Chinese characters[a] arelogographs usedto write the Chinese languages and others from regions historically influenced byChinese culture. Of the four independently inventedwriting systems accepted by scholars, they represent the only one that has remained in continuous use. Over a documented history spanning more than three millennia, the function, style, and means of writing characters have changed greatly. Unlike letters in alphabets that reflect the sounds of speech, Chinese characters generally representmorphemes, the units of meaning in a language. Writing all of the frequently used vocabulary in a language requires roughly 2000–3000 characters; as of 2024[update], nearly100000 have been identified and included inThe Unicode Standard. Characters are created according to several principles, where aspects of shape and pronunciation may be used to indicate the character's meaning.
The first attested characters areoracle bone inscriptions made during the 13th century BCE in what is nowAnyang, Henan, as part of divinations conducted by theShang dynasty royal house. Character forms were originally highlypictographic in style, but evolved as writing spread across China. Numerous attempts have been made to reform the script, including the promotion ofsmall seal script by theQin dynasty (221–206 BCE).Clerical script, which had matured by the earlyHan dynasty (202 BCE – 220 CE), abstracted the forms of characters—obscuring their pictographic origins in favour of making them easier to write. Following the Han,regular script emerged as the result of cursive influence on clerical script, and has been the primary style used for characters since. Informed by a long tradition oflexicography, states using Chinese characters have standardized their forms: broadly,simplified characters are used to write Chinese inmainland China,Singapore, andMalaysia, whiletraditional characters are used inTaiwan,Hong Kong, andMacau.
Where the use of characters spread beyond China, they were initially used to writeLiterary Chinese; they were then often adapted to write local languages spoken throughout theSinosphere. InJapanese,Korean, andVietnamese, Chinese characters are known askanji,hanja, andchữ Hán respectively. Writing traditions also emerged for some of the otherlanguages of China, like thesawndip script used to write theZhuang languages ofGuangxi. Each of these written vernaculars used existing characters to write the language's native vocabulary, as well as theloanwords it borrowed from Chinese. In addition, each invented characters for local use. In written Korean and Vietnamese, Chinese characters have largely been replaced with alphabets—leaving Japanese as the only major non-Chinese language still written using them, alongside the other elements of theJapanese writing system.
At the most basic level, characters are composed ofstrokes that are written in a fixed order. Historically, methods of writing characters have included inscribing stone, bone, or bronze; brushing ink onto silk, bamboo, or paper; and printing withwoodblocks ormoveable type. Technologies invented since the 19th century to facilitate the use of characters includetelegraph codes andtypewriters, as well asinput methods andtext encodings on computers.
Chinese characters are accepted as representing one of four independent inventions of writing in human history.[b] In each instance, writing evolved from a system using two distinct types ofideographs—either pictographs visually depicting objects or concepts, or fixedsigns representing concepts only by shared convention. These systems are classified asproto-writing, because the techniques they used were insufficient to carry the meaning of spoken language by themselves.[3]
Various innovations were required for Chinese characters to emerge from proto-writing. Firstly, pictographs became distinct from simple pictures in use and appearance: for example, the pictograph大, meaning 'large', was originally a picture of a large man, but one would need to be aware of its specific meaning in order to interpret the sequence大鹿 as signifying 'large deer', rather than being a picture of a large man and a deer next to one another. Due to this process of abstraction, as well as to make characters easier to write, pictographs gradually became more simplified and regularized—often to the extent that the original objects represented are no longer obvious.[4]
This proto-writing system was limited to representing a relatively narrow range of ideas with a comparatively small library of symbols. This compelled innovations that allowed for symbols which indicated elements of spoken language directly.[5] In each historical case, this was accomplished by some form of therebus technique, where the symbol for a word is used to indicate a different word with a similar pronunciation, depending on context.[6] This allowed for words that lacked a plausible pictographic representation to be written down for the first time. This technique preempted more sophisticated methods of character creation that would further expand the lexicon. The process whereby writing emerged from proto-writing took place over a long period; when the purely pictorial use of symbols disappeared, leaving only those representing spoken words, the process was complete.[7]
Chinese characters have been used in several differentwriting systems throughout history. A writing system is most commonly defined to include the written symbols themselves, calledgraphemes—which may include characters, numerals, or punctuation—as well as the rules by which they are used to record language.[8] Chinese characters arelogographs, which are graphemes that represent units of meaning in a language. Specifically, characters represent a language'smorphemes, its most basic units of meaning. Morphemes in Chinese—and therefore the characters used to write them—are nearly always a single syllable in length. In some special cases, characters may denote non-morphemic syllables as well; due to this,written Chinese is often characterized asmorphosyllabic.[9][c] Logographs may be contrasted withletters in analphabet, which generally representphonemes, the distinct units of sound used by speakers of a language.[11] Despite their origins in picture-writing, Chinese characters are no longer ideographs capable of representing ideas directly; their comprehension relies on the reader's knowledge of the particular language being written.[12]
The areas where Chinese characters were historically used—sometimes collectively termed theSinosphere—have a long tradition oflexicography attempting to explain and refine their use; for most of history, analysis revolved around a model first popularized in the 2nd-centuryShuowen Jiezi dictionary.[13] More recent models have analysed the methods used to create characters, how characters are structured, and how they function in a given writing system.[14]
Most characters can be analysed structurally as compounds made of smallercomponents (部件;bùjiàn), which are often independent characters in their own right, adjusted to occupy a given position in the compound.[15] Components within a character may serve a specific function: phonetic components provide a hint for the character's pronunciation, and semantic components indicate some element of the character's meaning. Components that serve neither function may be classified as pure signs with no particular meaning, other than their presence distinguishing one character from another.[16]
A straightforward structural classification scheme may consist of three pure classes of semantographs, phonographs, and signs—having only semantic, phonetic, and form components respectively—as well as classes corresponding to each combination of component types.[17] Of the3500 characters that are frequently used in Standard Chinese, pure semantographs are estimated to be the rarest, accounting for about 5% of the lexicon, followed by pure signs with 18%, and semantic–form and phonetic–form compounds together accounting for 19%. The remaining 58% are phono-semantic compounds.[18]
The 20th-century Chinese palaeographerQiu Xigui presents three principles of character function adapted from earlier proposals byTang Lan [zh] andChen Mengjia,[19] withsemantographs describing all characters with forms wholly related to their meaning, regardless of the method by which the meaning was originally depicted;phonographs that include a phonetic component; andloangraphs encompassing existing characters that have been borrowed to write other words. Qiu also acknowledges the existence of character classes that fall outside of these principles, such as pure signs.[20]
