Legends of Chinese Characters (except Cangjie Zi Zi Zi)

Fuxi Makes Characters is the earliest of the legends of the origin of Chinese characters.

Fu Xi is the ancient legendary monarch who preceded Huang Di and Shen Nong. The Records of the Grand Historian recorded the following about Fuxi: "At the beginning of his life, he was no different from the beasts. Knowing that there is a mother does not know his father, knowing that there is love but do not know his manners. Lie down is squeaky, up is panting; hungry for food, full of abandonment of the remaining; Ru hair and drink blood, and clothing leather; Tai Hao began to make the net, to tenant to fishing, to support the civilian population, it is said Fuxi. Raising sacrifices for the kitchen, also said the kitchen Xi's." "Tongjian compendium" Fu Xi "painting gossip, make bookmarks". The Records of the Grand Historian also said: "Tai Hao (Fu Xi) virtue and up and down. The sky should be birds and beasts Wen (lines) chapter, the earth should be negative map of the dragon and horse. So look up the image in the sky, look down the law in the ground, in the view of all things appropriate. Begin to draw gossip, gossip has three lines, and therefore heavy, for sixty four, to pass the virtue of God. Make a book and deed to replace the government of the rope."

Legendary Fuxi's territory in the current Huanghuai Valley, from this area remains to this day in ancient paintings and tomb paintings, can be seen everywhere in the ancient legacy of the big bird totem, which is Fuxi's descendants of the logo. This shows that in ancient times, about one million to six thousand years ago, a tribe with a bird as a totem had already emerged in the central and eastern parts of the country, and the "clan" may have been the name of their central clan, which grew into a unified tribal confederation after thousands of years of historical process. The so-called "Fuxi" theory refers to a group of the Fuxi confederacy, the Eastern Barbarians, who began writing during the Longshan culture period (about 7,000 years ago).

The legend of Fuxi's creation of the book and deed shows that in the ancient Fuxi's tribes, the tattoo writing and the so-called pictorial writing and pictorial writing, i.e., the use of ideographic symbols to keep track of things, had already begun.

In China 10,000 to 6,000 years ago, there were many alliances like the Fuxi clan, and the most powerful ones, besides the Shennong clan, were the Shaodian clan and the Youxiong clan. This long period of history is the period of the gradual formation and formal creation of writing. The various tribes of this period were creating their own writing.

Two, Cangjie made characters

Cangjie made characters is the most popular theory of the origin of Chinese characters.

There are two kinds of legends about Cangjie's creation of characters: one says that Cangjie was a record-keeping official in Fuxi's time, and Fuxi made the book deed, and Cangjie was a full-time official who created the characters; the other says that Cangjie was a historian in the time of the Yellow Emperor. Legend has it that Cangjie was a clever man with a four-eyed face, who was able to observe the changes of the sun, moon and stars, and the evolution of mountains, rivers, wind and rain, and who was inspired by the signs of nature, and was able to visualize the shape of things, and to combine them into a single character, thus creating the Chinese character. After the success of Cangjie's creation of Chinese characters, the gods and ghosts were so frightened that they cried out in the darkness of the night, and the heavens were so moved that they sent a rain of grains for him - the "rain of grains" in the twenty-four seasons originates from this.

There are many ancient writings about Cangjie's creation of characters. The Historical Records of the Five Emperors (史记-五帝本纪), which describes Cangjie as the Yellow Emperor's left historian, was commissioned to create the script. The legend of Cangjie's creation of characters is also found in the Book of the Han Dynasty (汉书-艺文志). Yang Xiong and Du Lin respectively wrote Cangjie Xunzao. It is also recorded in "Shuo Wen - Preface" that "Cang Jie, the history of the Yellow Emperor, saw the traces of the hooves of birds and beasts, and knew that the differentiation could be made, and he made the first book deed."

After many deifications and fabrications by literati through the ages, the legend of Cangjie has become more and more specific, and even Cangjie's hometown has multiple locations, including Shiguan Township in Baishui County, Shaanxi Province. There are also three Cangjie tombs in the country: one in Baishui County, Shaanxi Province, one in Dong'a County, Shandong Province (now in Yanggu), and one in the western suburb of Shouguang City, Shandong Province.

How much credibility is there to the legend of Cangjie's creation of characters? Is it true that Chinese characters were created by Cangjie? Most of the scholars who have been studying writing for many generations believe that Chinese characters cannot be created by a single person, but by thousands of Cangjie-style characters **** with the completion of the oracle bones from the many variant characters can also be seen, Chinese characters are by no means created by a person. The reason why Cangjie's name has been passed on to future generations is that he did the work of collecting, organizing and unifying characters. Cangjie was merely a representative figure in the history of character development during the period of official character creation.

There may have been a Cangjie, the left historian of the Yellow Emperor, but the name "Cangjie" was probably given to him by later generations. Primitive man did not have a clear name, the name of the legendary figures of the past, are the descendants according to its characteristics, especially according to his invention and creation of the merits of another name. For example, the "Aristotle's" invented the construction of houses, the "Suiren's" invented the drilling of wood for fire, the "Lieshan's" invented the making of fields in Lieshan, and the "Shennong's" taught the people to farm. The so-called "Zhou Rites" include the "First Pastoral", "First Cooking", "First Divination", "First Witching", "First Witching", "First Farming", and so on. The Zhou Rites call "first shepherd", "first cook", "first diviner", "first witch", "first meaner", "horse ancestor", "field ancestor", "first silkworm", "first teacher", "first food maker" and so on, are also the same nature of the name. From this, it is assumed that "Cangjie" is also likely to be a name of the same nature. Some scholars believe that, from the ancient sound point of view, Qi and Jie are close to each other, and Cangjie may be the meaning of "creating Qi". If this speculation is good, then, the so-called "Cangjie" may be the descendants of the earliest word organizer, the Yellow Emperor's historian of the posthumous name.

The legend of Cangjie and the creation of characters by Cangjie is not entirely plausible, but, from a variety of considerations, it is still consistent with the actual situation, which roughly confirms the age of the origin of characters. The primitive period of word-making is at least 6,000 years ago, and the official word-making movement was in the period of the Yellow Emperor before the Xia Dynasty.