Question 1

How did Chinese characters evolve?

Accepted Answer

From pictures to strokes. The oldest known Chinese writing is 甲骨文 (jiǎgǔwén), oracle bone script, from about 1250 BC; then came bronze script, 金文 (jīnwén), and seal script, 篆书 (zhuànshū). In the Han dynasty, clerks writing fast with a brush turned the curves into straight, flat strokes, 隶书 (lìshū), and from that came regular script, 楷书 (kǎishū), the characters printed today. The horse, 马 (mǎ), began as a drawing of a horse with a mane, legs and tail; by regular script it was strokes, 馬, and simplified it became 马.

Question 2

What is oracle bone script?

Accepted Answer

甲骨文 (jiǎgǔwén), the writing on 甲 (jiǎ), turtle shells, and 骨 (gǔ), bones. Kings of the Shang dynasty had questions carved on them, about harvests, war, weather or childbirth, then cracked them with heat and read the answer in the cracks. Most were dug up at 殷墟 (Yīnxū), the ruins of the Shang capital near Anyang, after scholars noticed the writing in 1899 on bones sold as medicine. Thousands of different characters have been found, and only part of them can be read.

Question 3

What is seal script, and is it still used?

Accepted Answer

篆书 (zhuànshū). Large seal, 大篆 (dàzhuàn), is the writing of the Zhou dynasty and its states; small seal, 小篆 (xiǎozhuàn), is the script that the First Emperor, 秦始皇 (Qín Shǐhuáng), and his chancellor 李斯 (Lǐ Sī) made the one standard after uniting China in 221 BC. It is still carved on name seals, 印章 (yìnzhāng), and used in calligraphy and logos, which is why it is the script people search for when they want an old-looking Chinese stamp.

Question 4

How are Chinese characters made?

Accepted Answer

Scholars sort them into the six kinds, 六书 (liùshū). Pictures, 象形字 (xiàngxíngzì): 日 sun, 月 moon, 山 mountain, 人 person. Pointers, 指事 (zhǐshì): 上 above and 下 below, a mark over or under a line. Meanings put together, 会意 (huìyì): 休 (xiū), to rest, is a person, 亻, by a tree, 木. And most of all, a meaning plus a sound, 形声 (xíngshēng): 妈 (mā), mother, is 女, woman, for the meaning, and 马 (mǎ) for the sound. The meaning part is usually the radical, 部首 (bùshǒu).

Question 5

Who invented Chinese characters?

Accepted Answer

Legend says 仓颉 (Cāng Jié), the historian of the Yellow Emperor, who had four eyes and made characters from the tracks of birds and animals. In fact they grew over centuries before the oldest writing we have, the oracle bones; earlier marks on pottery may be their beginnings, but nobody can yet read them as words.

Question 6

When was Chinese simplified, and what is the difference?

Accepted Answer

Mainland China simplified characters in the 1950s and 1960s, cutting strokes from the most common ones: 馬 became 马, 龍 became 龙, 書 became 书. Simplified characters, 简体字 (jiǎntǐzì), are used in mainland China and Singapore; traditional characters, 繁体字 (fántǐzì), in Taiwan, Hong Kong and Macau. Both are regular script, 楷书, and many characters, like 人 and 山, are the same in both.

Question 7

Can’t hear it?

Accepted Answer

Play uses your device’s Mandarin voice. Edge, Chrome and Safari have one; a browser with none plays each character in our recorded voice instead.

	In Chinese	When	What it looks like
Oracle bone script	甲骨文 jiǎgǔwén	Late Shang dynasty, about 1250–1050 BC	Thin, angular pictures scratched on turtle shells and ox bones for divination
Bronze script	金文 jīnwén	Shang and Zhou dynasties	Rounder, heavier pictures cast into bronze bells and vessels
Large seal script	大篆 dàzhuàn	Zhou dynasty, before 221 BC	The scripts of the Zhou and its states, each region writing its own way
Small seal script	小篆 xiǎozhuàn	Qin dynasty, from 221 BC	Even, curving lines of one width, set as the one script for the empire; still carved on seals
Clerical script	隶书 lìshū	Han dynasty, 206 BC–AD 220	Flat, wide characters with a flared stroke: the first that looks like Chinese today
Regular script	楷书 kǎishū	From the end of the Han, settled in the Tang	Every stroke separate and square: the script of print, and of learners
Running script	行书 xíngshū	From the Han; 王羲之 in the 300s	Strokes run into each other: everyday handwriting
Cursive script	草书 cǎoshū	From the Han	Whole characters in a few sweeps of the brush; hard to read without training
Simplified characters	简体字 jiǎntǐzì	Mainland China, from 1956	Regular script with fewer strokes, as in 马 for 馬; used in mainland China and Singapore

Chinese scripts through history

Chinese scripts, oldest to newest

The scripts, oldest to newest

How characters are made

Simplified and traditional

Writing through history

Fonts today