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 earliest carved symbols were more than 8000 years ago.
In recent decades, Chinese archaeologists have published a series of unearthed materials about the origin of Chinese characters earlier than Oracle Bone Inscriptions in Yin Ruins. These materials mainly refer to the carved or painted symbols that appeared on pottery in the late primitive society and early historical society, and also include a few symbols engraved on Oracle Bone Inscriptions, jade and stone tools. It can be said that they provide a new basis for explaining the origin of Chinese characters.
Wang, a doctoral supervisor of Zhengzhou University, made a systematic investigation and comparison of the carving symbols on pottery pieces unearthed from more than 100 archaeological sites in China, and thought that the earliest carving symbols in China appeared in Jiahu site in Wuyang, Henan Province, with a history of more than 8,000 years.
As a professional worker, he tried to comprehensively sort out these original materials by comprehensively using scientific methods such as archaeology, ancient Chinese character configuration, comparative philology, scientific archaeology and high-tech means, so as to compare some clues about the occurrence and development of Chinese characters before Shang Dynasty.
However, the situation is not so simple. In addition to the existing small-scale data of Zhengzhou Shangcheng site and Xiaoshuangqiao site (in recent years, more than 10 cases of Zhu Shutao's early characters of Shang Dynasty have been found), other symbols before Shang Dynasty are scattered and lack of contact with each other, and most of them are out of touch with Shang Dynasty characters. There are also some symbols with heavy regional colors and complex backgrounds.
The Chinese character system was formally formed in the Central Plains.
Wang believes that the formal formation of the Chinese character system should be in the Central Plains. Chinese characters are a writing system of independent origin, independent of any foreign language. However, its origin is not single. After many times and long-term running-in, probably in the early summer, our ancestors creatively invented the writing symbol system of recording language on the basis of extensively absorbing and using early symbols. At that time, the Chinese character system matured rapidly.
According to reports, according to the written materials unearthed from archaeological excavations, China had a formal written language at least in the Xia Dynasty. For example, in recent years, archaeologists found the word "Wen" for writing brush and bamboo calligraphy on a flat pottery jar unearthed from Taosi site in Xiangfen, Shanxi. These symbols belong to the basic configuration in the early writing system, but unfortunately such unearthed writing materials are still rare.
Characters first matured in Shang Dynasty.
As far as the written materials of Yin Shang Dynasty are known and seen at present, there are many kinds of written carriers. At that time, in addition to writing on simplified Chinese characters with a brush, other main writing methods were carved on tortoise shells and animal bones, and pottery, jade and Tao Zhu were carved on bronzes. Oracle Bone Inscriptions and bronze ritual vessels used in Yin Ruins are the earliest mature written materials found in China.
The Shang dynasty characters reflected in Yin Ruins are not only reflected in the large number of characters and rich materials, but also in the way of creating characters that has formed its own characteristics and laws. The structural characteristics of basic characters in Shang Dynasty can be divided into four categories: based on the physical characteristics of human body and a certain part of human body; Based on labor creation and labor object; Taking the images of animals and livestock as the basis of word formation; Taking natural images as the basis of word formation. Judging from the cultural connotation of the configuration, the objects selected by these early mature hieroglyphs are quite close to the social life of our ancestors and have strong realistic characteristics. At the same time, the content described by these hieroglyphs involves all levels of people and nature, so it also has the characteristics of extensive sources of configuration.
Descendants of Wind and Fire 17:52:27
Chinese characters are unique to our Chinese nation and a symbol of Chinese civilization. In our daily life, we can see it anytime and anywhere. It can be said that where there are China people, there are Chinese characters. However, do you know how Chinese characters developed? Here, I will introduce the history of Chinese characters.
There is a legend that in the period of the Yellow Emperor a long time ago, the Yellow Emperor ordered his courtier Cang Xie to create characters. Cang Xie is a strange man with eight eyes. He observed all directions with his eight eyes and saw all kinds of things. He simplified the shapes of these things and carved them on tortoise shells and animal bones, which became the earliest writing. This myth is of course absurd, but it also shows the fact that Chinese characters evolved from hieroglyphics.