Most of the oldest characters arepictographs (象形;xiàngxíng), representational pictures of physical objects.[21] Examples include日 ('Sun'),月 ('Moon'), and木 ('tree'). Over time, the forms of pictographs have been simplified in order to make them easier to write.[22] As a result, modern readers generally cannot deduce what many pictographs were originally meant to resemble; without knowing the context of their origin in picture-writing, they may be interpreted instead as pure signs. However, if a pictograph's use in compounds still reflects its original meaning, as with日 in晴 ('clear sky'), it can still be analysed as a semantic component.[23][24]
Pictographs have often been extended from their original meanings to take on additional layers of metaphor andsynecdoche, which sometimes displace the character's original sense. When this process results in excessive ambiguity between distinct senses written with the same character, it is usually resolved by new compounds being derived to represent particular senses.[25]
Indicatives (指事;zhǐshì), also calledsimple ideographs orself-explanatory characters,[21] are visual representations of abstract concepts that lack any tangible form. Examples include上 ('up') and下 ('down')—these characters were originally written as dots placed above and below a line, and later evolved into their present forms with less potential for graphical ambiguity in context.[26] More complex indicatives include凸 ('convex'),凹 ('concave'), and平 ('flat and level').[27]
The compound character好 illustrated as its component characters女 and子 positioned side by side
Compound ideographs (会意;會意;huìyì)—also calledlogical aggregates,associative idea characters, orsyssemantographs—combine other characters to convey a new, synthetic meaning. A canonical example is明 ('bright'), interpreted as the juxtaposition of the two brightest objects in the sky:日 ('Sun') and月 ('Moon'), together expressing their shared quality of brightness. Other examples include休 ('rest'), composed of pictographs人 ('man') and木 ('tree'), and好 ('good'), composed of女 ('woman') and子 ('child').[28]
Many traditional examples of compound ideographs are now believed to have actually originated as phono-semantic compounds, made obscure by subsequent changes in pronunciation.[29] For example, theShuowen Jiezi describes信 ('trust') as an ideographic compound of人 ('man') and言 ('speech'), but modern analyses instead identify it as a phono-semantic compound—though with disagreement as to which component is phonetic.[30]Peter A. Boodberg andWilliam G. Boltz go so far as to deny that any compound ideographs were devised in antiquity, maintaining that secondary readings that are now lost are responsible for the apparent absence of phonetic indicators,[31] but their arguments have been rejected by other scholars.[32]
Phono-semantic compounds (形声;形聲;xíngshēng) are composed of at least one semantic component and one phonetic component.[33] They may be formed by one of several methods, often by adding a phonetic component to disambiguate a loangraph, or by adding a semantic component to represent a specific extension of a character's meaning.[34] Examples of phono-semantic compounds include河 (hé; 'river'),湖 (hú; 'lake'),流 (liú; 'stream'),沖 (chōng; 'surge'), and滑 (huá; 'slippery'). Each of these characters have three short strokes on their left-hand side:氵, a simplified combining form of⽔ ('water'). This component serves a semantic function in each example, indicating the character has some meaning related to water. The remainder of each character is its phonetic component:湖 (hú) is pronounced identically to胡 (hú) in Standard Chinese,河 (hé) is pronounced similarly to可 (kě), and沖 (chōng) is pronounced similarly to中 (zhōng).[35]
The phonetic components of most compounds may only provide an approximate pronunciation, even before subsequent sound shifts in the spoken language. Some characters may only have the same initial or final sound of a syllable in common with phonetic components.[36] Aphonetic series comprises all the characters created using the same phonetic component, which may have diverged significantly in their pronunciations over time. For example,茶 (chá;caa4; 'tea') and途 (tú;tou4; 'route') are characters in the phonetic series using余 (yú;jyu4), a literary first-person pronoun. TheirOld Chinese pronunciations were similar, but the phonetic component no longer serves as a useful hint for their pronunciation in modernvarieties of Chinese due to subsequent sound shifts—demonstrated here in both theirMandarin andCantonese readings.[37]
The phenomenon of existing characters being adapted to write other words with similar pronunciations was necessary in the initial development of Chinese writing, and has remained common throughout its subsequent history. Some loangraphs (假借;jiǎjiè; 'borrowing') are introduced to represent words previously lacking a written form—this is often the case with abstract grammatical particles such as之 and其.[38] The process of characters being borrowed as loangraphs should not be conflated with the distinct process of semantic extension, where a word acquires additional senses, which often remain written with the same character. As both processes often result in a single character form being used to write several distinct meanings, loangraphs are often misidentified as being the result of semantic extension, and vice versa.[39]
Loangraphs are also used to write words borrowed from other languages, such as the Buddhist terminology introduced to China in antiquity, as well as contemporary non-Chinese words and names. For example, each character in the name加拿大 (Jiānádà; 'Canada') is often used as a loangraph for its respective syllable. However, the barrier between a character's pronunciation and meaning is never total: when transcribing into Chinese, loangraphs are often chosen deliberately as to create certain connotations. This is regularly done with corporate brand names: for example,Coca-Cola's Chinese name is可口可乐;可口可樂 (Kěkǒu Kělè; 'delicious enjoyable').[40][41][42]
Some characters and components are puresigns, with meanings merely stemming from their having a fixed and distinct form. Basic examples of pure signs are found withthe numerals beyond four, e.g.五 ('five') and八 ('eight'), whose forms do not give visual hints to the quantities they represent.[43]
TheShuowen Jiezi is a character dictionary authoredc. 100 CE by the scholarXu Shen. In its postface, Xu analyses what he sees as all the methods by which characters are created. Later authors iterated upon Xu's analysis, developing a categorization scheme known as the 'six writings' (六书;六書;liùshū), which identifies every character with one of six categories that had previously been mentioned in theShuowen Jiezi. For nearly two millennia, this scheme was the primary framework for character analysis used throughout the Sinosphere.[44] Xu based most of his analysis on examples of Qin seal script that were written down several centuries before his time—these were usually the oldest specimens available to him, though he stated he was aware of the existence of even older forms.[45] The first five categories are pictographs, indicatives, compound ideographs, phono-semantic compounds, and loangraphs. The sixth category is given by Xu as轉注 (zhuǎnzhù; 'reversed and refocused'); however, its definition is unclear, and it is generally disregarded by modern scholars.[46]
Modern scholars agree that the theory presented in theShuowen Jiezi is problematic, failing to fully capture the nature of Chinese writing, both in the present, as well as at the time Xu was writing.[47] Traditional Chinese lexicography as embodied in theShuowen Jiezi has suggested implausible etymologies for some characters.[48] Moreover, several categories are considered to be ill-defined: for example, it is unclear whether characters like大 ('large') should be classified as pictographs or indicatives.[34] However, awareness of the 'six writings' model has remained a common component of character literacy, and often serves as a tool for students memorizing characters.[49]
Diagram comparing the abstraction of pictographs in cuneiform, Egyptian hieroglyphs, and Chinese characters – from an 1870 publication by French EgyptologistGaston Maspero[A]
The broadest trend in the evolution of Chinese characters over their history has been simplification, both in graphicalshape (字形;zìxíng), the "external appearances of individual graphs", and in graphicalform (字体;字體;zìtǐ), "overall changes in the distinguishing features of graphic[al] shape and calligraphic style, ... in most cases refer[ring] to rather obvious and rather substantial changes".[50] The traditional notion of an orderly procession of script styles, each suddenly appearing and displacing the one previous, has been disproven by later scholarship and archaeological work. Instead, scripts evolved gradually, with several distinct styles often coexisting within a given area.[51]
