Evolution of Chinese characters:
Many changes have taken place in Chinese characters since Oracle Bone Inscriptions. According to historical facts, these changes can be roughly divided into two categories: reform and natural evolution. The reform of Chinese characters refers to the process of people consciously and actively managing Chinese characters, and the natural evolution of Chinese characters refers to the natural change process of Chinese characters. The reform of Chinese characters is generally discontinuous, intense and completed in a short time;
The natural evolution of Chinese characters is continuous, slow and long-term. The natural evolution of Chinese characters has both time and geographical factors, which makes the form, sound and meaning of Chinese characters diversified, leading to more and more variant characters, different pronunciations and changes in meaning, leading to disunity and nonstandard Chinese characters.
Therefore, after a period of natural evolution, people must reform Chinese characters to make them standardized and unified.
In addition, Chinese characters cannot be perfect as soon as they are produced, and can meet the needs of the development of productive forces in various periods. Therefore, with the progress of the times, people will actively transform Chinese characters to meet the needs of the continuous development of productive forces. When the reform measures were popularized, Chinese characters began a new round of natural evolution.
The change of Chinese characters is like the change of roads. The road is made by people; After the road comes out, people have to repair it every once in a while; After the repair, the road gradually changes, such as widening, straightening, damage, or new branches, which need to be repaired again.
In addition, with the development of the times, the previous roads can no longer meet the needs of the development of the times, and new roads need to be built, such as railways and highways. Road construction is equivalent to the reform of Chinese characters, and the road is gradually widened, straightened, damaged and naturally branched, which is equivalent to the natural evolution of Chinese characters.
These two changes have different properties, trends, laws and functions, so in the past, we generally discussed the historical evolution of Chinese characters together and drew some conclusions, such as "the development trend of Chinese characters is from complexity to simplicity", which is inevitably ambiguous and specious!
Extended data:
Founder of the character: Cang Xie.
It is said that Cang Xie is the originator of writing, but in fact he is only the summary and perfection of writing. Cang Xie lived in the 24th century BC, and now it is 265438+20th century, more than 4000 years ago.
But six or seven thousand years ago, China's writing began to develop slowly. For example, the painted pottery of Yangshao culture unearthed in Anbanpo, Xi 'an has written symbols, and the early hieroglyphics of Dawenkou culture in Shandong Province, etc. This should be the earliest prototype of ancient Chinese characters in China.
After the appearance of the famous Oracle Bone Inscriptions, Cang Xie began to summarize the creation of characters. But he can't finish such a huge project by himself.
It has been recorded in history that Xunzi said in "Exposing Articles": "Therefore, there are many good readers, and Cang Xie is also an independent biography. There are many people with good crops, but Hou Ji is the only one. " Cang Xie didn't create the explanatory text himself, just as anyone can grow crops, Hou Ji is not the only founder.
Up to now, there are 56,000 shaped characters in China. In China's 5,000-year-old sea of civilization, each era has produced splendid culture.
However, the development of Chinese characters has not stopped. As the carrier of records, Chinese characters have completed its original mission. People have gradually developed more functions, such as font appreciation of Chinese characters, the development of calligraphy and Chinese painting.