Why did the ancients like to write from right to left?

Because before the invention of papermaking, everyone wrote on bamboo slips, and bamboo pieces were long and narrow; While opening bamboo slips, you need to hold them in your right hand and unfold them in your left hand, which gradually formed this habit. Until the invention of Xuan paper, people got used to the previous writing method and continued to use it. Later, this writing order has been handed down. Until today, many calligraphers still like to write from right to left, which is more in line with the literati temperament.

When it comes to ancient books, we may first think of bamboo slips, which are all made up of pieces of bamboo, so we may think that the reason for this writing is the limitation of written materials. This statement seems to make sense. Before the appearance of ancient papermaking, the records of words needed to be engraved on wooden boards or written on bamboo slips for a long time. Although wood or bamboo chips are not so precious, it is a waste of time to make this material. Let's look at the writing of bamboo slips.

The reason why the ancients wrote vertically is because before papermaking was invented, the ancients wrote on bamboo slips. Bamboo slips and wooden slips are long and narrow pieces of bamboo, which can be rolled into books when strung together. The word "book" is a pictograph of bamboo slips. It is natural to hold the book in your right hand when you open it, and it is also convenient to unfold it in your left hand. Therefore, writing is from top to bottom and from right to left. In ancient times, bamboo slips were written piece by piece and then bound into a book.

The ancients respected heaven and earth and thought that heaven was the supreme existence. Otherwise, the emperors of past dynasties would not say that they were "ordered by heaven". The earliest writing up and down was nothing more than showing the ancients' respect for heaven. In ancient times, "only reading was high", and the status of scholars was lofty and at the top of social class. Reading and writing is a sacred thing. When you read from top to bottom, your head will move up and down, which means recognition and recognition, that is, innate acquisition and respect for heaven and earth.

Judging from the characteristics of Chinese characters and people's physiological habits, the stroke order of a word is naturally convenient. If you write horizontally from right to left, when you write the left half, the brush will inevitably cover the right half, which is inconvenient to arrange the structure and affects the beauty of the knot. The last stroke of each Chinese character is in the middle or lower right, and the last stroke of the previous word is followed by the beginning of the next word. Vertical writing is more convenient for the continuity of strokes than horizontal writing.