History of Oracle Bone Script

Oracle bone script mainly refers to the Yinxu Oracle Bone Script, also known as "Yinxu Script", "Wang Batan" and "Yin Qi", which is a script engraved on tortoise shells and animal bones during the Yin and Shang dynasties.It was discovered at the site of the capital city of Yin in the late 19th century by Xiaotun in present-day Anyang, Henan Province, inheriting the method of making pottery script. It was discovered at the site of the capital city of the Yin dynasty in Xiaotun, present-day Anyang, Henan Province, and inherited the method of creating characters from the Tao script. It is a script engraved (or written) on tortoise shell and animal bones by the royal family of China in the late Shang Dynasty (14th to 11th centuries BC) for the purpose of divination and record-keeping. It is one of the more complete systems of ancient writing found in China. Oracle in 1898 for the antique business, goldsmiths identified, followed by large-scale excavations in Yinxu (Henan Anyang Xiaotun Village), a large number of tortoise shells and animal bones have been unearthed, coupled with sporadic collection elsewhere, so far has been collected more than 100,000 pieces, of which the longest single article up to more than a hundred words, can be seen in the embryo of the application of the text. (Excerpted from "Applied Writing" Monthly Issue 3, 1992, "the prototype of the application of the text - Oracle Bone")

In the total *** more than 100,000 pieces of worded oracle bone, containing more than 5,000 different text graphics, of which has been recognized about 1,000 words.

The oracle bones contain about 27% of the graphic characters, which shows that the oracle bones were already a fairly mature writing system. Several pieces of animal bones engraved with graphic symbols (file photo)

Oracle bone script is an ancient Chinese script that is considered to be an early form of modern Chinese characters, sometimes considered one of the calligraphic styles of Chinese characters, and one of the oldest surviving mature scripts in China. Oracle bone script is also known as qiwen, tortoise shell script or tortoise shell and animal bone script. Oracle bone inscriptions are a very important source of ancient Chinese characters. Most of the oracle bone inscriptions were found in Yinxu. Yinxu is a famous site of the Yin and Shang Dynasties, covering Xiaotun Village, Huayuanzhuang and Houjiazhuang in northwest Anyang City, Henan Province. It was once the site of the capital city of the central dynasty of the late Yin and Shang dynasties, hence the name Yinxu. These oracle bones are basically divination records of the rulers of the Shang dynasty. The rulers of the Shang Dynasty were very superstitious, for example, whether there would be a disaster within ten days, whether it would rain, whether there would be a good crop, whether there would be a victory or not in war, which sacrifices should be made to which ghosts and gods, and even fertility, diseases, dreams and so on, all of which were subjected to divination to understand the will of the ghosts and gods and the good or bad fortune of things. The materials used for divination were mainly the belly and back armor of the tortoise and the scapula of the ox. Usually, some small pits were dug or drilled on the back of the bones to be used for divination, which were called "drill chisels" by oracle boneologists. When divination on these small pits on the heating is the surface of the bone to produce cracks. This kind of crack is called "sign". The oracle bone character for divination, "Bu", looks like a sign. People engaged in divination judged good or bad fortune according to the various shapes of the omen. From the oracle bones of the Yin and Shang Dynasties, it seems that the Chinese characters at that time had already developed into a complete and Chinese writing system. In the discovered oracle bones of Yinxu, the number of single characters has reached about 4000. Among them, there are a large number of referential characters, pictograms and ideograms, as well as a large number of morphosyntactic characters. There is a huge difference in appearance between these characters and the ones we use now. But from the point of view of the method of constructing characters, the two are basically the same.

There are about 150,000 oracle bones and more than 4,500 single characters found. The content of these oracle bones is extremely rich, involving many aspects of social life in the Shang Dynasty, including not only political, military, cultural, social customs, and involves astronomy, calendar, medicine and other science and technology. From the oracle bone inscriptions have been recognized about 1500 single words, it has already had "pictograms, will be, form and sound, refers to the matter, turn note, false borrowing" of the word-making method, showing the unique charm of the Chinese characters. Chinese documents from the Shang Dynasty and the early Western Zhou Dynasty (about 16th to 10th centuries B.C.) were written on tortoise shells and animal bones. It is the earliest known form of Chinese literature. Carved on the armor, bone writing was earlier known as qiwen, oracle bone inscriptions, divination, tortoise version of the text, the Yinxu text, etc., is now commonly known as oracle bone writing. Shang and Zhou emperors due to superstition, all things have to use the tortoise shell (to the tortoise abdominal armor is common) or animal bone (to the cattle shoulder blade is common) for divination, and then the divination of the relevant things (such as the time of divination, the diviner, the contents of the occupation of the question, depending on the results of the omen, the verification of the situation, etc.) engraved in the oracle bone, and as an archive of the royal historians by the preservation of the archives (see the file of the oracle bone). In addition to divination inscriptions, there are also a small number of record inscriptions in the oracle bone inscriptions. The contents of the oracle bone inscriptions are related to astronomy, calendar, meteorology, geography, square country, lineage, family, characters, officials, conquests, punishment and prison, agriculture, animal husbandry, hunting, transportation, religion, rituals, diseases, fertility, disasters and so on, which are extremely precious first-hand information for the study of the social history, culture and language and writing in ancient China, especially in the Shang Dynasty.

