Chinese calligraphic styles

In Chinese Penmanship (zh-Hant 書法 Pinyin: shūfǎ, literally: art, even the discipline of the writing), the Sinogramme S can be traced, differently, according to five large calligraphic styles . All are written normally with the brush. These styles are intrinsically related to the history of the Chinese writing.

Ancient styles

The Chinese writing, at its beginnings, is of pictographic nature: the character is a direct representation of the thing. However, the layout of the characters was quickly stylized: if first pictograms of more old certificates resemble drawings (what the sigillary calligraphic style still shows), the layout becomes fixed, conventional, and ends up more not resembling the original. |} The most primitive styles of writing are not employed any more nowadays.

First graphic symbols

Archaeological testimonys show that the Chinese writing goes back to highest antiquity. The oldest vestiges were found in Jiahu, a Neolithic site on the Huai river in the province of the Henan dated with -6500. This site with revealed carapaces of tortoise carrying of the symbols. The site of Longshan, in the province of the Shandong, delivered fragments of bones used for the divination, dated from -2500 to -1900, and the symbols on potteries which are regarded as a primitive form of writing. Symbols of comparable nature, coming from the culture of Liangzhu, were discovered in the low valley of the Yangzi Jiang.

These first testimonys of writing are to tell the truth only isolated symbols, and cannot thus be regarded as a writing with whole share. However, the inscriptions divinatoires on bone coming from the late Longshan culture (dated between -2500 and -1900) are regarded by certain as a proto-writing, similar to that which one finds in Mésopotamie or in Egypt. It is indeed possible that these inscriptions evolved to the form divinatoire on bones used under the Shang dynasty, and are consequently at the origin of the modern Chinese writings, since the Longshan culture of the late Neolithic era is regarded as the ancestor of the culture Erlitou of average bronze, and later of the dynasties Shang and Zhou.

Writing ossécaille and writing on bronze

The first inscriptions which are indisputably a Chinese writing are the oracles on bone (甲骨文 jiǎgǔwén , reads. “writing on scales (of tortoises) and bones (scapulas of bovines)”), a system which opens out under the Dynastie Shang (or Yin 殷), attested as of -1600.

One at that time finds in addition some inscriptions on fragments of pottery and bronze (the writing on bronze, 金文 jīnwén), whose relationship with the writing divinatoire is rather manifest, but which appears more complex and more picturesque. On the few 2.500 characters which one knows coming from oracles on bone, only 1.400 correspond to later Chinese characters, and can consequently be interpreted, but these characters are most frequently met.

These forms of writings are not used any more nowadays, they have only one historical, archaeological and etymological interest.

Yi writing

The Yi writing is also old, and resembles modern Chinese superficially, but would not be in fact not directly related for him. Its form is probably inspired by modern Chinese, and one cannot exclude that it has a common remote origin with the modern Chinese writing, tonic can be with oracles on bone.

Sigillary style

The sigillary style (zh-Hant 篆書 zhuànshū ) oldest of the styles is still used in penmanship: it finds its apogee under the Dynastie Qin, 221-206 before the Christian era. It originates in a calligraphic adaptation of the antiquated characters, to give them a form suitable to be engraved on bronze or the stone. Nowadays, with share in the clothes industry of the seals, the sigillary characters are written, and not engraved as they were it at the beginnings: one thus speaks about a layout imitating that of the past.

The lines are fine but constant thickness, and the ends finish clearly. In this type of layout, indeed, the formation of the features does not follow yet the constraints about which one speaks elsewhere, which is due to the brush. The curve is the general rule, the angles are exceptional. The layout of sigillary reflects an absence of constraint to the movement of the stylet, which moves freely and regularly: in modern terms, it is the type of layout which one obtains with a felt with round end. The form of the characters is rather free. In engraving, the features often tend to fill space, aiming at a balance between the width of the feature and that of the intervals; and the complex characters take a compact form evoking a digital fingerprint a little.

They are still old forms, very close to the drawing and pictogram, which will still undergo many deteriorations before arriving at the current layouts. Their form thus does not result simply from the modern layout. Their reading is difficult with which does not know the graphic etymologies, and their layout is practically impossible for layman who controls only the current C-Ws communication: it is necessary to learn the layout from each element of character.

Here the first five characters of the first column (on the basis of the line) of the illustration opposite, a work of the calligrapher, poet and engraver of seals zh-Hant 山杉 Shānshān, in current characters, as comparison: zh-Hant 松下問童子 sōng xià wèn tóng zǐ , extracted from a poem from zh-Hant 賈島 Jiǎ Dǎo, poet 唐 Táng: “尋隱者不遇” Xún yǐn zhě bú yù (“In the search of a hermit, without meeting it”).

It should well be noted that the texts which one finds in this style do not limit to reproductions of antiquated natures. All the current characters can be traced into sigillary, whereas one is well far from meeting in the antiquated writing itself all these characters.

