Calligraphy is regular: how did the ancients write it?

"Calligraphy with Law", published by Knowledge Publishing House, Wang Xizhi of the Eastern Jin Dynasty didn't write a few tables. When the words "sit on the floor" and "the window is bright and clean" appeared, China people had not used desks and chairs. Ancient people in China sat with their knees on the ground, their soles facing up and their hips resting on their ankles. It was not until the appearance of Hu bed and Hu chair in the Southern and Northern Dynasties that you could sit up straight. I once happened to see a picture of a cultural relic: two writing porcelain statues with blue glaze in Yongning, Western Jin Dynasty, 1958 was unearthed in Changsha, Hunan. Two statuettes sit opposite each other, with a rectangle in the middle, on which an inkstone, a pen and a penholder are placed. A small statue seems to have several boards in its hand. Such boards are obviously "thanks". Ancient bamboo slips were made of thin wooden boards, about a foot long, so they were called "foot slips". Another terracotta warrior holds a ruler in his left hand and writes with his right hand, which is the reading posture. This shows that at that time, the desk was not used for supporting and supporting elbows and wrists when writing, but only for placing utensils and stationery. These two porcelain figurines prove the writing posture of people in the Western Jin Dynasty, and also prove that China people used this posture for thousands of years without relying on their arms and wrists. Yongning in the Western Jin Dynasty was the last year of the Western Jin Dynasty, and Wang Xizhi was born in the Eastern Jin Dynasty. Does Wang Xizhi write in this posture? Wang Xizhi's book theory did not mention it, nor did contemporary calligraphers. I didn't mention it because it was unnecessary. There is only one situation that need not be mentioned, that is, we all know that it is a normal state. I think there may be unconscious reflections in paintings of the same period. Please look at Song Mo's Picture of Checking Books in the Northern Qi Dynasty. There are four people sitting on a big bed, belonging to literati and scholars, checking books. At that time, books were not bound by volumes, but by volumes. The calligraphers of couch colonel have different postures: one is holding paper in his left hand and writing in his right hand, with a posture like a porcelain figurine in the Western Jin Dynasty; A person rests with a pen in his right hand and looks sideways with a paper in his left hand, as if enjoying his own book. There is another person sitting in the same position on the right, with a pen in his right hand and a paper in his left hand, with the waiter holding it on it. Judging from the furniture of the same period, several boxes at that time were very short and almost flush with the bed. If you put paper on several boxes to write cantilever, your vision and hands must be two or three feet away, and you can't write the exquisite fine print at that time. If you put your whole arm on several boxes, it's like putting your head close to your feet. This is obviously an acrobatic action, so if you are afraid of Xi and offer your predecessors, you won't be so embarrassed. A little analysis, this is obviously unnatural. In the painting, people sitting in the same position put a piece of paper one foot high and two feet long on several cases to write, which not only saved trouble, but also proved that scholars generally did not write on several cases at that time. In ancient times, there were always extremely knowledgeable people "grinding ink and drawing paper", and the early "drawing paper" was probably like this. The proofreading map of the Northern Qi Dynasty is exactly the same as the porcelain figurines of the Western Jin Dynasty. From the Western Jin Dynasty to the Northern Qi Dynasty, it was nearly 300 years, which was the peak period of calligraphy and the period when Wang Zi dominated the whole country. For example, the famous Seven Sages of the Bamboo Forest and Biography of the Shrew all truthfully reflected the living condition of "sitting on the floor" at that time. In the picture of female history, there is a standing female history with a paper in her left hand and a pen in her right hand. This is probably what the ancients called "starting with horses." It can be asserted that contemporary Wang Xizhi never writes on a desk or desk. The Sui, Tang and Five Dynasties inherited the written heritage of the Six Dynasties. In China, high tables appeared later than chairs and stools. Tables originated from several cases, and chairs and stools were not equipped with high tables until six or seven hundred years later. Several cases still have their uses. I can't help thinking, in those six or seven hundred years, how did people write when they were sitting with their feet down and there was no table to match? There were tables in the Tang and Five Dynasties, but they were mostly used for catering and sacrificial utensils. Contemporary Gong's high table, statues of six venerable figures and music-listening pictures seem not to be used for writing. In the picture of Han Xizai's Night Banquet written by Gu in the Five Dynasties, there are several tables beside the bed, but they are as high and low as today's. In the Survey of Books by contemporary Wang, the host sits in a chair, and there is a high table behind him, whose height matches the chair in the picture, while there are pens, papers and inkstones on the knee-high square table in front of him. The picture tells us that this knee-high square table is used for writing. Let me emphasize the word "knee-length" again. Please imagine that in the Sui and Tang Dynasties, no matter how many times a person sat in a chair, his head and upper body would bend to his knees. How can our ancestors play tricks on themselves like this? So I'm sure the writing posture of the Sui, Tang and Five Dynasties is still a legacy of the Six Dynasties. The writing posture of the Song people is almost the same as that of the Riverside Scene at Qingming Festival written by Zhang Zeduan in the Northern Song Dynasty today, with high tables, high chairs and high tables everywhere. In the Eighteen Figures of the Bachelor in the Song Dynasty, we were clearly told the writing posture at that time: people were sitting on the bed, in front of a very high table with a piece of paper spread flat on it. The paper is still two feet high and more than two feet long, and some people want to write on it. Put a stick at both ends of the paper to make it flat. This is the "weighing rule" that we use so far, of course, heavy objects such as metal, jade and hardwood. "Weight" is used for paper spreading and desktop writing, which is not easy to roll and move, and has the same function as roll paper. Moreover, in Ma Yuan's "Elegant Map of the West Garden" in the Southern Song Dynasty, you can see a person standing at the edge of the console table, with a long and narrow hand roll lying flat on the ground, people writing cantilever, and there are "weights" on the ground. Writing this reminds me of Han Xizhai's banquet picture copied by Tang Yin in Ming Dynasty. He took the initiative to add a tall long table with pen and ink on it and a roll of paper on it. In fact, he was propping up a "ruler". Gu's original only has one chair, several chairs and a knee-high square table, and there is no high table from beginning to end. Up to the Tang Dynasty or the Five Dynasties after the Tang Dynasty, Ji was put on the bed to write. Tang's romantic nature, he imposed the scene of "writing at his desk" in the Ming Dynasty on the Five Dynasties, indicating that people in the Ming Dynasty did not understand the writing methods before the Five Dynasties. This phenomenon was also ridiculed by Mr. Qian Zhongshu in his Seven Pieces Collection: "Du Mu's Implication Collection: Wang Wei painted an image of an ambush, not with bamboo slips on his knees, but sitting in a basket and stretching several rolls. The cover is not formed, and it is a banana in the snow. " It can be seen that Wang Wei also imposed the customs of the Tang Dynasty on the Western Han Dynasty, which is really like planting banana in summer in the heavy snow in winter. "Guan Yu hit Qin Qiong" seems to have existed since ancient times. Although Tang and Wang are romantic, they truly reflect the objective background of the author. (Calligraphy and Law, published by Knowledge Publishing House)