One and two Song dynasties and the official seals of the Liaojin Western Xia
Compared with the Han seal, the later generations of the two Song seals have rarely discussed it, and they are rarely used as objects of temporary study. If we start from an aesthetic standpoint, we will find that the artistry of the two Song seals, including the official seals of the Liao, Jin and Western Xia, is really lackluster, and the lack of artistry has made it always in a state of neglect, and even the Yuanming seals who went to the Song Dynasty also believe that the seals of the Tang Dynasty and the Song Dynasty are below the self-reliance and are not worth mentioning. For example, Gan Yang said in the "Seal Collection": "The Song Dynasty and the Tang Dynasty system, the literature is more and more fragmented, it is not patriarchal and ancient, and it is still delicate." It was not until the early Qing Dynasty that The Duke of Qin began to look at the seal of the Song and Yuan dialectically, and he once said: "Descending to the Song and Yuan, the law is no longer ancient." For example, Songxue Zhuwen is also mellow and interesting, MiYuanzhang is printed smoothly and has bones, and Plum Blossom Dao is human and reasonable, although it is not quaint, most of them are crowned with upright titles, and they do not lose the meaning of the six books. "Therefore, the seals of the two Song Dynasties include the seals of Liao, Jin, and Western Xia, and as a kind of historical existence, it is necessary for us to introduce and sort out."
(1) Characteristics of the official seals of the two Song Dynasties
Generally speaking, the official seals of the two Song Dynasties mainly have the following characteristics:
Northern Song Dynasty Pingding County Seal
Southern Song Dynasty Yizhou under the jurisdiction of the Yudu Li County Seal
First, the size of the printing surface is getting larger and larger, the length of the printing surface is about 45 mm to 55 mm, and the outer frame of the printed text is getting wider and wider. In the early Northern Song Dynasty, the official seal was basically similar to the thickness of the printing edge, and the printing edge was gradually widened, reaching 2 mm to 3 mm. For example, the Northern Song Dynasty "Pingding County Seal" and the Southern Song Dynasty "Yizhou GuanZhi Du Li County Seal".
Southern Song Dynasty Xuanfu Disposal Envoy Division accompanied by the Military Audit Division Seal
Second, since the Beginning of the Northern Song Dynasty, the official seal font has mostly adopted the "Nine Stacked Seal". "Nine stacks" does not really refer to the number of stroke twists, in fact, it was not until the official seal twists of the Ming Dynasty further increased that the number of nine stacks was reached. The influence of the "stacked seal" of the official seal of the Song Dynasty on the seals of later generations is not only in the text, this deliberate folding of the stroke of the printing processing method, but also caused the official seal since the Song and Yuan Dynasties to be dull and dull. For example, in the Southern Song Dynasty, "Xuanfu Disposal envoys accompany the military audit division seal" had this drawback.
Third, after the middle of the Northern Song Dynasty, the back section was also engraved with the name of "Shaofu Supervisor" (the institution that issued the casting) while engraving the year, month and day, while the official seal of the Southern Song Dynasty was transferred to the wensiyuan, and the "shaofu supervisor" was replaced by the "Wensiyuan" paragraph. The date and month of the production of the song dynasty official seal back chisel seal and the production unit can be used as a logo to identify the official seal of the Song Dynasty.
Northern Song Dynasty Xiao Meng's fourth command of the fifth capital Zhu Ji
Fourth, in addition to the official seal of the Song Dynasty, there are also called "Ji" and "Zhu Ji", and the indian language also occasionally has a script font, which shows that the script commonly used by the people at that time has affected the production of some official seals. For example, in the Northern Song Dynasty, "Xiao Meng's fourth command of the fifth capital Zhu Ji".
(2) Characteristics of the official seal of the Liaojin Western Xia
During the two Song dynasties, there were regimes established by ethnic minorities at the same time, and their official seal systems were all influenced by the official seal system of the two Song Dynasties to varying degrees, and of course, they also had their own characteristics.
1. Liaoguan Seal
Liaoguanyin Khitan language
Liao (916-1125) was a regime established by the Khitans, and the official seal was in Han and Khitan scripts, and the Khitan script was divided into Khitan big characters and Khitan small characters. The edges of the printing surface are all under 55 mm long. The Khitan script was obtained in the fifth year (920) of the Liao Divine Book, which was obtained according to the half of the Chinese character Lishu, and no one has known it since the Ming and Qing dynasties, and has become a real "absolute learning".