From the point of view of the number of fonts and the way they were structured, the oracle bone inscriptions had already been developed into a text with a more rigorous system. The principle of "six books" of Chinese characters is reflected in the oracle bones. However, the traces of the original pictorial script are still relatively obvious. Its main features:

(1) In the construction of words, some pictographs only focus on highlighting the characteristics of physical objects, while the number of strokes, positive and negative backward and forward are not unified.

(2) Some of the oracle-bone inscriptions require only that the meanings of the radicals are clear when they are combined, but not that they are fixed. Therefore, there are many different characters in the oracle bone inscriptions, some of which can have more than ten or even dozens of writing styles.

(3) The form of the oracle bone inscriptions, often to represent the physical object of the complexity of the size of the decision, some of the word can take up a few words on the position, but also can have long, there are short.

(4) Because the word is carved with a knife on the harder animal bone, so the strokes are thin, square strokes mostly.

Because the oracle bone is carved with a knife, and the knife has a sharp and blunt, the bone has a fine and thick, hard and soft, so the carving of the strokes vary in thickness, and even some of them are as thin as a hair, and the connection of the strokes and peeling, thick and heavy. Structure, length and size are not certain, or sparse, intricate; or dense layers of very neat and solemn, so it can show a simple and colorful infinite interest.

Oracle, although the size of the knot, intricate changes, but has a symmetrical, stable pattern. So some people think that Chinese calligraphy, strictly speaking, is the beginning of the oracle bones, because the oracle bones have been prepared for the three elements of calligraphy, that is, the pen, the word, chapter.

The oracle bone inscriptions, named after the turtle shells and animal bones on which they were engraved, were the earliest calligraphic handwriting handed down by the Yin and Shang Dynasties; the contents of which were the divinations of the two hundred and seventy-year period from the time of Pan Geng's relocation to Yin to the time of King Zhou, and the earliest calligraphic handwriting of the period. Yin and Shang had three main characteristics, namely, belief in history, drinking and respect for ghosts and gods; because of this, these tortoise shells, which determined many things such as fishing, conquest and agriculture, were able to see the light of day in the later generations, and have become an important source of information for the study of Chinese writing.

During the Shang Dynasty, there was already a fine brush and ink, and the style of writing was carved by the qi, which was thin and sharp, with the interest of the blade. It was influenced by the prevalence and decline of the literary style, which can be divided into five phases, which are described below.

The turtle armor used for divination by King Wuding of the 殷王武丁 I. The majestic period:

From Pan Geng to Wuding, about one hundred years ago, under the influence of Wuding's heyday, the calligraphy style was grand and majestic, which was the ultimate in oracle-bone calligraphy. Generally speaking, the starting brush is rounded, the closing brush is pointed, and straight and curved, full of changes, regardless of fat and thin, all very strong.

Second, the period of caution:

Since Zu Geng to Zu A, about forty years. Both can be regarded as a virtuous ruler, this period of calligraphy is only prudent, largely inherited the style of the previous period, abide by the rules, very few new creations, but not as strong as the first bold breath.

Third, the decadent period:

Since the GG Xin to Kang Ding, about fourteen years. This period can be said to be the Yin dynasty style of writing in the fall, although there are still a lot of neat style, but the paragraphs of the wrong mixed, has not been so regular, and some childish, chaotic, coupled with the wrong word is not uncommon.

Fourth, strong craggy period:

Since Wu Yi to Wen Wu Ding, about seventeen years. Wen Wu Ding was keen to restore the ancient, trying to restore the majesty of the Wuding era, the calligraphy style has turned into a strong and powerful, showing the weather of the Middle Ages. In the more slender strokes, with a very strong style.

Fifth, the period of rigor:

From Emperor B to Emperor Xin, about eighty-nine years. Calligraphic style tends to be rigorous, and the second period is slightly similar; longer, more rigorous than the, no decadent disease, but also lack of majestic posture. The thin handwriting on the oracle bones is also influenced by the knife carving.

