| |
| Calligraphic art during the Seal Script period |
|
| |
|
| Inscriptions on oracle bones in the Shang dynasty represented the earliest written system in China. They were first marked by a brush then engraved by knife. They displayed initial characteristics of Chinese calligraphy. Bronze inscriptions were the documents cast on bronze vessels for ceremony. Their brush strokes resembled original written characters and displayed rich calligraphic flavor. These can be regarded as the inscriptions preceding the calligraphy of Big Seal Script. The bronze inscriptions of the Western Zhou period represented the beginning of Big Seal Script. The inscriptions showed random space in style. After first Emperor of the Qin unified China in 221 B.C., the Small Seal Script became the foundation of universal script for Chinese written system, which replaced diversified scripts utilized previously. This is described as the "unification of written system" in Chinese history. |
| |
|
| |
|