Several of theChinese classics indicate thatknotted cords were used to keep records prior to the invention of writing.[52] Works that reference the practice include chapter 80 of theTao Te Ching[B] and the "Xici II" commentary to theI Ching.[C] According to one tradition, Chinese characters were invented during the 3rd millennium BCE byCangjie, a scribe of the legendaryYellow Emperor. Cangjie is said to have invented symbols called字 (zì) due to his frustration with the limitations of knotting, taking inspiration from his study of the tracks of animals, landscapes, and the stars in the sky. On the day that these first characters were created, grain rained down from the sky; that night, the people heard the wailing of ghosts and demons, lamenting that humans could no longer be cheated.[53][54]
Collections of graphs and pictures have been discovered at the sites of severalNeolithic settlements throughout theYellow River valley, includingJiahu (c. 6500 BCE),Dadiwan andDamaidi (6th millennium BCE), andBanpo (5th millennium BCE). Symbols at each site were inscribed or drawn onto artefacts, appearing one at a time and without indicating any greater context. Qiu concludes, "We simply possess no basis for saying that they were already being used to record language."[55] A historical connection with the symbols used by the late NeolithicDawenkou culture (c. 4300 – c. 2600 BCE) in Shandong has been deemed possible by palaeographers, with Qiu concluding that they "cannot be definitively treated as primitive writing, nevertheless they are symbols which resemble most the ancient pictographic script discovered thus far in China... They undoubtedly can be viewed as the forerunners of primitive writing."[56]
Ox scapula inscribed with characters recording the result of divinations – datedc. 1200 BCE
The oldest attested Chinese writing comprises a body of inscriptions produced during theLate Shang period (c. 1250 – 1050 BCE), with the very earliest examples from the reign ofWu Ding dated between 1250 and 1200 BCE.[57] Many of these inscriptions were made onoracle bones—usually either oxscapulae or turtle plastrons—and recorded officialdivinations carried out by the Shang royal house. Contemporaneous inscriptions in a related but distinct style were also made on ritual bronze vessels. Thisoracle bone script (甲骨文;jiǎgǔwén) was first documented in 1899, after specimens were discovered being sold as "dragon bones" for medicinal purposes, with the symbols carved into them identified as early character forms. By 1928, the source of the bones had been traced to a village nearAnyang inHenan—discovered to be the site ofYin, the final Shang capital—which was excavated by a team led byLi Ji from theAcademia Sinica between 1928 and 1937.[58] To date, over150000 oracle bone fragments have been found.[59]
Oracle bone inscriptions recorded divinations undertaken to communicate with the spirits of royal ancestors. The inscriptions range from a few characters in length at their shortest, to several dozen at their longest. The Shang king would communicate with his ancestors by means ofscapulimancy, inquiring about subjects such as the royal family, military success, and the weather. Inscriptions were made in the divination material itself before and after it had been cracked by exposure to heat; they generally include a record of the questions posed, as well as the answers as interpreted in the cracks.[60][61] A minority of bones feature characters that were inked with a brush before their strokes were incised; the evidence of this also shows that the conventionalstroke orders used by later calligraphers had already been established for many characters by this point.[62]
Oracle bone script is the direct ancestor of later forms of written Chinese. The oldest known inscriptions already represent a well-developed writing system, which suggests an initial emergence predating the late 2nd millennium BCE. Although written Chinese is first attested in official divinations, it is widely believed that writing was also used for other purposes during the Shang, but that the media used in other contexts—likelybamboo and wooden slips—were less durable than bronzes or oracle bones, and have not been preserved.[63]
TheShi Qiangpan, a bronze ritual basin bearing inscriptions describing the deeds and virtues of the first seven Zhou kings – datedc. 900 BCE[64]
As early as the Shang, the oracle bone script existed as a simplified form alongside another that was used in bamboo books, in addition to elaborate pictorial forms often used in clan emblems. These other forms have been preserved inbronze script (金文;jīnwén), where inscriptions were made using a stylus in a clay mould, which was then used to castritual bronzes.[65] These differences in technique generally resulted in character forms that were less angular in appearance than their oracle bone script counterparts.[66]
Study of these bronze inscriptions has revealed that the mainstream script underwent slow, gradual evolution during the late Shang, which continued during theZhou dynasty (c. 1046 – 256 BCE) until assuming the form now known assmall seal script (小篆;xiǎozhuàn) within the Zhoustate of Qin.[67][68] Other scripts in use during the late Zhou include thebird-worm seal script (鸟虫书;鳥蟲書;niǎochóngshū), as well as the regional forms used in non-Qin states. Examples of these styles were preserved as variants in theShuowen Jiezi.[69] Historically, Zhou forms were collectively known aslarge seal script (大篆;dàzhuàn), though Qiu refrains from using this term due to its lack of precision.[70]
FollowingQin's conquest of the other Chinese states that culminated in the founding of the imperialQin dynasty in 221 BCE, the Qin small seal script was standardized for use throughout the entire country under the direction of ChancellorLi Si.[71] It was traditionally believed that Qin scribes only used small seal script, and the later clerical script was a sudden invention during the early Han. However, more than one script was used by Qin scribes: a rectilinear vulgar style had also been in use in Qin for centuries prior to the wars of unification. The popularity of this form grew as writing became more widespread.[72]
By theWarring States period (c. 475 – 221 BCE), an immature form ofclerical script (隶书;隸書;lìshū) had emerged based on the vulgar form developed within Qin, often called "early clerical" or "proto-clerical".[73] The proto-clerical script evolved gradually; by theHan dynasty (202 BCE – 220 CE), it had arrived at a mature form, also called八分 (bāfēn). Bamboo slips discovered during the late 20th century point to this maturation being completed during the reign ofEmperor Wu of Han (r. 141–87 BCE). This process, calledlibian (隶变;隸變), involved character forms being mutated and simplified, with many components being consolidated, substituted, or omitted. In turn, the components themselves were regularized to use fewer, straighter, and more well-defined strokes. As a result, clerical script largely lacks the pictorial qualities still evident in seal script.[74]
Around the midpoint of theEastern Han (25–220 CE), a simplified and easier form of clerical script appeared, which Qiu terms 'neo-clerical' (新隶体;新隸體;xīnlìtǐ).[75] By the end of the Han, this had become the dominant script used by scribes, though clerical script remained in use for formal works, such as engravedstelae. Qiu describes neo-clerical as a transitional form between clerical andregular script which remained in use through theThree Kingdoms period (220–280 CE) and beyond.[76]
Cursive script (草书;草書;cǎoshū) was in use as early as 24 BCE, synthesizing elements of the vulgar writing that had originated in Qin with flowing cursive brushwork. By theJin dynasty (266–420), the Han cursive style became known as章草 (zhāngcǎo; 'orderly cursive'), sometimes known in English as 'clerical cursive', 'ancient cursive', or 'draft cursive'. Some attribute this name to the fact that the style was considered more orderly than a later form referred to as今草 (jīncǎo; 'modern cursive'), which had first emerged during the Jin and was influenced by semi-cursive and regular script. This later form was exemplified by the work of figures likeWang Xizhi (fl. 4th century), who is often regarded as the most important calligrapher in Chinese history.[77][78]
Semi-cursive script
An early form ofsemi-cursive script (行书;行書;xíngshū; 'running script') can be identified during the late Han, with its development stemming from a cursive form of neo-clerical script. Liu Desheng (刘德升;劉德升; fl. 2nd century CE) is traditionally recognized as the inventor of the semi-cursive style, though accreditations of this kind often indicate a given style's early masters, rather than its earliest practitioners. Later analysis has suggested popular origins for semi-cursive, as opposed to it being an invention of Liu.[79] It can be characterized partly as the result of clerical forms being written more quickly, without formal rules of technique or composition: what would be discrete strokes in clerical script frequently flow together instead. The semi-cursive style is commonly adopted in contemporary handwriting.[80]
