The impact of oracle bone inscriptions on Chinese people is self-evident. First of all, it has gone through the development of different fonts such as bronze inscriptions, seal script, official script, and regular script, and it has retained the most basic methods of glyphs, pronunciations, and meanings. It is the source of Chinese characters. Secondly, there are rich records in oracle bone inscriptions, which fully reflect the scientific and cultural level of people during the Yin and Shang Dynasties. In addition, some speculations and fortune-telling activities recorded in oracle bone inscriptions can also reflect the thinking and logical reasoning abilities of the Yin people. Finally, the unity of the content (text) and form (bone fragments) of oracle bone inscriptions is a beautiful presentation and has a profound impact on Chinese calligraphy.
Oracle bone inscriptions are an ancient Chinese writing, also known as "deeds", "oracle bone inscriptions", "Yinxu writing" or "tortoise shell and animal bone inscriptions". It is the earliest mature Chinese character we can see. It mainly refers to the characters inscribed on tortoise shells or animal bones used by the royal family in the late Shang Dynasty to tell fortunes and record events. It is one of the earliest known systematic Shang Dynasty characters in China and East Asia. kind of carrier.
It was first found by the villagers of Xiaotun Village in Anyang, Henan Province. At that time, they did not know that it was an ancient relic and only used it as a medicinal "dragon bone" to cure all diseases. The animal bones were ground into powder, which wasted many extremely valuable cultural relics. Later, Wang Yirong, an official and epigrapher of the late Qing Dynasty, discovered the location of the oracle bone inscriptions on oracle bones from Anyang, Henan, when he was treating illness in the 25th year of Guangxu (1899). Over the past 100 years, more than 154,600 oracle bones have been unearthed locally through archaeological excavations and other means. In addition, oracle bone inscriptions also appeared in other areas of Henan and Shaanxi, dating from the late Shang Dynasty (about 1300 BC) to the Spring and Autumn Period.
Oracle bone inscriptions have a symmetrical and stable pattern. It has the three elements of calligraphy, namely the use of pen, the formation of characters, and the composition of the calligraphy. Judging from the number and structure of fonts, Oracle has developed into a more rigorous system of writing. The "six books" principle of Chinese characters is reflected in oracle bone inscriptions. However, the traces of original pictorial characters are still relatively obvious, and the pictographic meaning is also relatively obvious.