The specific process of the evolution of the word Wei is as follows:
1. The origin of the word Wei
1. Wei, a common Chinese character, pronounced wēi, a phonetic character, It was first seen in the oracle bone inscriptions of the Shang Dynasty. The original meaning is concealment and concealment. The extended meanings include secret place, reconnaissance, subtle and profound, dim and unclear, small, few, decline, and nothing.
2. Phonograms. The shape of the oracle bone inscriptions comes from the sound and the sound. The word "洴" on the right side means "strike", which means pruning. The combination of glyphs means trimming and arranging hair. Some of the gold inscriptions inherit the structure of Jia inscriptions, while others change the province of "洴" into "you" and add the shape of "彳" on the left side.
3. The shape of the characters in the Warring States period has been slightly changed. As for the seal script, the shape of the hair on the head was changed to the "mountain" shape of the oblique strokes, and it was divided into two characters: one character was derived from the "微" in the sound of "彳", and the other character was derived from the oracle bone script. The official script is designated as Congji and Congji, and the shape is changed to "mountain". Modern Chinese regular script is designated as "wei" according to the shape of seal script. In the six books, it is both pictorial and phonetic. The standard word is "微".
2. Expanding knowledge about the evolution of Chinese characters
1. The characters written on tortoise shells and animal bones in the Shang Dynasty are called "oracle bone inscriptions". Oracle bone inscriptions are the earliest relatively mature writing discovered in our country. Today’s Chinese characters evolved from oracle bone inscriptions. The history of our country’s written history also started from the Shang Dynasty.
2. Bronze inscriptions are inscriptions cast on bronze vessels during the Shang and Zhou dynasties. Because it is engraved on the bell and tripod, it is also called Zhongdingwen. The bronze inscriptions have thick and wide strokes, the stipples are round and round, and the posture is graceful. Bronze inscriptions and oracle bone inscriptions belong to the same system of writing, but they are more standardized and neatly structured than oracle bone inscriptions.
3. In the late Western Zhou Dynasty, the bronze inscriptions tended to be linear and the strokes were neat and well-proportioned. This type of font was called Dazhuan. During the Warring States Period, the writing styles of different countries varied greatly.
4. The round strokes of seal script retain the pictographic meaning to a certain extent, but the symbolism is obviously greatly enhanced. Xiaozhuan standardized writing, but it was still very inconvenient to write. Therefore, a simpler font called official script became popular among the people.
5. In the late Han Dynasty, official script evolved into regular script. Regular script can be used as a model for practicing calligraphy, so it is called regular script. There is basically no change in the glyph structure from official script to regular script. The only difference is that the wave-like picking method of official script is changed into a stereotyped hook when writing, making the glyphs more square and straight and making writing easier.