A page from a Song-era publication printed using a regular script style[D]
Regular script (楷书;楷書;kǎishū), based on clerical and semi-cursive forms, is the predominant form in which characters are written and printed.[81] Its innovations have traditionally been credited to the calligrapherZhong Yao, who lived in the state ofCao Wei (extant 220–266); he is often called the "father of regular script".[82] The earliest surviving writing in regular script comprises copies of Zhong Yao's work, including at least one copy by Wang Xizhi. Characteristics of regular script include the 'pause' (頓;dùn) technique used to end horizontal strokes, as well as heavy tails on diagonal strokes made going down and to the right. It developed further during theEastern Jin (317–420) in the hands of Wang Xizhi and his sonWang Xianzhi.[83] However, most Jin-era writers continued to use neo-clerical and semi-cursive styles in their daily writing. It was not until theNorthern and Southern period (420–589) that regular script became the predominant form.[84] The system ofimperial examinations for the civil service established during theSui dynasty (581–618) required test takers to write inLiterary Chinese using regular script, which contributed to the prevalence of both throughout later Chinese history.[85]
Each character of a text is written within a uniform square allotted for it. As part of the evolution from seal script into clerical script, character components became regularized as discrete series ofstrokes (笔画;筆畫;bǐhuà).[86] Strokes can be considered both the basic unit of handwriting, as well as the writing system's basic unit ofgraphemic organization. In clerical and regular script, individual strokes traditionally belong to one of eight categories according to their technique and graphemic function. In what is known as theEight Principles ofYong, calligraphers practice their technique using the character永 (yǒng; 'eternity'), which can be written with one stroke of each type.[87] In ordinary writing,永 is now written with five strokes instead of eight, and a system of five basic stroke types is commonly employed in analysis—with certain compound strokes treated as sequences of basic strokes made in a single motion.[88]
Characters are constructed according to predictable visual patterns. Some components have distinct combining forms when occupying specific positions within a character—for example, the⼑ ('knife') component appears as刂 on the right side of characters, but as⺈ at the top of characters.[89] The order in which components are drawn within a character is fixed. Theorder in which the strokes of a component are drawn is also largely fixed, but may vary according to several different standards.[90][91] This is summed up in practice with a few rules of thumb, including that characters are generally assembled from left to right, then from top to bottom, with "enclosing" components started before, then closed after, the components they enclose.[92] For example,永 is drawn in the following order:
Variants of the Chinese character for 'turtle', collectedc. 1800 from printed sources.[E] The traditional form龜 (left) is used in Taiwan and Hong Kong. The simplified form龟 (not pictured) is used in mainland China, and the simplified form亀 (top row, third from the right) is used in Japan.
Over a character's history,variant character forms (异体字;異體字;yìtǐzì) emerge via several processes. Variant forms have distinct structures, but represent the same morpheme; as such, they can be considered instances of the same underlying character. This is comparable to visually distinct double-storey|a| and single-storey|ɑ| forms both representing the Latin letter⟨A⟩. Variants also emerge for aesthetic reasons, to make handwriting easier, or to correct what the writer perceives to be errors in a character's form.[93] Individual components may be replaced with visually, phonetically, or semantically similar alternatives.[94] The boundary between character structure and style—and thus whether forms represent different characters, or are merely variants of the same character—is often non-trivial or unclear.[95]
For example, prior to the Qin dynasty the character meaning 'bright' was written as either明 or朙—with either日 ('Sun') or囧 ('window') on the left, and月 ('Moon') on the right. As part of the Qin programme to standardize small seal script across China, the朙 form was promoted. Some scribes ignored this, and continued to write the character as明. However, the increased usage of朙 was followed by the proliferation of a third variant:眀, with目 ('eye') on the left—likely derived as a contraction of朙. Ultimately,明 became the character's standard form.[96]
From the earliest inscriptions until the 20th century, texts were generally laid out vertically—with characters written from top to bottom in columns, arranged from right to left.Word boundaries are generally not indicated withspaces. A horizontal writing direction—with characters written from left to right in rows, arranged from top to bottom—only became predominant in the Sinosphere during the 20th century as a result of Western influence.[97] Many publications outside mainland China continue to use the traditional vertical writing direction.[98] Western influence also resulted in the generalized use of punctuation being widely adopted in print during the 19th and 20th centuries. Prior to this, the context of a passage was considered adequate to guide readers; this was enabled by characters being easier to read than alphabets whenwritten without spaces or punctuation due to their more discretized shapes.[99]
Ordinary handwriting on a lunch menu in Hong Kong. Here,反 (fǎn) is being used as an unofficial short form of飯 (fàn; 'meal') by omitting the latter's⾷ ('eat') component.
The earliest attested Chinese characters were carved into bone, or marked using a stylus in clay moulds used to castritual bronzes. Characters have also been incised into stone, or written in ink onto slips of silk, wood, and bamboo. Theinvention of paper for use as a writing medium occurred during the 1st century CE, and is traditionally credited toCai Lun.[100] There are numerous styles, orscripts (书;書;shū) in which characters can be written, including the historical forms like seal script and clerical script. Most styles used throughout the Sinosphere originated within China, though they may display regional variation. Styles that have been created outside of China tend to remain localized in their use: these include the Japaneseedomoji and Vietnameselệnh thư scripts.[101]
Chinese calligraphy of mixed styles by the Song-era poetMi Fu
Calligraphy was traditionally one of thefour arts to be mastered by Chinese scholars, considered to be an artful means of expressing thoughts and teachings. Chinese calligraphy typically makes use of anink brush to write characters. Strict regularity is not required, and character forms may be accentuated to evoke a variety of aesthetic effects.[102] Traditional ideals of calligraphic beauty often tie into broader philosophical concepts native to East Asia. For example, aesthetics can be conceptualized using the framework ofyin and yang, where the extremes of any number of mutually reinforcing dualities are balanced by the calligrapher—such as the duality between strokes made quickly or slowly, between applying ink heavily or lightly, between characters written with symmetrical or asymmetrical forms, and between characters representing concrete or abstract concepts.[103]
Woodblock printing was invented in China between the 6th and 9th centuries,[104] followed by the invention ofmoveable type byBi Sheng during the 11th century.[105] The increasing use of print during theMing (1368–1644) andQing dynasties (1644–1912) led to considerable standardization in character forms, which prefigured later script reforms during the 20th century. This printorthography, exemplified by the 1716Kangxi Dictionary, was later dubbed thejiu zixing ('old character shapes').[106]Printed Chinese characters may use differenttypefaces,[107] of which there are four broad classes in use:[108]
Song (宋体;宋體) or Ming (明体;明體) typefaces—with "Song" generally used with simplified Chinese typefaces, and "Ming" with others—broadly correspond to Westernserif styles. Song typefaces are broadly within the tradition of historical Chinese print; both names for the style refer to eras regarded as high points for printing in the Sinosphere. While type during theSong dynasty (960–1279) generally resembled the regular script style of a particular calligrapher, most modern Song typefaces are intended for general purpose use and emphasize neutrality in their design.