Divination commonly used "yes" or "no" engraved on both sides of the central longitudinal line of the tortoise shell, from this line to the left and right writing, so both sides of the symmetry and harmony, with the symmetry of the beauty of the line. And after the carving, the size of the characters were filled with ink and vermilion, or the front and back filled with vermilion ink, more profound artistic meaning, which is a miracle in the history of calligraphy.

Most of the content of the oracle is the record of divination of the royal family of the Shang Dynasty. The people of the Shang Dynasty were superstitious about ghosts and gods, and they had to be divined in all matters, some of which were the weather, some of which were agricultural harvests, and some of which were asking about illnesses, seeking children, and hunting, fighting, sacrificing, and other major events, which were even more important for the need to be divined! Therefore, the content of the oracle bone inscriptions can be a brief understanding of the life of the Shang Dynasty, but also can learn the development of the history of the Shang Dynasty.

Oracle Calligraphy

King Wuyi of 殷王武乙贞问祭祀先王的占卜用牛肩胛骨 Anyang Yin ruins oracle bone inscriptions are the earliest known system of writing in China, and also a more mature script. The ancient writing of the points, horizontal and horizontal, sparse and dense structure, with today's eyes to see, indeed, the beginning of the use of the brush, style, chapter and other essentials of calligraphy, nurturing the beauty of the art of calligraphy, it is worth appreciating and savoring. In terms of oracle bones, Guo Moruo published in 1937 in the preface to the "Yin Deeds Compendium," the calligraphy embodied very appreciated: "Divination Deeds in the tortoise bone, the Deeds of the essence of the word of the beauty, each of us thousands of years of the future generation of the people to be mesmerized. Text style and due to different people because of the world, for the most part, Wuding's world, the word more majestic, Di B's world, Wen Xian Xiuli. And the line of sparse, word structure, back and forth according to, well organized ...... enough to know the existing deed, the real generation of law, and the book of the deed of the person, is the Yin Shi Zhong Wang Yan Liu also."

"Zhong Wang Yan Liu" refers to the ancient four great calligraphers. The "Zhong Wang Yan Liu" of the Yin Dynasty were the historians who wrote and engraved the divinations. It was they who left a wealth of historical materials for future generations, as well as a precious copy of ancient calligraphy. If the form of oracle bone inscriptions for a cursory glance, will find that the early font is large, like Luo Zhenyu compiled "Yin virtual book Deeds of the essence of" included in many of the Wuding period of divination, very atmospheric, eye-catching; to the end of the Shang Di B, Di Xin era, the word has become a small and trivial; as for the Western Zhou oracle bone inscriptions are more fine as corn hair.

The oracle bone style type: one is strong and majestic type; two is beautiful and light type; three is neat and regular type; four is sparse and clear type; five is rich and ancient type. In short, although the oracle bone is carved out of the text, but full of penmanship, a hundred mixed, or bone frame open, with the interest of free; or fine silk show, with the hairpin of the frame, the word between the lines, more than the beauty of calligraphy.

The so-called "oracle bone calligraphy", roughly has two meanings. First, it refers to the Shang Zhou oracle bone font structure, calligraphic characteristics of the ancestor, to be copied neatly into the calligraphic works. This kind of work can be set according to the need for ancient characters to combine for a new sentence. The content is new, but the characters are as elegant as those of the Yin people 3,000 years ago. But the oracle bones total *** only two thousand words, of which there are still a lot of not yet released strange words (especially names of people and places), not a lot of real use. Therefore, once encountered the oracle bone in the word, and written couplets, inscriptions and can not be replaced, you have to carry out the side split zero, their own splicing; and then spelled out, we must go to the Jinwen and other ancient texts to ask for help. The first person to carry out this creation was Luo Zhenyu, who, in 1921, in addition to his research, wrote oracle bone inscriptions into couplets with a brush, and published the "Collection of Yinxu Script Couplets". He was followed by Zhang Yu, Gao Dexin, and Wang Jilie, who also followed suit. Some predecessors in paleography, such as Dong Zuobin, Shang Chengzuo, Tang Lan, Yu Shenwu, etc., also specialized in oracle bone calligraphy, which is the true meaning of oracle bone calligraphy works. Another layer of meaning refers to the modern calligraphy works that draw on the characteristics of oracle bone inscriptions and create their own. They regard the oracle bone script as a kind of inspiration, just a little revelation in artistic creation, not in the pursuit of "resemblance". Therefore, they do not write strictly according to the calligraphic characteristics of the oracle bone script, but may have synthesized the characteristics of various ancient scripts, such as the oracle bone script, the golden script, and the Warring States script, and created their works. This kind of calligraphy is related to the study of ancient scripts, but it is not a step in the same direction.