One can distinguish two sigillary typestyles: the large seal (zh-Hant 大篆 dàzhuàn ) and the small seal (zh-Hant 小篆 xiǎozhuàn ). The first is oldest, irregular and less neat. It goes back to IXe century before the Christian era and rises directly antiquated characters, zh-Hant 甲骨文 jiǎgǔwén (under the dynasty zh-Hant 商 Shāng) and zh-Hant 金文 jīnwén (under zh-Hant 西周 Xī Zhōu, Zhōu Occidentaux), respectively “oracular writing on bone” and “writing on bronze”, mainly engraved on the carapaces of tortoises intended for the Scapulomancie liturgical and bronzes. They are the first Chinese real written certificates. One sees of them examples in the part devoted to the typestyles, section “pictograms”. It would not have to be believed that the large seal and the antiquated characters do only one: the large seal is the type of the oldest layout still used and not the oldest Chinese writing.

The second, the small seal, is a standardization and a perfection of the large seal dating from Qin, whose model is due to the Prime Minister of Qín Shǐ Huángdì zh-Hant 秦始皇帝, 李斯 Lǐ Sī (towards 200 before the Christian era). The small seal, replaced by simpler and more regular styles, left the uses under Hàn 漢 (of 206 before the Christian era with 220 before the Christian era), before becoming a solemn purely calligraphic style under Táng 唐 (618-907 of the Christian era), traced with the brush or engraved on the seals (from where its current name). The large seal, as for him, is studied more only by the historians (to reach the reading of old documents epigraphic) and the historians of the writing.

Style of the scribes

Regular style

The regular style (zh-Hant 楷書 kǎishū ) appears under Hàn, during IIIe century of the Christian era, regarded as an improvement and a rationalization of the style of the scribes. It is the standardized writing (正楷 zhèngkǎi ) which finds its apogee under the 唐 Táng (618-907 of the Christian era), whose calligraphers definitively fix the structure and the technique of layout. The need for the simple writing, most readable possible, very regular, answered the needs for centralization of the capacity. This writing, vector of the administration, thus also took part, by its stability, with the hegemony of the imperial capacity, so much so that until the simplifications of 1958 practiced as a Popular republic of China, it had never been improved nor modified.

Stylistiquement, it is characterized by the respect of the constraints of layout mentioned above: large a stabilité (no character overflows of the virtual square), the final abandonment of the direct curves and the acute angles of the writing of the scribes for a more soft compromise, the possibility of using only one definite number of fundamental features, the horizontal ones discreetly assembling left towards the line and a modification of the techniques of attack of the features. There exist two alternatives of the regular style: the large one (zh-Hant 大楷 dàkǎi ) and the small regular ones (zh-Hant 小楷 xiǎokǎi ). The differences between the two are due especially to the technique of the brush: into small regular, the attacks are less complex, more running and the general layout is more flexible, less rigid than into large regular, which remains most current of the two alternatives.

It is into regular that one currently learns the layout from the characters and that one usually writes when one applies. The regular style is very close to the printed characters, which one said that they were sometimes very slightly different from the handwritten characters.

Current style

The style running (zh-Hans 行書 xíngshū ), born under the 漢 Hàn, at the end of the Eastern dynasty (25-220), is a double form: it is fast (the characters “run”) and usual (“current”). It is a “deformation” by simplification of the layout of the regular one. It is for these reasons that it is used nowadays for the manuscript writing of the daily life. She is however not ignored penmanship, far from there, and is not regarded as a form debased of the regular one: it has in penmanship its own constraints.

One estimates that his creator would be 劉德昇 Liú Déshēng, of the 漢 Hàn Orientaux. The perfection of this style is however due to 王獻之 Wáng Xiànzhī (344-348) like with 王羲之 Wáng Xīzhī (321-379), his/her father, one of the most famous Chinese calligraphers, both pennies the dynasty of the 東晉 Dōngjìn, Jìn Orientaux (317-420 of the Christian era).

Traced point of the brush or with a pen, it remains very readable, rapid to be written and easily decipherable. It inevitably does not require a separate training of regular because if it is a quasi cursive C-W communication, the reductions undergone by the characters remain logical: they are stylizations of the fundamental units being born naturally from the brush or the pen when this one does not leave any more the sheet for a new feature, which thus meet more often than into regular. In the same way, the attacks of the features are simpler and direct (the point of the brush does not practice the flashbacks characteristic of regular).

The example presented above is a preparatory fragment of draft to a penmanship of the painter and calligrapher Iris Yawen Hsu (徐雅雯, Xú Yǎwén). Traced without claim, it illustrates well the fluid character and summary of this style, which remains however perfectly readable. The three characters are, 風, from top to bottom fēng , 萬 wàn and 里 lǐ .

