Notes can be roughly divided into ghosts and gods, historical anecdotes and textual research and syndrome differentiation according to their contents. The notes of ghosts and immortals in Wei and Jin Dynasties were very popular and were the mainstream of notes at that time. Famous ones are Zhang Hua's Natural History and Gan Bao's Searching for God. Historical anecdote notes mainly record anecdotes, people's feelings and customs, anecdotes of people, interesting stories of mountains and rivers, etc. , such as the story of Sui and Tang Dynasties in the Tang Dynasty and the story of Surabaya in the Song Dynasty. Textual research and dialectical notes developed uniquely in the Tang Dynasty. Textual research flourished during Qianlong and Jiaqing years in Qing Dynasty, and such notes increased even more. Such as Meng Qian Bitan in the Song Dynasty and Rilu in the Qing Dynasty. Although most of the notes are trivial fragments, they are more vivid and true than the official records, and many of them are not available in the official history. The notes also recorded some untrue rumors and lax review. In addition, such as copying from each other, relishing absurd anecdotes and promoting feudal superstitions. , also can be seen everywhere.
The official use of annotations as a book title began in the Northern Song Dynasty and the Song Dynasty, and there are three volumes of annotations. Its origin is quite early, and early notes are often classified as "novels". Ban Gu wrote Han Shu, and listed 15 novels and 1380 novels in Literature and Art Annals, all of which are called novels. Amin Hu Yinglin further divided it into six categories: strange stories, legends, miscellaneous notes, talks, arguments and admonitions. Most of the novels referred to by Ban Hu belong to the category of notes. As a special book genre, notes began in Wei and Jin Dynasties, and became more popular in Ming and Qing Dynasties after the rapid development of Tang and Song Dynasties.
The notes of ghosts and immortals in Wei and Jin Dynasties were very popular and were the mainstream of notes at that time. Famous ones are Zhang Hua's Natural History and Gambao's Searching for the Gods. Later, Youyang Zawen in the Tang Dynasty, Shenji by Xu Xuan in the Song Dynasty, Jian Yizhi by Hong Mai and Yuewei Caotang Notes by Ji Yun in the Qing Dynasty all belong to this category.