In the primitive times tens of thousands of years ago, the ancients learned to express themselves in words, and later learned to use gestures, but some things are difficult to express in words and gestures, so someone came up with a method of marking, but there are too many marks and it is easy to forget. Later, they used graphics to express their meaning, such as "the sun" was painted as a circle and "the tree" was painted as a tree. This is how the earliest hieroglyphs were produced.
With the passage of time, mankind entered the slave society. At this time, there are more things that need to be recorded in words, and it is too cumbersome to express them with some graphic symbols. So people simplified some pictographs and combined some pictographs into a new text, making it easier for people to understand. For example, combining "man" and "wood" into the word "Hugh" means a person sleeping against a tree. In this way, many Chinese characters have been created, and a new type of Chinese characters-knowing characters has been formed.
During the Spring and Autumn Period and the Warring States Period, many vassal states appeared on the land of China, and the characters of these vassal states were different, so there was a situation of polysemy, which brought difficulties to cultural exchanges between countries. After Qin Shihuang unified the six countries, he ordered the unified use of a script-Xiao Zhuan. This kind of writing is much simpler than the previous writing, but it is still a bit cumbersome, so an emergency folk style-official script has gradually emerged. During the Three Kingdoms period, Zhong You of Wei created a simpler and more beautiful script-regular script. From then on, Chinese characters established its square shape and began to have a shelf structure. Since then, people have created cursive script, running script and other fonts, and world-famous calligraphers such as Zhong, Wang, Yan, Liu, Su, Huang, Mi and Cai have also appeared. The development of Chinese characters has gradually entered a higher level.
With the development of Chinese characters, the number of Chinese characters is increasing, so there are tools for people to find Chinese characters, such as Shuo Wen Jie Zi, Kangxi Dictionary and so on.
Descendants of Wind and Fire 17:52:54
Changji's creation
Cang Xie, surnamed Hou, the historian of the Yellow Emperor and the founder of Chinese characters, is known as the "sage of word-making". Today, in wucun, 35 miles northwest of Nanle County, there are Cang Xie Ridge, Cangjie Temple and Bookstores. Historians believe that Cang Xie was born in Sri Lanka and was buried there.
It is said that Cang Xie "began to change the book contract into a rope". Before that, people tied knots and kept records, that is, big knots were tied for big events, small ones were summarized, and connected things were linked. Later, it was developed to carve symbols on wood and bamboo with a knife as notes. With the development of history, civilization is gradual, things are complicated and there are many famous things. The knotting and carving methods of wood are far from meeting the needs. There is an urgent need to create words. The Yellow Emperor was a period of numerous inventions in ancient times. At that time, not only sericulture was invented, but also boats, carts, bows, mirrors, cooking pots and retort were invented. Under the influence of these inventions, Cang Xie was determined to create a kind of writing.
Legend of Cang Xie; Four eyes and heavy pupils, very clever. One year, Cang Xie made a southern tour, climbed a mountain with Yang Que (now Luonan County, Shaanxi Province) and confronted Xuan Huluo? In the water, I suddenly saw a chinemys reevesii with many blue patterns on his back. Cang Xie looked surprised, so he picked it up and studied it carefully. He looked around and found that the pattern on the turtle's back was meaningful. He believes that patterns can not only express meaning, but if a rule is made, isn't it used by everyone to convey their feelings and record things?
