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Chinese characters for the words 'seal script' in regular script (left) and seal script (right).

Seal script (Chinese: Simplified: 篆书 [Traditional: 篆書]; pinyin: zhuànshū) is an ancient style of Chinese calligraphy. It evolved organically out of the Zhōu dynasty script (see bronze script), arising in the Warring State of Qin. The Qin variant of seal script became the standard and was adopted as the formal script for all of China in the Qin dynasty, and was still widely used for decorative engraving and seals (name chops, or signets) in the Han dynasty. Ever since, its predominant use has been in seals, hence the English name. The literal translation of its Chinese name 篆书 (zhuànshū) is decorative engraving script, because by the time this name was coined in the Han dynasty, its role had been reduced to decorational inscriptions rather than as the main script of the day.

See East Asian Calligraphy for examples of seal script compared to modern Chinese script.

Most people today cannot read the seal script, so it is generally not used outside the fields of seals and calligraphy.

Large Seal Scripts

Small seal script epigraph on the standard weight prototype of Qin Dynasty. Made from iron, this prototype was unearthed in 1973 at Wendeng City (文登市), Weihai, Shandong Province.

There are two uses of the word seal script, the Large or Great Seal script (大篆 Dàzhuàn; Japanese daiten), and the lesser or Small Seal Script (小篆 Xiǎozhuàn; Japanese shōten); the latter is also called simply seal script. The Large Seal script was originally a later, vague Han dynasty reference to writing of the Qin system similar to but earlier than Small Seal. It has also been used to refer to Western Zhou forms or even oracle bones as well. Since the term is an imprecise one, not clearly referring to any specific historical script and not used with any consensus in meaning, modern scholars tend to avoid it, and when referring to seal script, generally mean the (small) seal script of the Qin system, that is, the lineage which evolved in the state of Qin during the Spring and Autumn¹ to Warring States periods and which was standardized under the First Emperor.

Evolution of Seal Script

There were several different variants of seal script which developed in each kingdom independently during the warring state period and spring and autumn. The 'birds and worms script', was used in the Kingdoms of Wu, Chu, and Yue. It was found on several artifacts including the Spear of Fuchai, and Sword of Goujian.

Bronze sword of King Gōujiàn of Yuè (late Spring & Autumn), with bird script; detail--part of inscription: "越王自作" Yuè Wáng zì zuò, “Made by the King of Yuè”. Húbĕi Provincial Museum

On one side of the blade, two columns of text were visible. In total there are eight characters written in an ancient script. The script was found to be the one called "鸟虫文" (literally "'birds and worms'-characters" owing to the intricate decorations to the defining strokes), a variant of zhuan that is very difficult to read. Initial analysis of the text deciphered six of the characters, "越王" (King of Yue) and "自作用剑" ("made this sword for (his) personal use"). As a southern state, Chu was close to the Wu-Yue influences. Chu produced broad bronze swords that were similar to Wuyue swords, but not as intricate. Chu also used the difficult to read script called "Birds and Worms (鸟虫文}" style, which was common in the Wu and Yue states.

Unified Small seal script

The script of the Qin system (the writing as exemplified in bronze inscriptions in the state of Qin before unification) had evolved organically from the Zhou script starting in the Spring and Autumn period². Beginning around the Warring States period, it became vertically elongated with a regular appearance. This was the period of maturation of Small Seal script, also called simply seal script. It was systematized by Li Si 李斯 during the reign of the First Emperor of China Qin Shi Huang through elimination of most variant structures, and was imposed as the nationwide standard (thus banning other regional scripts), but small seal script was clearly not invented at that time³. Through Chinese commentaries, it is known that Li Si compiled Cangjie 倉頡篇, a non-extant work of character recognition listing some 3,300 Chinese characters in small seal script. Their form is characterised by being less rectangular and more squarish.

In the popular history of Chinese characters, the Small Seal script is traditionally considered to be the ancestor of the clerical script 隷書, which in turn gave rise to all of the other scripts in use today. However, recent archaeological discoveries and scholarship have led some scholars to conclude that the direct ancestor of clerical script was proto-clerical script, which in turn evolved out of the little-known vulgar or popular writing of the late Warring States to Qin period (see Qiu Xigui, in references).

The first known character dictionary was the 3rd century BC Erya 爾雅, collated and bibliographed by Liu Xiang 劉向 and his son Liu Xin 劉歆, lost the pre-Han script during the course of textual transmission. Not long after however, the Shuowen Jiezi 說文解字 (AD 100–121) was written preserving the canonical small seal script of late-Qin. The latter shows 9,353 pre-Han scripts, consisting mostly of the late Qin small seal script characters and a small number of Six Warring States variant scripts, listed under 540 section headers, the lifework of Xu Shen 許愼, during the Han Dynasty.

See also

• Old Texts

Notes

References

• Chén Zhāoróng (陳昭容) Research on the Qín (Ch'in) Lineage of Writing: An Examination from the Perspective of the History of Chinese Writing (秦系文字研究 ﹕从漢字史的角度考察) (2003). Academia Sinica, Institute of History and Philology Monograph (中央研究院歷史語言研究所專刊). ISBN 957-671-995-X. (in Chinese)
• Qiú Xīguī (裘錫圭) Chinese Writing (2000). Translation of 文字學概要 by Gilbert L. Mattos and Jerry Norman. Early China Special Monograph Series No. 4. Berkeley: The Society for the Study of Early China and the Institute of East Asian Studies, University of California, Berkeley. ISBN 1-55729-071-7.

External links

• Script translation
• Richard Sears on seal script

Wikipedia content modification information:

• This page was last modified on 22 November 2008, at 08:49.

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