The origin of Chinese characters
According to legend, a long time ago, Cangjie was the emperor’s historian. He had a face like a dragon and four piercing eyes.
He especially likes to observe things around him and around him, and he also likes to use his brain or think about problems. He looked up every day to observe the changes in the stars in the sky, the patterns on the backs of turtles, the colors of bird feathers, and the shapes and images of the undulating mountains and rivers. He often painted the shapes and characteristics of things with his hands. Over time, Ding characters were created. When Cangjie was creating writing, he was afraid that people would patronize his writing. People will be hungry in the future.
Ghosts cry secretly in the dark night, and dragons hide, because they are afraid that words will record their ugly behaviors and tell them to the world, making them infamy for thousands of years.
This is the origin of words. A great Cangjie, I particularly admire him.
History of writing
Chinese writing - the emergence of Chinese characters is well documented in the late Yin and Shang Dynasties around the 14th century BC, when the initial stereotyped writing was formed , namely oracle bone inscriptions. Oracle bone inscriptions are both pictographs and phonetic characters, and there are still some pictographs in Chinese characters that are the same as pictures, which are very vivid.
In the late Western Zhou Dynasty, Chinese characters developed into large seal scripts. The development of large seal script resulted in two characteristics: first, linearization. The uneven thickness of the early lines became even and soft, and the lines they drew with the actual objects were very concise and vivid; second, standardization, the glyph structure tended to be neat, and gradually left the The original form of the picture laid the foundation for the square characters.
Later, Prime Minister Li Si of the Qin Dynasty simplified the large seal script and changed it to small seal script. In addition to simplifying the shape of the large seal script, the small seal script also perfected the lines and standardization. It was almost completely separated from the pictorial characters and became a neat, harmonious and very beautiful basically rectangular block font. However, Xiaozhuan also has its own fundamental shortcomings, that is, its lines are very inconvenient to write with a pen, so almost at the same time, the shape of the official script was stretched to both sides to become a flat square.
By the Han Dynasty, official script had developed to a mature stage, and the legibility and writing speed of Chinese characters had greatly improved. Later, official script evolved into Zhangcao, and then Jincao. In the Tang Dynasty, there was Kuangcao, which expresses the writer's thoughts and expresses his feelings on the pen. Subsequently, regular script (also known as real script), which was a blend of official script and cursive script, became popular in the Tang Dynasty. The printing style we use today evolved from regular script. Between regular script and cursive script is running script, which is smooth in writing and flexible in use. It is said to have been made by Liu Desheng in the Han Dynasty. It has been passed down to this day and is still the font we are accustomed to using in daily writing.
In the Song Dynasty, with the development of printing, woodblock printing was widely used, and Chinese characters were further improved and developed, resulting in a new type of calligraphy - Song Dynasty printing font. After the invention of printing, the engraving knives used for lettering had a profound impact on the shape of Chinese characters, resulting in a printing font that was thin horizontally and thick vertically, eye-catching and easy to read, which was later called Song Dynasty. There were two types of fonts carved at that time: fat and thin, the fat ones imitating Yan style and Liu style, and the thin ones imitating European style and Yu style. Among them, Yan style and Liu style have tall and tall strokes, which already have some characteristics of thin horizontal and thick vertical lines. During the Longqing and Wanli years of the Ming Dynasty, it evolved from the Song style to the Ming style with thin horizontal strokes and thick vertical strokes and square fonts. It turns out that at that time, a kind of Hongwu style with very thin horizontal strokes and particularly thick vertical strokes and flat fonts was popular among the people. This style was used for official title plaques, lanterns, notices, private boundary stones, and god plaques in ancestral halls. font. Later, some engravers imitated the Hongwu calligraphy process and created a skin outline that was neither beautiful nor European. Especially because the strokes of this font are horizontal and vertical, it is really easy to carve. It is different from the four styles of seal script, Li script, Zhen script and Cao script. It is unique and fresh and pleasing to the eye, so it is increasingly used. It has become the main printing font that has been very popular since the 16th century and is still called Song font, also called lead font.
In Chinese characters, various fonts formed in various historical periods have their own distinctive artistic characteristics. For example, seal script is simple and elegant, official script is dynamic and decorative in its quietness, cursive script is fast-moving and compact in structure, regular script is neat and beautiful, running script is easy to read and write, has strong practicality, diverse styles and different personalities.
The evolution of Chinese characters is from pictographic pictures to line symbols, strokes suitable for writing with brushes, and printed fonts that are easy to engrave. Its evolutionary history provides us with rich inspiration for Chinese font design. In text design, if you can give full play to the characteristics and style of various Chinese character fonts, use them skillfully and have unique ideas, you will surely be able to design exquisite works.