2. Golden Official Seal
Jin Guanyin Zhao Wangfu Literary Seal
Jin (1115-1234) was founded by the Jurchens and fought against the Southern Song Dynasty and western Xia for more than a hundred years. The length of the gold seal surface is mostly about 70 mm, or even as large as 130 mm. Generally, the left side of the seal back is engraved with the name of the printing agency, such as the Shaofu Supervisor, the Ceremonial Department, the Shangshu Ceremonial Department, the Palace Ceremonial Department, etc., the right side is engraved with the date and month of the printing, and the side of the printing table is engraved with the name of the text or the number of the seal.
3. Official seal of Western Xia
Liaoguan Seal Anzhou Ayajinyuan Chronicle
The Western Xia (1038-1227) was a regime established by the Dangxiang clan, whose writing absorbed some of the characteristics of Chinese character strokes. The western Xia official seal is mostly between 45 mm and 70 mm long, and the printed text is mostly full of white text, the strokes are extremely thick, and the border is used. In addition to the chronology, the back of the seal is also engraved with the user's name. The seal of the Western Xia official seal ranges from two characters to six characters, of which the two characters of "chief" are the most printed, accounting for 90% of the existing Western Xia official seals. (Li Gangtian and Ma Shida, eds., Seal Engraving, pp. 345-347, Jiangsu Education Press, 2009)
2. The Two Song Dynasties and the Private Seals of the Liaojin Western Xia
Xuanhe Seven Seals Xuanhe
Xuanhe Seven Seals Double Dragon (Fang)
The private seals of the Two Song Dynasties can be examined through two ways: one is the traces of the seals retained on the works of calligraphy and painting passed down from generation to generation; the other is the actual seals unearthed or discovered.
Xuanhe Seven Seals Zhenghe
Xuanhe Seven Seals Imperial Palace
Xuanhe Seven Seals Double Dragon (Circle)
Western Xia official seal □ prefecture fierce official seal
Chief of the Western Xia Official Seal
The style of literati good printing has tended to be popular since the beginning of the Tang Dynasty and the Two Song Dynasties, but there is no basic French style and style to speak of, whether it is in the aspect of collecting Tibetan printing or in the printing of calligraphy and painting, and the level of literati printing in this period is generally poor. Even so, these seals constitute valuable material for us to discuss the art of seal engraving in the Song and Yuan dynasties. For example, the most famous "Xuanhe Seven Seals" of Emperor Huizong of the Song Dynasty appeared in a large number of ancient calligraphy and painting works. This kind of calligraphy and painting collection style from top to bottom, has a great impact on the folk, and even forms a situation of generational transmission, such as Su Yijian - Su Qi - Su Shunyuan, Su Shunqin - Su Li, Su Bi, Su Ji, a door of four generations, all elegant collection, in his family collection of calligraphy and paintings often have "descendants of Xu Guo", "descendants of Pei Liuxiang", "ShunQin", "Wuxiang Zhiji", "four generations of Xiangyin" and other seals. This change in the use of seals caused by the collection of calligraphy and painting constitutes an important part of the transformation of seals from practicality to artistry.
Su's Collection Seal Four generations of phase seals
Song private seal
Song private printing is suitable
Song Private Seal Zhang Shi An Dao
Song Private Seal Lu □
The interest of the Song Dynasty literati in seals can also be proved by the physical seals unearthed. There are few excavated materials from private seals in the Song Dynasty, such as the Northern Song Dynasty "Zhang Shi Andao" (copper seal) "Suitable" (copper seal), the Southern Song Dynasty "Lu □" (jade seal), "Zhao" (wooden seal), "Yefu, Zhang Tongzhi seal" (copper seal) and so on. Among them, Zhu Wenduo was influenced by the Sui and Tang seals, and the white seals, especially the "Seal of Zhang Tong", seemed to convey the atmosphere of the Han and Wei seals intentionally or unintentionally. The users of these seals seem to be mainly literati, of which "suitable" is the seal of Su Shi's nephew Su Shi; Zhang Tong of "Zhang Tong's Seal" is said to be the son of the Southern Song Dynasty poet Zhang Xiaoxiang, and the edge of the seal is very distinctive, the seal book "Ten has two months, ten has four days, and the same life as Yu, the fate of the same".
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