Sans-serif typefaces are called 'black form' (黑体;黑體;hēitǐ) in Chinese and 'Gothic' (ゴシック体) in Japanese. Sans-serif strokes are rendered as simple lines of even thickness.
Before computers became ubiquitous, earlier electro-mechanical communications devices liketelegraphs andtypewriters were originally designed for use with alphabets, often by means of alphabetictext encodings likeMorse code andASCII. Adapting these technologies for a writing system that uses thousands of distinct characters was non-trivial.[109][110]
Chinese IME displaying candidates based on pinyin spelling
Chinese characters are predominantly input on computers using a standard keyboard. Many input methods (IMEs) are phonetic, where typists enter characters according to schemes likepinyin orbopomofo for Mandarin,Jyutping for Cantonese, orHepburn for Japanese. For example,香港 ('Hong Kong') could be input asxiang1gang3 using pinyin, or ashoeng1gong2 using Jyutping.[111]
Character input methods may also be based on form, using the shape of characters and existing rules of handwriting to assign unique codes to each character, potentially increasing the speed of typing. Popular form-based input methods includeWubi on the mainland, andCangjie—named after the mythological inventor of writing—in Taiwan and Hong Kong.[111] Often, unnecessary parts are omitted from the encoding according to predictable rules. For example,疆 ('border') is encoded using the Cangjie method asNGMWM, which corresponds to the components弓土一田一.[112]
Contextual constraints may be used to improve candidate character selection. When ignoringtones,知道 and直刀 are both transcribed aszhidao; the system may prioritize which candidate appears first based on context.[113]
While special text encodings for Chinese characters were introduced prior to its popularization,The Unicode Standard is the predominant text encoding worldwide.[114] According to the philosophy of theUnicode Consortium, each distinct graph is assigned a number in the standard, but specifying its appearance or the particularallograph used is a choice made by the engine rendering the text.[F] Unicode'sBasic Multilingual Plane (BMP) represents the standard's 216 smallest code points. Of these,20992 (or 32%) are assigned toCJK Unified Ideographs, a designation comprising characters used in each of theChinese family of scripts. As of version 16.0, published in 2024, Unicode defines a total of98682 Chinese characters.[G]
Writing first emerged during the historical stage of the Chinese language known asOld Chinese. Most characters correspond to morphemes that originally functioned as stand-alone Old Chinese words.[115]Classical Chinese is the form of written Chinese used in theclassic works of Chinese literature from roughly the 5th century BCE until the 2nd century CE.[116] This form of the language was imitated by later authors, even as it began to diverge from the language they spoke. This later form, referred to asLiterary Chinese, remained the predominant written language in China until the 20th century. Its use in theSinosphere was loosely analogous to that ofLatin in pre-modern Europe.[117] While it was not static over time, Literary Chinese retained many properties of spoken Old Chinese. Informed by the local spokenvernaculars, texts were read aloud usingliterary and colloquial readings that varied by region.[118] Over time, sound mergers created ambiguities in vernacular speech as more words became homophonic. This ambiguity was often reduced through the introduction of multi-syllablecompound words,[119] which comprise much of the vocabulary in modern varieties of Chinese.[120][121]
Over time, use of Literary Chinese spread to neighbouring countries, including Vietnam, Korea, and Japan. Alongside other aspects of Chinese culture, local elites adopted writing for record-keeping, histories, and official communications.[122] Excepting hypotheses by some linguists of the latter two sharing a common ancestor, Chinese, Vietnamese, Korean, and Japanese each belong to differentlanguage families,[123] and tend to function differently from one another. Reading systems were devised to enable non-Chinese speakers to interpret Literary Chinese texts in terms of their native language, a phenomenon that has been variously described as either a form of diglossia, asreading by gloss,[124] or as a process of translation into and out of Chinese. Compared to other traditions that wrote using alphabets or syllabaries, the literary culture that developed in this context was less directly tied to a specific spoken language. This is exemplified by the cross-linguistic phenomenon ofbrushtalk, where mutual literacy allowed speakers of different languages to engage in face-to-face conversations.[125][126]
Following the introduction of Literary Chinese, characters were later adapted to write many non-Chinese languages spoken throughout the Sinosphere. These new writing systems used characters to write both native vocabulary and the numerousloanwords each language had borrowed from Chinese, collectively termedSino-Xenic vocabulary. Characters may have native readings, Sino-Xenic readings, or both.[127] Comparison of Sino-Xenic vocabulary across the Sinosphere has been useful in the reconstruction ofMiddle Chinese phonology.[128] Literary Chinese was used in Vietnam during themillennium of Chinese rule that began in 111 BCE. By the 15th century, a system that adapted characters to write Vietnamese calledchữ Nôm had fully matured.[129] The 2nd century BCE is the earliest possible period for the introduction of writing to Korea; the oldest surviving manuscripts in the country date to the early 5th century CE. Also during the 5th century, writing spread from Korea to Japan.[130] Characters were being used to write both Korean and Japanese by the 6th century.[131] By the late 20th century, characters had largely been replaced with alphabets designed to write Vietnamese and Korean. This leaves Japanese as the only major non-Sinitic language typically written using Chinese characters.[132]
Excerpt from a 1436 primer on Chinese characters[133]
Words in Classical Chinese were generally a single character in length.[134] An estimated 25–30% of the vocabulary used in Classical Chinese texts consists of two-character words.[135] Over time, the introduction of multi-syllable vocabulary into vernacular varieties of Chinese was encouraged byphonetic shifts that increased the number of homophones.[136] The most common process of Chinese word formation after the Classical period has been to create compounds of existing words. Words have also been created by appendingaffixes to words, byreduplication, and by borrowing words from other languages.[137] While multi-syllable words are generally written with one character per syllable, abbreviations are occasionally used.[138] For example,二十 (èrshí; 'twenty') may be written as the contracted form廿.[139]
Sometimes, different morphemes come to be represented by characters with identical shapes. For example,行 may represent either 'road' (xíng) or the extended sense of 'row' (háng): these morphemes are ultimatelycognates that diverged in pronunciation but remained written with the same character. However, Qiu reserves the termhomograph to describe identically shaped characters with different meanings that emerge via processes other than semantic extension. An example homograph is铊;鉈, which originally meant 'weight used at a steelyard' (tuó). In the 20th century, this character was created again with the meaning 'thallium' (tā). Both of these characters are phono-semantic compounds with⾦ ('gold') as the semantic component and它 as the phonetic component, but the words represented by each are not related.[140]
There are a number of 'dialect characters' (方言字;fāngyánzì) that are not used in standardwritten vernacular Chinese, but reflect the vocabulary of other spoken varieties. The most complete example of an orthography based on a variety other thanStandard Chinese isWritten Cantonese. A common Cantonese character is冇 (mou5; 'to not have'), derived by removing two strokes from有 (jau5; 'to have').[141] It is common to use standard characters to transcribe previously unwritten words in Chinese dialects when obvious cognates exist. When no obvious cognate exists due to factors like irregular sound changes, semantic drift, or an origin in a non-Chinese language, characters are often borrowed or invented to transcribe the word—either ad hoc, or according to existing principles.[142] These new characters are generally phono-semantic compounds.[143]
In Japanese, Chinese characters are referred to askanji. During theNara period (710–794), readers and writers ofkanbun—the Japanese term for Literary Chinese writing—began utilizing a system of reading techniques and annotations calledkundoku. When reading, Japanese speakers would adapt the syntax and vocabulary of Literary Chinese texts to reflect their Japanese-language equivalents. Writing essentially involved the inverse of this process, and resulted in ordinary Literary Chinese.[144] When adapted to write Japanese, characters were used to represent bothSino-Japanese vocabulary loaned from Chinese, as well as the corresponding native synonyms. Most kanji were subject to both borrowing processes, and as a result have both Sino-Japanese and native readings, known ason'yomi andkun'yomi respectively. Moreover, kanji may have multiple readings of either kind. Distinct classes ofon'yomi were borrowed into Japanese at different points in time from different varieties of Chinese.[145]