Grass style

The last of the calligraphic styles, also named cursive or insane writing , the style of grass (zh-Hant 草書 cǎoshū) is undoubtedly more striking. Its name can be included/understood several manners: either it is an agitated writing as the grass (it is one of the directions of 草 cǎo ) in the wind, or it is intended for transitory uses, like the draft (another possible direction of 草), the made-to-order of the straw. Far from being a shorthand form born of the preceding one, it is a type of writing to whole share. The layout of the characters - which appear strongly deformed, seem formed without apparent constraints, are often dependant between them and often move away from the virtual square - rests on tachygraphiques forms borrowed as much from sigillary, with the style of the scribes that to the regular one. There exists, moreover, of very many alternatives, according to the times and the calligraphers. The reading and the writing of this style are thus reserved to the calligraphers and to the specialists scholars.

The history of this style, which underwent many modifications, is complex. One distinguishes two cursive histories principal, the 章草 zhāngcǎo , “cursive of the seals” and the 今草 jīncǎo , “news cursive”. The first, whose first certificates would go back to the Kingdoms Combatants, 戰國 Zhànguó, -475~-221 before the Christian era, and who was sophisticated under the 漢 Hàn, drift of the style of the scribes and the sigillary one. The second, created once again under the 漢 Hàn in IIe century of the Christian era, is a modification of the zhāngcǎo itself. If the characters of the first cursive one are still separate from/to each other and relatively regular, those of the second style take more independence, going towards the complete jamming of the limits between features and characters themselves. 王獻之 Wáng Xiànzhī and 王羲之 Wáng Xīzhī of the 東晉 Dōngjìn, Jìn Eastern (317~420 of the Christian era), are regarded as the Masters on the matter.

This style is characterized mainly by a very codified layout of the characters, which are shortened and reduced to their fundamental form and are not recognizable any more with the profane eye. The reductions proceed is of a natural simplification of the feature, the brush leaving only seldom the sheet, that is to say conventional shorthand C-Ws communication sometimes very old, which could give rise to some of the simplified characters of the Popular republic of China. The calligrapher working in grass style does not trace however inevitably the characters more quickly than for the other styles: the speed is suggested and described but not required in oneself. This style, indeed, is very now only seldom used for the drafts: he asks such a knowledge of the Chinese writing, of his history, and such a technical control which he is mainly reserved for Article In fact, although cursive, the grass style generally traces himself with application.

One can easily speak about abstract art and idealization about the writing, this one being almost only outlined, his movements more than his layouts being written. Penmanship in top of this section was carried out by Iris Yǎwén Hsú (徐雅雯). It is an extract of the 九歌 Jiǔ Gē “Last nine songs” ) of 屈原 Qū Yuán (339? - 278 before the Christian era) of which here the text in regular characters (penmanship is read of course in columns from right to left): 帝子降兮北渚, 目眇眇兮愁予. 袅袅兮秋風, 洞庭波兮木葉下 ( Dì zǐ jiàng xī běi zhǔ, mù miǎo miǎo xī chóu yú. Niǎo Niǎo xī qiū fēng, dòng tíng bō xī mù yè xià ). One notices that, among the shorthand constraints (pretended), the author used the character of iteration, 々, being used not to repeat the redoubled characters : one indeed reads 眇々 in the second column (on the basis of the line) and 袅々, in top of the third column, instead of 眇眇 and 袅袅.

That of Sūn Guòtíng (孙过庭) is drawn from the 書譜/书谱 Shūpǔ (“Treated penmanship”) and was carried out towards 650.

Dictionaries of styles

To help the calligrapher as much as the amateur, there exist dictionaries of styles, which give for each quoted character the five C-Ws communication (six of them by counting the printed C-W communication makes, which can from time to time differ slightly from the regular C-W communication). Here, as illustration, an extract of such a dictionary (the 学生六体书法小字典, Xuéshēng liù tǐ shūfǎ xiǎo zǐdiǎn “Small dictionary of natures classified according to the six styles for the student”, published by 北京大学出版社 Běijīng dàxué chūbǎnshè university Presses of Beijing).

In the image above, the characters, classified according to the pīnyīn are quoted, from left to right, in the noncalligraphic current C-W communication, the traditional printed C-W communication (to consult Variantes of the sinogrammes). This dictionary coming from R.P.C., its characters, by defect, are simplified then in the five calligraphic styles: regular, current, of grass, the scribes and sigillary.

Appendices

Eight principles of yǒng;
Fabienne Verdier, French calligrapher.

External bonds

To discover and learn Chinese painting and penmanship
Workshop from Chinese penmanship
To learn Chinese penmanship
Its first name in Chinese penmanship Various calligraphic styles
Penmanship from names transcribed in Chinese Possibility of choosing various Chinese police forces
Font face
18 police forces of writing Chinese
Another library of Chinese police forces
Chinese Etymology
Chinese Penmanship Basic principles, order of the features, style
Apprendre has to write some characters
Article of Ground Penmanship in Bejing

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