Qidan nationality originated from Xianbei Rouran Department, a descendant of Donghu people. She used the word "Qidan", which originally meant "iron", as the national title, symbolizing the indomitable will and indestructible national spirit of the Qidan people. The earliest record of the Khitan nationality in historical documents began in 389 AD.
Qidan culture is the main body of Liao culture and has a wide influence in Central Asia and Europe. Its heritage has experienced Jin, Yuan, Qing and even today.
Culturally, the Khitans created two different types of characters based on Chinese characters, namely, Khitan characters and Khitan characters. The Khitan nationality is a nationality with a long history and culture. According to historical records, the Khitan originally had no writing. After the establishment of Liao Dynasty, due to the needs of political, economic, military and cultural development and the awakening of national consciousness, with reference to the physical structure of Chinese characters, two kinds of Khitan characters were created to record the Khitan language. The difference between Qidan characters and Qidan small characters is not because of the size of the characters, but because of the time of creation and the strength of pinyin. The pinyin system created first is incomplete, and the pinyin form created later is complete.
In the first month of spring in 920 AD, Emperor Lu Ye Abaoji of Liao Dynasty ordered the creation of Qidan characters, which were made in autumn and September, and were issued by imperial edicts. This Chinese character is simplified or added with strokes. Before liberation, the words written in the Mourning Book unearthed in Liaoqing Cemetery were all in big characters. Later, this Khitan script also appeared on murals in Qingling and many pottery in Liao Dynasty.
According to historical records, the fine print of Qidan was created by the Prince. After liberation, the epitaph unearthed from Hushanxiao Tomb in Jinxi County, Liaoning Province, and the Khitan characters on bronzes and silverware unearthed in Yixian County and Jianping County, Liaoning Province, are all of this kind of Khitan fine print.
The Khitan script has been used for hundreds of years, but it is not easy to read through, so it has not penetrated into the people. However, it has a great influence on Xixia and Jurchen script, and it is a great contribution of Qidan people to culture. There are many dictionaries, dictionaries, phonetic symbols and other materials related to Xixia characters in Heishui language literature, such as A Collection of Words with Two Interpretations in Xixia Language and Chinese, Fan Han He Shi Zhang Zhong, Wenhai, Xixia Phonetic Annotation Book and Yintong, which are undoubtedly valuable materials for studying Xixia characters. Xixia dynasty, a historical and legal category, has a complete legal system. However, there are no records in Chinese historical materials, but there are many legal documents of Xixia in Black Water City, the most famous of which is the decree of reforming the old by the heavenly saints. This code was originally 20 volumes, but now it is 19 volumes, 1300 pages. It is another dynasty code publicly engraved and promulgated after the publication of Song Criminal Code in ancient China, and it is also the first code published in minority languages. It absorbed the essence of Tang and Song laws, innovated in form and content, and formed its own characteristics, which is very close to the form of modern legal provisions. There are few literary works handed down from generation to generation in Xixia literature. There are written and engraved Xixia poems in the literature of Heishui City, and dozens of them have been preserved, which reflects the artistic achievements of Xixia poems. There are a large number of various types of Xixia proverbs in the Collection of New Words and Proverbs, which show the social customs of Xixia and the national ethics and morality of Tangut Qiang in a mellow national style. The Xixia rulers actively borrowed the culture of the Central Plains and translated a large number of China classics, such as The Analects of Confucius, Mencius, Sun Tzu's Art of War, and The Book of Filial Piety. In particular, the book Lin Lei, edited by Yu in the Tang Dynasty, has long been lost. There are only zero fragments in Dunhuang documents, and the Xixia edition is intact. Through translation and supplement, this lost ancient book can be restored to its original appearance. As a Buddhist classic, Xixia rulers believed in Buddhism, and vigorously promoted Buddhism in China, spending a lot of manpower and material resources to translate and copy Buddhist scriptures. Some of these Buddhist classics have been translated from Han and Tibetan, some have been translated from Tibetan scriptures, and some have compiled their own documents, which are important materials for studying the Buddhist history of Xixia and even China. ? Xixia dynasty attached great importance to seal cutting, and government agencies set up seal cutting departments, and there were works of seal cutting departments in the literature of Heishui City. Before the Xixia Buddhist scriptures, the printmaking was skillful, beautifully printed, magnificent and unique in style. Xixia literature has various formats and specifications, including large margins and small margins. Its binding methods include scroll binding, warp binding, butterfly binding, bag binding and line binding, which can reveal the history of the development and evolution of book binding art in China. ?