TheJapanese writing system is a mixed script, and has also incorporated syllabaries calledkana to represent phonetic units calledmoras, rather than morphemes. Prior to theMeiji era (1868–1912), writers used certain kanji to represent their sound values instead, in a system known asman'yōgana. Starting in the 9th century, specificman'yōgana were graphically simplified to create two distinct syllabaries calledhiragana andkatakana, which slowly replaced the earlier convention. Modern Japanese retains the use of kanji to represent mostword stems, whilekana syllabograms are generally used for grammatical affixes, particles, and loanwords. The forms ofhiragana andkatakana are visually distinct from one another, owing in large part to different methods of simplification:katakana were derived from smaller components of eachman'yōgana, whilehiragana were derived from the cursive forms ofman'yōgana in their entirety. In addition, thehiragana andkatakana for some moras were derived from differentman'yōgana.[146] Characters invented for Japanese-language use are calledkokuji. The methods employed to createkokuji are equivalent to those used by Chinese-original characters, though most are ideographic compounds. For example,峠 (tōge; 'mountain pass') is a compoundkokuji composed of山 ('mountain'),上 ('above'), and下 ('below').[147]
While characters used to write Chinese are monosyllabic, many kanji have multi-syllable readings. For example, the kanji刀 has a nativekun'yomi reading ofkatana. In different contexts, it can also be read with theon'yomi readingtō, such as in the Chinese loanword日本刀 (nihontō; 'Japanese sword'), with a pronunciation corresponding to that in Chinese at the time of borrowing. Prior to the universal adoption ofkatakana, loanwords were typically written with unrelated kanji withon'yomi readings matching the syllables in the loanword. These spellings are calledateji: for example,亜米利加 (Amerika) was theateji spelling of 'America', now rendered asアメリカ. As opposed toman'yōgana used solely for their pronunciation,ateji still corresponded to specific Japanese words. Some are still in use: the official list ofjōyō kanji includes 106ateji readings.[148]
In Korean, Chinese characters are referred to ashanja. Literary Chinese may have been written in Korea as early as the 2nd century BCE. During Korea'sThree Kingdoms period (57 BCE – 668 CE), characters were also used to writeidu, a form of Korean-language literature that mostly made use ofSino-Korean vocabulary. During theGoryeo period (918–1392), Korean writers developed a system of phonetic annotations for Literary Chinese calledgugyeol, comparable tokundoku in Japan, though it only entered widespread use during the laterJoseon period (1392–1897).[149] While thehangul alphabet was invented by the Joseon kingSejong in 1443, it was not adopted by the Korean literati and was relegated to use in glosses for Literary Chinese texts until the late 19th century.[150]
Much of the Korean lexicon consists of Chinese loanwords, especially technical and academic vocabulary.[151] While hanja were usually only used to write this Sino-Korean vocabulary, there is evidence that vernacular readings were sometimes used.[128] Compared to the other written vernaculars, very few characters were invented to write Korean words; these are calledgukja.[152] During the late 19th and early 20th centuries, Korean was written either using a mixed script of hangul and hanja, or only using hangul.[153] Following the end of theEmpire of Japan's occupation of Korea in 1945, the total replacement of hanja with hangul was advocated throughout the country as part of a broader "purification movement" of the national language and culture.[154] However, due to the lack of tones in spoken Korean, there are many Sino-Korean words that are homophones with identical hangul spellings. For example, the phonetic dictionary entry for기사 (gisa) yields more than 30 different entries. This ambiguity had historically been resolved by also including the associated hanja. While still sometimes used for Sino-Korean vocabulary, it is much rarer for native Korean words to be written using hanja.[155] When learning new characters, Korean students are instructed to associate each one with both its Sino-Korean pronunciation, as well as a native Korean synonym.[156] Examples include:
The first two lines of the 19th-century Vietnamese epic poemThe Tale of Kieu, written in bothchữ Nôm and the Vietnamese alphabet
Borrowed characters representing Sino-Vietnamese words
Borrowed characters representing native Vietnamese words
Inventedchữ Nôm representing native Vietnamese words
In Vietnamese, Chinese characters are referred to aschữ Hán (𡨸漢),chữ Nho (𡨸儒; 'Confucian characters'), orHán tự (漢字). Literary Chinese was used for all formal writing in Vietnam until the modern era,[157] having first acquired official status in 1010. Literary Chinese written by Vietnamese authors is first attested in the late 10th century, though the local practice of writing is likely several centuries older.[158] Characters used to write Vietnamese calledchữ Nôm (𡨸喃) are first attested in an inscription dated to 1209 made at the site of a pagoda.[159] A maturechữ Nôm script had likely emerged by the 13th century, and was initially used to record Vietnamese folk literature. Somechữ Nôm characters are phono-semantic compounds corresponding to spoken Vietnamese syllables.[160] Another technique with no equivalent in China createdchữ Nôm compounds using two phonetic components. This was done because Vietnamese phonology included consonant clusters not found in Chinese, and were thus poorly approximated by the sound values of borrowed characters. Compounds used components with two distinct consonant sounds to specify the cluster, e.g.𢁋 (blăng;[d] 'Moon') was created as a compound of巴 (ba) and陵 (lăng).[161] As a system,chữ Nôm was highly complex, and the literacy rate among the Vietnamese population never exceeded 5%.[162] Both Literary Chinese andchữ Nôm fell out of use during the French colonial period, and were gradually replaced by the Latin-basedVietnamese alphabet. Following the end of colonial rule in 1954, the Vietnamese alphabet has been sole official writing system in Vietnam, and is used exclusively in Vietnamese-language media.[163]
Several minority languages ofSouth andSouthwestern China have been written with scripts using both borrowed and locally created characters. The most well-documented of these is thesawndip script for theZhuang languages ofGuangxi. While little is known about its early development, a tradition of vernacular Zhuang writing likely first emerged during theTang dynasty (618–907). Modern scholarship characterizessawndip writing as a network of regional traditions that have mutually influenced one another while maintaining their local characteristics.[164] Like Vietnamese, some invented Zhuang characters are phonetic–phonetic compounds, though not primarily ones intended to describe consonant clusters.[165] Despite the Chinese government encouraging its replacement with a Latin-basedZhuang alphabet,sawndip remains in use.[166] Other non-Siniticlanguages of China historically written with Chinese characters includeMiao,Yao,Bouyei,Bai, andHani; each of these are now written with Latin-based alphabets designed for use with each language.[167]
Title page for a 1908 edition of the 13th-centurySecret History of the Mongols, which uses Chinese characters to transcribe Mongolian and provides glosses to the right of each column
Chinese characters have also been repurposed phonetically to transcribe the sounds of non-Chinese languages. For example, the only manuscripts of the 13th-centurySecret History of the Mongols that have survived from the medieval era use characters in this manner to write theMongolian language.[172]
The memorization of thousands of different characters is required to achieve literacy in languages written with them, in contrast to the relatively small inventory of graphemes used in phonetic writing.[173] Historically, character literacy was often acquired via Chinese primers like the 6th-centuryThousand Character Classic and 13th-centuryThree Character Classic,[174] as well as surname dictionaries like the Song-eraHundred Family Surnames.[175] Studies of Chinese-language literacy suggest that literate individuals generally have anactive vocabulary of three to four thousand characters; for specialists in fields like literature or history, this figure may be between five and six thousand.[176]
The first four characters of the 6th-centuryThousand Character Classic in different styles. From right to left: seal script, clerical script, regular script, Song type, and sans-serif type.