Cang Xie thought about it day and night, observed everywhere, and saw the distribution of stars in the sky, the appearance of mountains and rivers on the ground, the traces of birds, animals, insects and fish, the shapes of plants and tools, described and painted, created various symbols, and set the meaning represented by each symbol. According to his own mind, he pieced together several paragraphs with symbols and showed them to people. After his explanation, he also understood. Cang Xie called this symbol "Zi". Cang Xie succeeded in coining words, and strange things happened. On that day, it rained like millet during the day, and I heard ghosts crying and wolves howling at night. Why does it rain like rain? Because Cang Xie created words, words can be used to convey ideas and record things, which is naturally worth celebrating. But why do ghosts cry? Some people say that because of writing, people's wisdom is growing, people's morality is dividing, and deception and cunning are born. The world will never be peaceful, and even ghosts will not be at peace, so ghosts will cry. There is another saying:
On one occasion, Cang Xie made a mistake in providing the historical records recorded in these knots to the Yellow Emperor, which led to the defeat of the Yellow Emperor in the border negotiations with Yan Di. Later, it was a good way for Cang Xie to resign, travel around the world, visit and record historical events. Three years later, he returned to his hometown, Baishui Wu Yang Village, and lived alone in a deep ditch, "watching the joy of Kuixing and the traces of birds and animals' hooves", sorting out all kinds of materials and creating all kinds of symbols representing everything in the world. He gave these symbols a name, called Zi.
Cang Xie's words are made according to the shape of everything. For example, Japanese characters are marked according to the red circle of the sun; The word "moon" is painted in imitation of the shape of the new moon. The herringbone is looking at the silhouette painting of people ... The first article that the Yellow Emperor learned was very moved, so he was named Cang. It means that a gentleman is better than one person and a villain is better than a gentleman. Later, when God knew this, he sent down millet to reward Cang Xie. This is the origin of Grain Rain Festival on Earth.
Starting from Baishui County, get off the Luohe River along Wei (South) Qing (Jian) Highway, and then transfer to Bai (Shui) Luo (Chuan) Highway. The jeep ran for about an hour between the ditches and forks on the plateau before it came to Shiguan Village, where Cang Xie Temple is located. This Cang Xie Temple, with a history of over 1800 years, has been officially listed as a national key cultural relic protection unit by the State Council.
Cang Xie Ridge is on the west side of wucun, facing the west and east of Cang Xie Temple. This is a big mound five meters high. There are ancient cultural relics from Yangshao to Longshan under the mausoleum. There is a stone lion in Weng Zhong in front of the tomb, and there is a stone square with the word "Cang Xie" written on it. Cang Xie Temple, whose construction date is unknown. According to the existing inscriptions in the temple, "it has not been replaced since the Han and Tang Dynasties". Today's Cang Xie Temple was built in the Ming and Qing Dynasties, covering an area of about 2,700 square meters, with a pair of stone pillars facing south, beautifully carved and elegant; The gate and the second gate are hard mountain buildings, and the worship hall, the main hall and the sleeping pavilion are generous and beautiful. There are inscriptions on the seals of famous people in Ming Dynasty and stone carvings of Cang Xie and his wife. There are many steles in the temple, pines and cypresses, willows and pavilions, and the whole building is magnificent.
Say goodbye to the era of "knotting notes"
There are records in ancient books in China, such as "tying a rope to record" and "writing with a piece of wood", which are commonly used in early records. Unfortunately, these materials could not be preserved for a long time, so the records at that time were unknown. However, in Xiaotun, Anyang, 50,000 pieces of Oracle bone inscriptions150,000 pieces were found, and the words carved on tortoise shell and ox blade were quite well preserved, with a total of 3,500 words. As far as the structure of Oracle characters is concerned, in addition to pictographs, more advanced word-making methods such as pictographs, knowing words and borrowing words have been widely used. It can be seen that the characters of the Shang Dynasty reached a fairly complete level more than 3,000 years ago, so there must be a longer development process before it.
Archaeological findings prove that China's ancestors carved symbols on tortoise shells as early as seven or eight thousand years ago. There are dozens of symbols carved on pottery in Yangshao culture and Dawenkou culture five or six thousand years ago, some of which are similar to the characters seen in Oracle Bone Inscriptions, so some people think they are early characters. As for the bamboo script found on the pottery pots in the early Longshan culture, it can definitely be written, which fully shows that Chinese characters have a history of at least 4,000 years in China. The appearance of Chinese characters is not only the result of people's continuous accumulation and summary in long-term social life, so Cang Xie is probably a representative figure who summarized and sorted Chinese characters and made contributions to the formation of Chinese characters.