Several different theories about the origin of Chinese characters
Through language, human beings can accumulate knowledge and form culture. With words, you can record language, exchange information. Language separates humans from animals, and writing separates the primitive and civilized stages of human society. Writing breaks the limitations of language in time and space, transmits language to distant places, and expands the communicative function of language.
Theories about the origin of chinese alphabet include rope knot theory, gossip theory, Hedala theory, Cangjie character creation theory, image theory, etc.
Knot said:
"Northern History·Benji of Wei" says: The ancestors of the Wei Dynasty in the Northern Dynasties "shooted and hunted as a profession, simple as vulgar, and simple as transformation; not for writing, but carving wood and knotting ropes", which records some developments of various tribes in a primitive human society or in China. Minority countries and ethnic groups, before the problem of written information, used the method of knotting and recording events to record large and small historical events such as wars, hunting, alliances, elections, celebrations, marriages, births, diseases and disasters.
Gossip says:
Kong Anguo's "Preface to the Book of History" (a forgery, but it is very old) said: "In ancient times, the king of the Paoxi clan, the king of the world, began to draw gossip and make book contracts to replace the government of knotting ropes. Yan."
Hetu Luoshu said:
"Yi Xici 1": "He produces pictures, Luo produces books, and sages follow them." "Pictures" and "books" come from Heluo, how mysterious! Mysticism is the main feature of this theory. In vain, it can be understood as a book, but in fact it can be understood as the Book of Changes and history books.
Cangjie invented characters and said:
"The theory of Cangjie's creation of characters" was already popular in the Warring States period. "Lu's Spring and Autumn Annals Junshou" said: "Cangjie made books, Houji made crops." "Xunzi" and "Han Feizi" are also recorded. Xu Shen's "Shuowen Jiezi·Xu": "When Cangjie first wrote books, he covered them with pictographs."
Who is Miss Cang? According to legend, he was the leader of the ancient tribal alliance in the Central Plains and the recorder of the Yellow Emperor. As the society entered the stage of large-scale tribal alliances, the diplomatic activities of the ancient tribal alliances in the Central Plains became more and more frequent. Therefore, establishing a set of communication signs shared by the alliance has become a top priority. Therefore, the work of collecting and collating the shared documents was left to the historian Cang Jie.
picture says:
Modern research scholars can believe that the real development of Chinese character culture originated from Chinese primitive pictures. The graphics depicted on some unearthed cultural relics are likely to have an origin relationship with the text.
The painted pottery Yangshao culture unearthed from the Banpo site in Xi'an, and the fish-shaped decorations on the bronzes of the late Shang Dynasty are lifelike. Comparing them with the word for "fish" in ancient Chinese characters, the similarities are strong enough to believe that these characters evolved from the original pictures.
Structure of Chinese characters
Regarding the structure of Chinese characters, there is a traditional saying of "six books". "Book" refers to written characters in ancient times, and also refers to written characters, so "Liu Shu" literally means six characters, and Liu Shu talks about the theory of six characters:
Pictogram:
Xu Shen's "Shuowen Jiezi·Xu" said: "Pictographic characters are drawn into their objects, and they are interspersed with the body, such as the sun and the moon." The shape of things, the strokes of characters and the shape of objects are zigzag, such as "day", "month" and other characters.
The seal character "日" is shaped like the sun, and the short horizontal line in the middle is a decorative painting to fill in the blank, which has no practical meaning; the seal character "Yue" is like a crescent moon, and the middle painting is also a decorative painting. If you study Shang and Zhou characters, the pictographic level of the two characters is higher.
Pictographs such as:
Sheep, oracle bone inscriptions are in the shape of a sheep's head.
Wood, oracle bone inscriptions resemble a tree with branches and roots.
Water, oracle bone inscriptions resemble flowing water, and its original meaning is a general name for a river.
Refers to:
Xu Shen's "Shuowen Jiezi·Xu" said: "Those who refer to things can be recognized when they look at them, and they can be seen when they are observed. It is up and down." Its meaning, the characters "up" and "down" are such characters. Zhishi is a word that uses abstract symbols to indicate the things that the meaning of the word expresses.
Descriptive words such as:
Originally, the bronze inscriptions and Xiaozhuan used dots or horizontal lines under the tree to point out the root of the tree. The original meaning refers to the root of the tree.
At the end, the bronze inscription used a horizontal drawing on the wood to point out the location of the treetop, which originally meant the treetop.
Dan, the bronze inscriptions are like the rising sun, and the ground is still connected to the ground (one said it is cloud). The original meaning is dawn and morning.
understand:
Xu Shen's "Shuowen Jiezi·Xu" said: "Those who know the meaning, compare the friendship with the analogy, and use it to see the meaning, and Wu Xin is also." That is to say, the word "know" is a parallel part of speech, that is, more than two words. Their meanings combine to show what the meaning of the word refers to. "None" and "new" are such words. The seal script of the word "Wu" is composed of the character "Zhi", which originally resembles a human foot, in other words, it means that a person moves forward, so "Zhi" means to advance with Ge, that is, to conquer and use troops. The seal script of "Xin" consists of two characters, the original meaning is honesty, and people must be honest.
Knowing words such as:
Light, oracle bone inscriptions from fire on people, means that there is fire shining on the top of people's heads. The original meaning is brilliance.
Zong, oracle bone inscriptions from 宀congshi, which means indoor display (that is, the god). The original meaning is ancestral temple.
Cong, oracle bone inscriptions follow each other, the original meaning is to follow each other.
phonetic:
Xu Shen's "Shuowen Jiezi·Xu" said: "Those who know the meaning, compare the friendship with the analogy, and use it to see the meaning, and Wu Xin is the same." Combine the pronunciation of the new word with the same or similar pronunciation as the new word to form a new word, " The characters "江" and "河" are such words.
Pictophonetic characters such as:
Mu, oracle bone inscriptions, knows this word from 日在四屮 (the pictograph for grass) or Simu, and the original meaning is that when the sun will set, it will be designated as "Mo". Later, a pictograph was added under the word "Mo" to express its original meaning.
Overflow, oracle bone inscriptions are like water overflowing from a vessel; Xiaozhuan follows the vessel from water. Both of them are the word "Yi", the original meaning is water overflowing. Later, a pictophonetic character "Yi" was added next to the word "Yi" to show its original meaning.
However, the oracle bone inscriptions are in the shape of a bird, that is, the character "隹", which is originally the same character as "bird". Oracle bone inscriptions and He often use it to represent characters. Later generations added the pictogram "口" to become the pictophonetic character "Wei" of Congkou and Jiasheng. The original meaning is the sound of response.
Repost:
Xu Shen's "Shuowen Jiezi·Xu" said: "Those who re-annotate, create a class, agree to accept it, and pass the exam."
Under the guise of:
Xu Shen's "Shuowen Jiezi·Xu" said: "The borrower has no words at all, and he relies on his voice to entrust things, and the commander is also."
Since the Warring States period, people have analyzed and summarized the structure and usage of Chinese characters, and summarized six regulations, transferred annotations, and borrowed two books to talk about the usage of Chinese characters. To know the classification of things, each can only use the same standard, and different categories cannot be compared with each other. There can only be one meaning in , and it cannot be used as a method of word creation and word use at the same time. Therefore, the traditional Liushu theory is by no means a mixture of word creation and word use in essence.
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