Old Mandarin or Early Mandarin was the speech of northern China during the Jurchen-ruled Jin dynasty and the Mongol-led Yuan dynasty. New genres of vernacular literature were based on this language, including verse, drama and story forms, such as the qu and sanqu.

The Jin dynasty, officially known as the Great Jin, was an imperial dynasty of China that existed between 1115 and 1234. Because the Wanyan clan that founded the dynasty were of Jurchen descent, it is also sometimes called the Jurchen dynasty or the Jurchen Jin.