According to analyses of mainland Chinese, Taiwanese, Hong Kong, Japanese, and Korean sources, the total number of characters in the modern lexicon is around15000.[177] Dozens of schemes have been devised for indexing Chinese characters and arranging them in dictionaries, though relatively few have achieved widespread use. Characters may be ordered according to methods based on their meaning, visual structure, or pronunciation.[178]
TheErya (c. 3rd century BCE) organized the Chinese lexicon into 19 sections according to character meaning: 3 sections deal with everyday vocabulary, while each of the remaining 16 is dedicated to specialized vocabulary related to a specific topic.[179] TheShuowen Jiezi (c. 100 CE) introduced what would ultimately become the predominant method of organization used by later character dictionaries, whereby characters are grouped according to certain visually prominent components calledradicals (部首;bùshǒu; 'section headers'). TheShuowen Jiezi used a system of 540 radicals, while subsequent dictionaries have generally used fewer.[180] The set of 214Kangxi radicals was popularized by theKangxi Dictionary (1716), but originally appeared in the earlierZihui (1615).[181] Character dictionaries have historically been indexed usingradical-and-stroke sorting, where characters are grouped by radical andsorted within each group by stroke number. Some modern dictionaries arrange character entries alphabetically according to their pinyin spelling, while also providing a traditional radical-based index.[182]
Before the invention of romanization systems for Chinese, the pronunciation of characters was transmitted viarhyme dictionaries. These used thefanqie (反切; 'reverse cut') method, where each entry lists a common character with the sameinitial sound as the character in question, alongside one with the same final sound.[183]
Usingfunctional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI),neurolinguists have studied the brain activity associated with literacy. Compared to phonetic systems, reading and writing with characters involves additional areas of the brain—including those associated with visual processing.[184] While the level of memorization required for character literacy is significant, identification of the phonetic and semantic components in compounds—which constitute the vast majority of characters—also plays a key role in reading comprehension. The ease of recognition for a given character is impacted by how regular the positioning of its components is, as well as how reliable its phonetic component is in indicating a specific pronunciation.[185] Moreover, due to the high level of homophony in Chinese languages and the more irregular correspondences between writing and the sounds of speech, it has been suggested that knowledge of orthography plays a greater role in speech recognition for literate Chinese speakers.[186]
Developmental dyslexia in readers of character-based languages appears to involve independent visuospatial and phonological disorders co-occurring. This seems to be a distinct phenomenon from dyslexia as experienced with phonetic orthographies, which can result from only one of the aforementioned disorders.[187]
The first official list of simplified character forms, published in 1935 and including 324 characters[188]
Attempts to reform and standardize the use of characters—including aspects of form, stroke order, and pronunciation—have been undertaken by states throughout history. Thousands ofsimplified characters were standardized and adopted in mainland China during the 1950s and 1960s, with most either already existing as common variants, or being produced via the systematic simplification of their components.[189] After World War II, the Japanese government also simplified hundreds of character forms, including some simplifications distinct from those adopted in China.[190] Orthodox forms that have not undergone simplification are referred to astraditional characters. Across Chinese-speaking polities, mainland China, Malaysia, and Singapore use simplified characters, while Taiwan, Hong Kong, and Macau use traditional characters.[191] In general, Chinese and Japanese readers can successfully identify characters from all three standards.[192]
Prior to the 20th century, reforms were generally conservative and sought to reduce the use of simplified variants.[193] During the late 19th and early 20th centuries, an increasing number of intellectuals in China came to see both the Chinese writing system and the lack of a national spoken dialect as serious impediments to achieving the mass literacy and mutual intelligibility required for the country's successful modernization. Many began advocating for the replacement of Literary Chinese with a written language that more closely reflected speech, as well as for a mass simplification of character forms, or even the totalreplacement of characters with an alphabet tailored to a specific spoken variety. In 1909, the educator and linguistLufei Kui formally proposed the adoption of simplified characters in education for the first time.[194]
In 1911, theXinhai Revolution toppled the Qing dynasty, and resulted in the establishment of theRepublic of China the following year. The early Republican era (1912–1949) was characterized by growing social and political discontent that erupted into the 1919May Fourth Movement, catalysing the replacement of Literary Chinese withwritten vernacular Chinese over the subsequent decades. Alongside the corresponding spoken variety ofStandard Chinese, this written vernacular was promoted by intellectuals and writers such asLu Xun andHu Shih.[195] It was based on theBeijing dialect ofMandarin,[196] as well as on the existing body of vernacular literature authored over the preceding centuries, which includedclassic novels such asJourney to the West (c. 1592) andDream of the Red Chamber (mid-18th century).[197] At this time, character simplification and phonetic writing were being discussed within both the rulingKuomintang (KMT) party, as well as theChinese Communist Party (CCP). In 1935, the Republican government published the first official list of simplified characters, comprising 324 forms collated byPeking University professorQian Xuantong. However, strong opposition within the party resulted in the list being rescinded in 1936.[198]
Comparison between character forms, showing systematic simplification of the component⾨ ('gate')
The project of script reform in China was ultimately inherited by the Communists, who resumed work following theproclamation of the People's Republic of China in 1949. In 1951, PremierZhou Enlai ordered the formation of a Script Reform Committee, with subgroups investigating both simplification and alphabetization. The simplification subgroup began surveying and collating simplified forms the following year,[199] ultimately publishing adraft scheme of simplified characters and components in 1956. In 1958, Zhou Enlai announced the government's intent to focus on simplification, as opposed to replacing characters withHanyu Pinyin, which had been introduced earlier that year.[200] The 1956 scheme was largely ratified by arevised list of2235 characters promulgated in 1964.[201] The majority of these characters were drawn from conventional abbreviations or ancient forms with fewer strokes.[202] The committee also sought to reduce the total number of characters in use by merging some forms together.[202] For example,雲 ('cloud') was written as云 in oracle bone script. The simpler form remained in use as a loangraph meaning 'to say'; it was replaced in its original sense of 'cloud' with a form that added a semantic⾬ ('rain') component. The simplified forms of these two characters have been merged into云.[203]