When studying Chinese characters, the first question that bears the brunt is how Chinese characters were created, that is, we need to solve the problem of the origin of Chinese characters. Before Oracle discovered it, this problem was difficult to solve. Because to discuss the theory of Chinese character creation, it must be based on the examination and interpretation of the initial shapes and meanings of a large number of Chinese characters. The discovery of oracle bone inscriptions, together with bronze inscriptions, pottery inscriptions, stone drum inscriptions and bamboo slips, etc., has made it possible for the initial forms of many Chinese characters to be revealed, which provides rich and authoritative materials for the study of the emergence of Chinese characters. Therefore, it can be said that with the discovery and research of oracle bone inscriptions, the conditions for solving the major theoretical issue of how Chinese characters came into being have become mature.
According to the author's examination of Oracle Bone Inscriptions, I believe that every word in Oracle Bone Inscriptions is pictographic, a visual depiction of something, and a small part of it still retains a strong pictorial character. , most of the depictions of images have been highly linearized. It can be concluded from this that every oracle bone inscription is a pictographic character, with very few exceptions, such as the words Shang, Zhou, Lu, Jun, Tang and other words added to the mouth and the dots and horizontal lines in some referring words do not have specific images. In addition to meaning, every stroke in a word represents a certain image or a part of an image.
The specific things reflected by oracle bone inscriptions through the use of images come from the social life of the ancients. It includes all aspects of the social life of the ancients, including economic, religious, political, military, customs, and people's views on Natural observation and thinking, etc.
First there was the social life of the ancients, and then the Chinese characters were created based on this. This is how the oracle bone inscriptions were created.
For example, there was the custom of tying ropes to record events, and then the characters Wu and Wu were created based on this.
There was a custom of carving wood as letters, and the characters Xin and Dui were created accordingly.
First there was the custom of removing the kidneys of people and making them slaves, and then there were the words "chen" and "huan".
First, children were given tattoos so that they could obtain a kind of witchcraft to protect them when they grew up. Later, people used tattoos to create righteousness.
First there was the alliance between cutting off the cow's ears and killing the blood, and then there were the Wei and Zhi characters based on this.
First there was the hourglass timer, and then there were the characters Shang and Geng.
First there was the custom of killing the first son to sacrifice to the gods, and then the word Meng came into being.
5. The noon elephant is in the shape of a knotted rope, the Xin and Xiang objects are in the shape of carved wooden letters, the ministers and eunuchs are in the shape of testicles, the civilian elephants are in the shape of needles, the Wei and Zhi elephants are in the shape of bull heads, and the Shang and Geng elephants are in the shape of leaks. The pot is carved in the shape of an arrow, in the shape of Meng Xiangzi entering a vessel filled with water.
Wait like this, don’t worry about it.
There is no doubt that oracle bone inscriptions reflect various aspects of ancient people’s social life in concrete images.
It can be concluded from this that Chinese characters are symbolic records of ancient social activities. Chinese characters are humanistic. Each Chinese character is a pocket-sized version of ancient social customs. Chinese characters contain rich ancient culture. Information, if you decipher Chinese characters, you can restore ancient society; conversely, only by understanding ancient society can you decipher Chinese characters.
Unfortunately, for a long time, many people have not understood these principles and only studied Chinese characters based on the characters. As a result, they have gained little or even drawn wrong conclusions. Therefore, the study of Chinese characters must undergo a methodological revolution, from the traditional character analysis from characters to characters, to the cultural analysis from the social life of ancients to characters. Only in this way can the mystery of Chinese characters and Chinese character culture be unveiled. , truly appreciate the greatness and wonder of Chinese characters.
Chinese characters have undergone changes for more than 6,000 years, and their evolution process is:
Oracle bone script → Bronze script → Xiaozhuan → Official script → Regular script → Running script
(Shang) ( Zhou) (Qin) (Han) (Wei and Jin) Cursive Script
The above seven fonts of "Jiajin Seal, Li, Cao Kaixing" are called "Seven Chinese Characters"
Chinese characters ——The emergence of Chinese characters is well-documented in the late Yin and Shang Dynasties around the 14th century BC. At this time, the initial stereotyped writing, namely oracle bone inscriptions, was formed. Oracle bone inscriptions are both pictographs and phonetic characters, and there are still some pictographs in Chinese characters that are the same as pictures, which are very vivid.
In the late Western Zhou Dynasty, Chinese characters developed into large seal scripts. The development of large seal script resulted in two characteristics: first, linearization. The uneven thickness of the early lines became even and soft, and the lines they drew with the actual objects were very concise and vivid; second, standardization, the glyph structure tended to be neat, and gradually left the The original form of the picture laid the foundation for the square characters.
