Fonts from various countries
The Dunhuang posthumous writings include more than 40,000 volumes of ink from the Jin Dynasty, the Sixteen Kingdoms, and the Northern Song Dynasty. The richest and most systematic first-hand information on the art of calligraphy. The style of Dunhuang posthumous writings has obvious characteristics of the times and regions, and is called classics style. The script style originated from the simplified script style of the Han Dynasty and was completed in the regular script style of the Tang Dynasty. It was an important script style for copying scriptures after the Jin Dynasty. It records in detail the entire process of Chinese characters becoming regularized after the official change, and played a major role in promoting the development of characters.
The Dunhuang posthumous documents contain three rubbings from the Tang Dynasty. There are Ouyang Xun's "Inscription on the Pagoda of Zen Master Huadu Shouqi", Liu Gongquan's "Diamond Sutra", Tang Taizong Li Shimin's "Hot Spring Inscription", and even 3 of Wang Xizhi's 17 copies. These rubbings and calligraphy are extremely valuable and are rare Tang Dynasty ink treasures today.
Calligraphy Theory
There are three fragments of calligraphy theory in the Dunhuang posthumous manuscripts, which are quite eye-catching. The first is a discussion of writing methods, with detailed and incisive discussions on the proportional relationship between strokes, thickness, length, width, and the size relationship between characters. The second and third are Wang Xizhi's calligraphy treatises and the fragments of writing styles, which are copies of Wang Xizhi's calligraphy treatises in folklore.
Hard-brush calligraphy
The hard-brush calligraphy in Dunhuang scrolls is a folk creation that has not been recorded in the history of calligraphy. The so-called hard pen here was a wooden pen or a reed pen at that time. Judging from the actual objects unearthed in Gansu, the tip of the hard pen was split into two pieces, which is exactly the same as today's water-dipped steel pen tip. This shows that hard-tipped calligraphy has existed in our country since ancient times.
Ethnic Minority Scripts
Since Dunhuang was occupied by multiple ethnic groups in history, many writings in minority languages ??are also preserved in the suicide notes. There are Sanskrit, Mongolian, Uighur, Xixia, Tubo and so on. Among them, Tubo script (ancient Tibetan script) has the largest number. These scrolls are all written with brushes or hard pens, which are quite neat and fluent, full of rhythm and unique aesthetic taste, and have high calligraphy artistic value.