From the ancient legend of Cangjie's word-making to the discovery of Oracle Bone Inscriptions more than 65,438,000 years ago, China scholars have been trying to uncover the mystery of the origin of Chinese characters. Regarding the origin of Chinese characters, there are many sayings in China ancient literature, such as "knot rope theory", "gossip theory", "picture theory" and "calligraphy contract theory". Ancient books also generally recorded the legend of Cang Xie, the historian of the Yellow Emperor who created Chinese characters. Modern scholars believe that systematic writing tools cannot be completely created by one person. If Cang Xie really exists, he should be a text organizer or publisher.
The story of the origin of Chinese characters:
"Bei" is a pictophonetic word and a knowing word. From the perspective of pictophonetic characters, the word "clothes" on the left of the word "quilt" means that the quilt belongs to the category of clothes, and the word "skin" on the right is similar to the word "quilt" in the word-making era, indicating the pronunciation of this word, but with the passage of time, the pronunciation of "skin" and "quilt" becomes different and gradually loses its function of expressing pronunciation. From the perspective of understanding characters, clothes made of leather are "quilts". The original meaning of quilt refers to a small quilt. In later generations, the meaning of "suffering" was extended on the basis of the original meaning of quilt.
knot theory
"The History of the Northern Wei Dynasty" said: The ancestors of the Northern Wei Dynasty "hunted for a career, and simplicity was a custom, and simplicity was a change; Not for words, but for wood carving. " It records tribes in primitive society or some ethnic minorities in China. Before the writing appeared, it recorded large and small events such as war, hunting, alliance, election, celebration, marriage, childbirth, disease and disaster by knotting notes. In the past, according to the Book of Changes, some scholars said, "The ancient rule of law was based on knotting ropes, and the later sages used calligraphy easily, and the rule of hundreds of officials was observed by all the people." Infer that "words originated from knots".
Gossip theory
Kong Anguo's Preface to Shangshu (this is a fake, but it is a long time ago) said: "The ancients loved the king of the Xi family and began to draw gossip and make a book contract instead of tying the rope, so literary books came into being." "Yi Gan Wei's Letters" holds that: Gangua is Tian Zi's ancient prose; Kungua, ancient Chinese characters; Deviating from divination, the ancient Chinese character of fire in China; Kangua, an ancient water character in China; Sea melon, ancient prose with wind characters; China ancient divination and thunder writing; Gengua, ancient mountain words; Dugua, Zezi's ancient prose.
Hetullo theory
The Book of Changes: the river is drawn, Luo is written, and the sage is written. "Jade Edition of River Map": Cang Xie was the emperor, making his maiden voyage to the south, making the mountain in the Yang Que, facing the water for the first time, Gui Ling wrote the book, and Jia Danwen was clear, so as to teach it. "Picture" and "book" are from Heluo, how mysterious! Mysticism is the main feature of this theory. In vain, it can be understood as books, but in fact, it can be understood as I ching and history books. Under the article "Book of River Map" in Ci Hai, it is said that in Fu, Yi Long appeared from the Yellow River with a horse carrying "River Map"; A turtle appeared from Luoshui, carrying "Luoshu". Fuxi painted eight diagrams based on this "picture" and "book", which was the source of the later Zhouyi. Yu said that he was in charge of the flood, and the Emperor of Heaven gave him a nine-domain Hong Fan (Shang Shu Hong Fan). Liu Xin thought that Hong Fan was a lost book. Unveiling the mystery of this theory, it is not difficult to find that its real core is arithmetic, which can be compared with the "Jiugong" algorithm. The so-called "Nine Palaces", for Chen Weijia, is the Eight Diagrams plus the Central Committee, and it becomes nine ("Five" is located in the Central Committee and can also be associated with the Five Elements); In the eyes of astrologers, the horizontal, vertical, oblique and additive numbers are always 15.
The Book of Hutuluo (4 pieces)
Cang Xie's Word-building Theory
"Cang Xie's Theory of Word Creation" was popular in the Warring States Period. "Lv Chunqiu JUNSHOU" said: "Cang Xie is a book and Hou Ji is a crop." Xunzi and Han Feizi also recorded it. "Huai Nan Zi Xiu Wu Xun" said in an essay: Cang Xie "was born knowing books". In the Qin and Han Dynasties, this legend became more popular. Xu Shen [1] "Shuo Wen Jie Zi Xu" [2]: "Cang Xie's early book, Gai Yi is like a pictograph." Who the hell is Cang Xie? Legend has it that he is a historian of the Yellow Emperor, who was the leader of the tribal alliance in ancient Central Plains. With the society entering the stage of large-scale tribal alliances, the external affairs between alliances are becoming more and more frequent, and it is urgent to establish a set of communication symbols enjoyed by all alliances, so the work of collecting and sorting out * * * was handed over to historian Cang Xie. During the period of Chunhua in Song Dynasty, there was a famous calligraphy collection, Chunhua Pavilion Post, which contained five volumes of 28-word ancient seal script, and the legend was written by Cang Xie. The established Chinese character system is a long-term trial and error and gradually improved by the people, and will never be created by one person.
Image theory
Modern scholars believe that Chinese characters really originated from the original picture. Some figures carved on unearthed cultural relics are probably related to words. Around 4000 BC, it was unearthed in the site of Huaxian Village, Shaanxi Province, on the painted pottery basin of Yangshao culture in the Neolithic Age (the nature should be the emblem of the primitive clan here, when it was in the clan society stage of transition from matriarchal system to paternal system). There are four bird-shaped patterns, which are very similar to "bird" (rising) and "guard" (falling) in ancient Chinese characters. Shuowen said that "Wei" is a general term for short-tailed birds. Painted pottery pots of Yangshao culture unearthed from Anbanpo site in Xi 'an and fish-shaped patterns on bronzes in the late Shang Dynasty are vivid. Comparing them with some "fish" in ancient Chinese characters, the similarity is enough to make people believe that Chinese characters evolved from the original picture.