Seal script, also known as seal script, can be divided into two categories: big seal script and small seal script.
"Da Zhuan" means "Xiao Zhuan", which was a popular font in Qin before Qin unified the characters. Xu Shen's "great biography" refers to "Wang Xuan's surname said that he wrote fifteen great biographies". All the books below Wei and Jin dynasties have been lost. Today, his works are scattered in Shuo Wen Jie Zi and various Zhong Ding Yi wares collected by later generations.
Biography was formed on the basis of Biography of Teachers. During the Warring States period, the situation of "deformed figures" was formed due to the separatist regime of governors. In 22 1 BC, Qin Shihuang unified the six countries and established the first centralized empire in the history of China. A high degree of political unity inevitably requires the unity of culture and writing. Therefore, "Qin Shihuang is the first emperor in the world, and Prime Minister Lisi plays with him instead of cooperating with Qin Wen." Our company wrote Cang Xie, CZ ordered Zhao Gao to write Love Calendar, and a surname ordered Hu Wujing to write erudition, all of which were based on the big seal of history books, or rather preserved, so-called small seal. "Li Si, Zhao Gao, Hu Wujing and others are active participants and makers of this unified text.
Compared with Da Zhuan, Xiao Zhuan's style is simplified, but the number of words is increasing, which is the requirement of the times. The changes in writing from Oracle Bone Inscriptions, bronze inscriptions to Dazhuan and from Dazhuan to Xiaozhuan are of epoch-making significance and occupy an important position in the history of writing in China.
Today's writing stage
official script
Official script originated on weekends. 1980, two wooden slips were unearthed from Qin Tomb in Haojiaping, Qingchuan County, Sichuan Province, with ink calligraphy on them, and the font was quite different from that of Dazhuan. Its distinctive features are simple style and rounded strokes. Moreover, the glyph is not a rectangle like seal script, but a flat square. The thickness of the brush is not as uniform as that of the seal script, but it tends to be "swallowtail silkworm head", which can be regarded as the abuse of official script, and it is the font for the transition from seal script to official script.
There are different opinions about the origin of the name of official script. Han Shu's literature and art: "It's time to be an official script, starting with the troubles in the official prison, and then saving Yi and applying it to the official." In other words, it is called "official script" because it is applied to official script. On the other hand, he also said that Cheng Miao was an official jailer, offended Yunyang, increased or decreased the big seal, and removed its complexity, which was the suggestion. Therefore, it is called official script.
As for Cheng Miao's theory of creating servants, it has been quite popular since ancient times. However, the formation of official script is a gradual process. As mentioned earlier, during the Warring States period, some characters had the style of official script. It is the general trend of writing to simplify the official script. It should be said that it was the vast number of Chinese characters users who created the official script, and Cheng Miao may have sorted out and standardized it, rather than creating the official script alone.
The existing official script in Qin dynasty is represented by sleeping tiger bamboo slips. The vertical direction of its seal script is horizontal, and the font is not rectangular, but tends to be square or oblate; It got rid of the feature that the seal script pen rotates evenly, and became a horizontal and vertical gesture. This font, which is the transition from seal script to official script, is called "official script" by calligraphers.
In the Han Dynasty, official script replaced seal script and became the standard writing. The flat font and the foot grip of the wave pen have become the remarkable characteristics of the official script. Since the official script, the form has changed from lines to strokes, which indicates that Chinese characters have entered the stage of "modern writing" from "ancient writing".
, regular script
Official script is a great progress of seal script, a great leap in the development history of Chinese characters, and a pioneering writing at this writing stage. Its writing is much simpler than the winding seal script, but its shape requires a "swallowtail silkworm head" and twists and turns, and it is still not fast to write. In Xu Shen's Shuo Xu Wen, "Han Xing has cursive script", which is a font simplified from official script. Because of its haste, it is called "cursive script". Although cursive writing is fast, it is scrawled, illegible, without uniform standards and rules. In order to correct its deviation, regular script came into being. The so-called "regular script" is the text that can be used as a model.
Regular script sprouted at the end of the Eastern Han Dynasty. The Book of Jin Wei Heng Biography: "The method of regular script was pioneered by Wang Ci in Shanggu." Unfortunately, its words are now invisible, and its "model method" cannot be verified. The calligraphy style of the Three Kingdoms, Wei, Jin, Southern and Northern Dynasties showed distinct characteristics of semi-official script, such as Gulang tablet in the first year of Wu Fenghuang in the Three Kingdoms (AD 272) and Xianbaozi tablet in the fourth year of the Eastern Jin Dynasty (AD 405), all of which showed the transition from official script to regular script.
Clear marks. In the Sui and Tang Dynasties, regular script completely broke away from official script and developed into a new style.
Regular script has a square shape and straight strokes, which saves the ripple of official script strokes and makes writing faster and more convenient. This horizontal and vertical square structure has been maintained to this day and has become a typical feature of orthographic Chinese characters. (Source: China for five thousand years)