Asecond round of simplified characters was promulgated in 1977, but was poorly received by the public and quickly fell out of official use. It was ultimately formally rescinded in 1986.[204] The second-round simplifications were unpopular in large part because most of the forms were completely new, in contrast to the familiar variants comprising the majority of the first round.[205] With the rescission of the second round, work toward further character simplification largely came to an end.[206] TheChart of Generally Utilized Characters of Modern Chinese was published in 1988 and included7000 simplified and unsimplified characters. Of these, half were also included in the revisedList of Commonly Used Characters in Modern Chinese, which specified2500 common characters and1000 less common characters.[207] In 2013, theList of Commonly Used Standard Chinese Characters was published as a revision of the 1988 lists; it includes a total of8105 characters.[208]
Regional forms of the character次 in the Noto Serif typeface family. From left to right: forms used in mainland China, Taiwan, and Hong Kong (top), and in Japan and Korea (bottom)
After World War II, the Japanese government instituted its own program of orthographic reforms. Some characters were assigned simplified forms calledshinjitai; the older forms were then labelledkyūjitai. Inconsistent use of different variant forms was discouraged, and lists of characters to be taught to students at each grade level were developed. The first of these was the1850-charactertōyō kanji list published in 1946, later replaced by the1945-characterjōyō kanji list in 1981. In 2010, thejōyō kanji were expanded to include a total of2136 characters.[209][210] The Japanese government restricts characters that may be used in names to thejōyō kanji, plus an additional list of 983jinmeiyō kanji whose use are historically prevalent in names.[211][212]
Hanja are still used in South Korea, though not to the extent that kanji are used in Japan. In general, there is a trend toward the exclusive use of hangul in ordinary contexts.[213] Characters remain in use in place names, newspapers, and to disambiguate homophones. They are also used in the practice of calligraphy. Use of hanja in education is politically contentious, with official policy regarding the prominence of hanja in curricula having vacillated since the country's independence.[214][215] Some support the total abandonment of hanja, while others advocate an increase in use to levels previously seen during the 1970s and 1980s. Students in grades 7–12 are presently taught with a principal focus on simple recognition and attaining sufficient literacy to read a newspaper.[150] The South Korean Ministry of Education published theBasic Hanja for Educational Use in 1972, which specified1800 characters meant to be learned by secondary school students.[216] In 1991, theSupreme Court of Korea published theTable of Hanja for Use in Personal Names (인명용 한자;Inmyeong-yong Hanja), which initially included2854 characters.[217] The list has been expanded several times since; as of 2022[update], it includes8319 characters.[218]
In the years following its establishment, the North Korean government sought to eliminate the use of hanja in standard writing; by 1949, characters had been almost entirely replaced with hangul in North Korean publications.[219] While mostly unused in writing, hanja remain an important part of North Korean education: a 1971 textbook for university history departments contained3323 distinct characters, and in the 1990s North Korean schoolchildren were still expected to learn2000 characters.[220] A 2013 textbook appears to integrate the use of hanja in secondary school education.[221] It has been estimated that North Korean students learn around3000 hanja by the time they graduate university.[222]
Singapore's Ministry of Education promulgated three successive rounds of simplifications: the first round in 1969 included 502 simplified characters, and the second round in 1974 included2287 simplified characters—including 49 that differed from those in the PRC, which were ultimately removed in the final round in 1976. In 1993, Singapore adopted the revisions made in mainland China in 1986.[224]
^According to Handel: "While monosyllabism generally trumps morphemicity—that is to say, a bisyllabic morpheme is nearly always written with two characters rather than one—there is an unmistakable tendency for script users to impose a morphemic identity on the linguistic units represented by these characters."[10]
^This is theMiddle Vietnamese pronunciation; the word is pronounced in modern Vietnamese astrăng.
^改定常用漢字表、30日に内閣告示 閣議で正式決定 [The amended list ofjōyō kanji receives cabinet notice on 30th: to be officially confirmed in cabinet meeting].The Nikkei (in Japanese). 24 November 2010.
^人名用漢字に「渾」追加 司法判断を受け法務省 改正戸籍法施行規則を施行、計863字に ["渾" added to kanji usable in personal names; Ministry of Justice enacts revised Family Registration Law Enforcement Regulations following judicial ruling, totaling 863 characters].The Nikkei (in Japanese). 25 September 2017.
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Xue, Shiqi (1982). "Chinese Lexicography Past and Present".Journal of the Dictionary Society of North America.4 (1):151–169.doi:10.1353/dic.1982.0009.ISSN2160-5076.
Yang, Lihui; An, Deming (2008).Handbook of Chinese Mythology. Oxford University Press.ISBN978-0-19-533263-6.
Yang Runlu (杨润陆) (2008).现代汉字学 [Modern Chinese Characters] (in Chinese). Beijing Normal University Press.ISBN978-7-303-09437-0.
Yin Jiming (殷寄明); et al. (2007).现代汉语文字学 [Modern Chinese Writing] (in Chinese). Fudan University Press.ISBN978-7-309-05525-2.
Yip, Po-ching (2000).The Chinese Lexicon: A Comprehensive Survey. Psychology Press.ISBN978-0-415-15174-0.
Yong, Heming; Peng, Jing (2008).Chinese Lexicography: A History from 1046 BC to AD 1911. Oxford University Press.ISBN978-0-19-156167-2.
Zhang Xiaoheng (张小衡); Li Xiaotong (李笑通) (2013).一二三笔顺检字手册 [Handbook of the YES Sorting Method] (in Chinese). The Language Press.ISBN978-7-80241-670-3.
Zhao, Liming (1998). "Nüshu: Chinese Women's Characters".International Journal of the Sociology of Language.129 (1):127–137.doi:10.1515/ijsl.1998.129.127.ISSN0165-2516.
Zhong, Yurou (2019).Chinese Grammatology: Script Revolution and Literary Modernity, 1916–1958. Columbia University Press.doi:10.7312/zhon19262.ISBN978-0-231-54989-9.
——— (2003).The Historical Evolution of Chinese Languages and Scripts中国语文的时代演进. Pathways to Advanced Skills (in English and Chinese). Vol. 8. Translated by Zhang Liqing (张立青). National East Asian Languages Resource Center, Ohio State University.ISBN978-0-87415-349-1.
^Laozi (1891)."80".道德經 [Tao Te Ching] (in Literary Chinese and English). Translated byLegge, James – via theChinese Text Project. [I would make the people return to the use of knotted cords (instead of the written characters).]
^係辭下 [Xi Ci II].易經 [I Ching] (in Literary Chinese and English). Translated byLegge, James. 1899 – via theChinese Text Project. [In the highest antiquity, government was carried on successfully by the use of knotted cords (to preserve the memory of things). In subsequent ages the sages substituted for these written characters and bonds.]
Handel, Zev (2025).Chinese Characters Across Asia: How the Chinese Script Came to Write Japanese, Korean, and Vietnamese. University of Washington Press.ISBN978-0-295-75302-7.
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Unihan Database – Reference glyphs, readings, and meanings for characters inThe Unicode Standard, with information about the history of Han unification
![The Shi Qiang pan, a bronze ritual basin bearing inscriptions describing the deeds and virtues of the first seven Zhou kings – dated c. 900 BCE[64]](/mt/?noimg=&dark=on&url=http%3a%2f%2fen.wikipedia.org%2fwiki%2fFile%3aShi_Qiang_pan.jpg)
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