Later, Prime Minister Li Si of the Qin Dynasty simplified the large seal script and changed it to small seal script. In addition to simplifying the shape of the large seal script, the small seal script also perfected the lines and standardization. It was almost completely separated from the pictorial characters and became a neat, harmonious and very beautiful basically rectangular block font. However, Xiaozhuan also has its own fundamental shortcomings, that is, its lines are very inconvenient to write with a pen, so almost at the same time, the shape of the official script was stretched to both sides to become a flat square.
By the Han Dynasty, official script had developed to a mature stage, and the legibility and writing speed of Chinese characters had greatly improved. Later, official script evolved into Zhangcao, and then Jincao. In the Tang Dynasty, there was Kuangcao, which expresses the writer's thoughts and expresses his feelings on the pen. Subsequently, regular script (also known as real script), which was a blend of official script and cursive script, became popular in the Tang Dynasty. The printing style we use today evolved from regular script. Between regular script and cursive script is running script, which is smooth in writing and flexible in use. It is said to have been made by Liu Desheng in the Han Dynasty. It has been passed down to this day and is still the font we are accustomed to using in daily writing.
In the Song Dynasty, with the development of printing, woodblock printing was widely used, and Chinese characters were further improved and developed, resulting in a new type of calligraphy - Song Dynasty printing font. After the invention of printing, the engraving knives used for lettering had a profound impact on the shape of Chinese characters, resulting in a printing font that was thin horizontally and thick vertically, eye-catching and easy to read, which was later called Song Dynasty. There were two types of fonts carved at that time: fat and thin, the fat ones imitating Yan style and Liu style, and the thin ones imitating European style and Yu style. Among them, Yan style and Liu style have tall and tall strokes, which already have some characteristics of thin horizontal and thick vertical lines.
During the Longqing and Wanli years of the Ming Dynasty, it evolved from the Song style to the Ming style with thin horizontal strokes and thick vertical strokes and square fonts. It turns out that at that time, a kind of Hongwu style with very thin horizontal strokes and particularly thick vertical strokes and flat fonts was popular among the people. This style was used for official title plaques, lanterns, notices, private boundary stones, and the gods and master plaques in ancestral halls. font. Later, some engravers imitated Hongwu style calligraphy and created a skin outline that was neither beautiful nor European. Especially because the strokes of this font are horizontal and vertical, it is indeed easy to carve. It is different from the four styles of seal script, Li, Zhen and Cao. It is unique and fresh and pleasing to the eye, so it is increasingly used. It has become the main printing font that has been very popular since the 16th century and is still called Song font, also called lead font.
In Chinese characters, various fonts formed in various historical periods have their own distinctive artistic characteristics. For example, seal script is simple and elegant, official script is dynamic and decorative in its quietness, cursive script is fast-moving and compact in structure, regular script is neat and beautiful, running script is easy to read and write, has strong practicality, diverse styles and different personalities.
The evolution of Chinese characters is from pictographic pictures to line symbols, strokes adapted to writing with brushes, and printed fonts that are easy to engrave. Its evolutionary history provides us with rich inspiration for Chinese font design. In text design, if you can give full play to the characteristics and style of various Chinese character fonts, use them skillfully and have unique ideas, you will surely be able to design exquisite works.
Since the unification of Qin Shihuang, Chinese characters have gradually embarked on the path of development. Chinese characters in each era have unique national and folk connotations. The history of Chinese characters is deeply engraved everywhere. Showing the wisdom and diligence of the Chinese people. However, some people today know very little about their own languages, and they are still half-hearted about the languages ????and languages ??of other countries. Writing is the soul of the country. In order to understand the changes of the motherland’s writing, the history of the motherland, and the soul of the motherland, we chose this topic.
In the development of Chinese characters, after the Qin Dynasty unified China, Chinese characters were continuously simplified and organized, making Chinese characters gradually standardized. The development of Chinese characters can be roughly divided into four stages of evolution: ancient script, seal script, official script, and regular script. Among them, seal script can be divided into large seal script and small seal script; official script can be divided into Qin Li and Han Li. It can be seen that any new font in history was gradually formed after a long period of evolution. Generally speaking, after the formation of regular script, Chinese characters have basically been finalized (Table 1).
(Table 1: The evolution of Chinese character calligraphy)
1 Oracle bone inscriptions
Before the Qin Dynasty unified writing, Chinese Chinese characters, both from the perspective of font and application, , still confusing. In a broad sense, ancient Chinese writing refers to the writing before the small seal script including the big seal script; in a narrow sense, it refers to the writing before the big seal script in the history of Chinese writing. The concept of classical Chinese in a narrow sense is adopted here. Ancient writing includes oracle bone inscriptions and bronze inscriptions; among them, the former is regarded as the earliest stereotyped writing in China.
Oracle bone writing: written or carved in the late Shang Dynasty, written on tortoise shells and animal bones. Most of the contents are: