phillips had translated and published a revised edition of the Gospel of Mark into the Kienning Colloquial Romanized alphabet. A revised edition of the Gospel of Matthew was completed and published in 1900 and by the following year, saw the printing of A Chinese–English Dictionary of the Kien-ning Dialect, which taught people how to read this particular romanization system. The Kienning Colloquial Romanized alphabet played a significant role in the spread of Christianity in Kienning Prefecture and was widely circulated within the local churches of that region. The missionary records showed that the local women were able to master the reading of the Kienning Romanized Bible after three months. Nevertheless, literacy in that writing system even amongst the local Christians did not reach 100 percent.