Classical poetry, a genre of China's ancient poetry, also known as classical poetry or archaism, refers to a poetic genre that originated before the Tang Dynasty and was opposite to the modern poetry that appeared in the Tang Dynasty. Its characteristic is that the metrical restrictions are not too strict.
Classical poetry has a fixed verse and a fixed style. All ancient poems are classified according to the number of words in the poem. Four-character ancient poems are referred to as four-character ancient poems for short; Five-character ancient poems are referred to as five-character ancient poems for short; Seven-character ancient poems are referred to as seven-character ancient poems for short. Four-character poems were adopted by people as early as the Book of Songs. But it gradually declined in the Tang Dynasty, and few people wrote it. Therefore, ancient poetry is still expressed in five words and seven words. There are many styles of ancient poetry in China, and there are different opinions on the classification and appellation of ancient poetry. Especially for Yuefu, ancient style and ballad poetry, it is even more confusing. Because, from the formal point of view, Yuefu style and ancient style are both five-character styles, and seven-character ancient poems and ancient songs are all seven-character styles, so it is difficult to distinguish them. But since ancient times, people have unanimously recognized their differences in content, technique and style, and established their names.