The evolution of Chinese character fonts has three stages: (1) From oracle bone inscriptions to small seal scripts. (2) From small seal script to official script. (3) From official script to regular script. The characteristics of each stage are:
Oracle bone inscriptions and bronze inscriptions are closer to the realistic pictograms of pictures, while the small seal script strokes are round and regular, gradually alienating from the physical form. The marks of the oracle bone inscriptions are obvious, while the bronze inscriptions are thickly molded. Their shapes are relatively random. Characters with few strokes occupy a small space, and characters with many strokes occupy a large space. The small seal script is neat in shape, with each stroke occupying one space.
From Xiaozhuan to official script, this is the biggest change in fonts, and it is the turning point from ancient characters to modern characters. The glyph structure of Xiaozhuan is broken, the pictographic meaning is weak, and the symbolism is strengthened. The rounded strokes of Xiaozhuan generally change into square folds and horizontal, left, and back strokes in official script. Xiaozhuan became official script, and the basic pattern of modern Chinese character strokes was formed.
From official script to regular script, except for some changes in the pen, the font structure has basically not changed.