Among the most popular languages in the world, the number of people who speak Chinese is the largest. Chinese characters originated in Chinese. In today's daily life, we use only six or seven thousand Chinese characters.
When someone counts the thirteen sutras, the total number of words adds up to 589283 words. The number of words is 6544 words.
Chinese characters have undergone many changes since the oracle bone. According to historical facts, these changes can be roughly divided into two main categories: reform and natural rheology.
Chinese character reform refers to the process of people consciously and actively governing Chinese characters, and the natural flow of Chinese characters refers to the natural change process of Chinese characters.
The reform of Chinese characters is generally discontinuous, drastic, and short-term; the natural flow of Chinese characters is continuous, slow, and long-term.
1. Oracle
The oracle bone was first found by villagers in Xiaotun Village, Anyang, Henan. It is an ancient Chinese script, also known as "Qiwen", "Oracle Bone Bu ci", "Yin Xu Script" or "Tortoise Shell Beast Bone Script". It is the earliest mature Chinese character that we can see at present, mainly referring to the script used by the royal family in the late Shang Dynasty of China to divination and inscribed on tortoise shells or animal bones.
2. Jin Wen
Refers to the inscription cast on the bronzes of the Yin Shang and Zhou Dynasties, also known as the Zhong Ding Wen. The Shang Zhou is the age of bronze. The age of jin wen application, from the end of the Shang Dynasty to the qin extinction of the Six Kingdoms, about 800 years. The number of words in jinwen, according to Rong Geng's "Jinwen Compilation", totals 3722, of which 2420 can be recognized.
3. Great Seal
The Great Seal was a commonly used font in the late Western Zhou Dynasty, and is said to have been created by Boyi of the Xia Dynasty.
4. Small seal
XiaoZhuan ( ) was the policy of "writing the same text, the same track as the car" after Qin Shi Huang unified the Six Kingdoms (221 BC), and the policy of unifying weights and measures was carried out by The Minister of Qi, Li Si, who was responsible for simplifying and creating a unified form of Chinese character writing. It was popular from the Qin Dynasty until the end of the Western Han Dynasty, and was gradually replaced by Lishu.
5. Letter of Affiliation
Lishu was founded in the Qin Dynasty, the legend of Cheng Mi zuoli, Han Li reached its peak in the Eastern Han Dynasty, inheriting the tradition of seal calligraphy, opening up the Wei and Jin dynasties, the Southern and Northern Dynasties, which has a great influence on the calligraphy of later generations, and the calligraphy circle is known as "Han Li Tang Kai".
6. Cursive Writing It was formed in the Han Dynasty and evolved on the basis of Lishu for the sake of writing simplicity. As Li Zhimin said: "Approaching the pool, considering reason, teaching things, gaining the heart, understanding the elephant, and then beginning to enter the wonderful realm of cursive writing."
7. Letters
The book "Ci Hai" explains that it is "square in shape, straight in strokes, and can be used as a model". This kind of Chinese character font is correct, which is the modern common Chinese character handwriting orthography. Italic script is the most popular style of writing in China's feudal society from the Northern and Southern Wei to the Jin and Tang Dynasties.
8. Writing
Xingshu is a type of writing between calligraphy and cursive writing, which appeared around the end of the Eastern Han Dynasty. Those who have more cursive methods are called "xingkai", and those who have more cursive methods than cursive methods are called "xingcao".
The practicality and artistry of the writing are high, while the script is a text symbol, the practicality is high and the kung fu; in comparison, cursive is highly artistic, but the practicality is relatively insufficient.
Chinese characters are morpheme scripts, and the total number is very large. How many characters are there in total in Chinese characters? So far, I am afraid that no one has been able to answer very precise figures. But the development of Chinese characters is from complex to simple. Therefore, it is necessary to practice calligraphy and quietly experience the unique charm of Chinese characters.