The so-called signature painting of the ancients, also known as "pledge", "flower pledge", "grass pledge", etc., is to leave unique certificates on official documents and contracts with words, seals and fingerprints.
The Southern Song Dynasty scholar Zhou Mi recorded in the book "Miscellaneous Knowledge of Decoction": "The ancient people's pledge characters, called the flower oshi seal, were slightly flowered by name. ”
"Slightly flowered" here means to turn one's name or character or number into a unique symbol that resembles both words and patterns in cursive form.
This unique symbol is not easy to imitate, has a strong anti-counterfeiting, and can be used as a private note to win the letter.
The earliest origin of the "Oshi character" originated in the Cao Wei period of the Three Kingdoms.
The "Mo Xue" records: "Xingshu, Zheng Xiao is also called, and Zhong Xuan is called 'Xingbao Shu'. ”
Zhong Xuan pioneered the "Pledge Character" with the Xingshu, also known as the "Xingbao Book".
During the Tang Dynasty, cursive writing began to be popular, many literati and inkers liked to sign cursive names at the end of the article, or the blank space of the calligraphy and painting, because of the pursuit of personality, many signatures are very fancy, so it is also called "flower charge", "painting charge", and today's art signature is very similar.
Tang Dynasty officials did not advocate the use of "flower pledge" signatures, for example, Tang Taizong Li Shimin strictly forbade ministers to sign in the form of "flower pledges" on the song.
The Treatise on the Rest of the Eastern View records that Emperor Taizong of Tang "ordered his subjects to play and appoint true grass, but the name was not grass." Later generations then took the name of the grass as a flower charge. ”
In the Song Dynasty, the "Flower Pledge" was no longer signed by the name, but the word, number, or unique text, highlighting the personality charm, so it was renamed "Bet Character", and gradually formed a custom, which was accepted and used by officials and the people.
During the Song Dynasty, official documents must have "pledge characters", which is more important than signing names, otherwise they are considered invalid official documents.
During the Southern Song Dynasty, when emperor Xiaozong required the "pledge character", it was necessary to sign the name to take effect. If an official document needs to be signed by multiple officials to be valid, the bottom "pledge" is often the highest-ranking official.
"Pledge characters" can show personality charm, not only the people are happy to accept, ministers, emperors also like to use this way of signing.
The signature of the Tang Dynasty official Wei Zhi was written in cursive, and the character "陟" was written as "grass law implicated and very beautiful", calling itself "five clouds".
Emperor Huizong of the Song Dynasty's "Flower Charge" is very famous in history, known as the "Absolute Charge", some people think that it is a shorthand for "one person under the heavens", and some people speculate that it is a shorthand for "Tianshui".
Emperor Huizong of Song seemed to be playing hide-and-seek with the people of the world, and no one could guess what his "flower charge" was.
If it is really the meaning of "one person under the heavens", then these few words have become proverbs, Jin Bing invaded the south, and Zhao Yi indeed became a prisoner of Tianzi No. 1.
The "Shilin Yan Language" records that wang Anshi, the chancellor of the Northern Song Dynasty, initiated the document "circle reading", "Tang people bet on the characters, cursive writing its name is a private note." Song Wang Anshi "bet on the word 'stone', the first horizontal painting, the left pin is a circle. The public is anxious, the circle is not round, often nest plaque, and the horizontal painting is more belted. ”
When Wang Anshi signed the word "stone", the glyph was like a horizontal circle.
Wang Anshi is a man with an anxious personality, and the circle is often not drawn roundly, very flat, like the word "anti", and like the word "evil", which is often teased by colleagues.
After the fall of the Ming Dynasty, Zhu Quan, the ninth grandson of Zhu Quan, the seventeenth son of The Ming Emperor Zhu Yuanzhang, cut his hair and became a monk, and in order to commemorate his homeland, his calligraphy and painting "Oshizi" is the day of the martyrdom of the Chongzhen Emperor "March 19th".
Through painting, Zhu Yun dispelled the resentment of the destruction of the country and the death of the family, and his other "pledge character", "Bada Shanren", the four words are relatively close, both like "laughter" and "crying".