Chinese Characters

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Ancient Egyptian and Babylonian characters were invented over 5, 000 years ago and have gone through golden ages of development and use. But among the ancient writing systems, only the Chinese characters have survived the test of tin and continue to be used.

Ancient Chinese used simple pictographs to record events or notes before the Chinese characters were invented. Overtime, the pictographs became simplified to a basic outline and developed designs and meanings; this led to the beginning of pictographic characters. By the 14th century a mature system of characters called jiaguwen (jiaguwen had developed. Aboucrificial ceremonies and divinations Most of these characters are pictographs, but the beginning of activities or, characters have been found inscribed on bones and tortoise shells, recording in detail the ideographs and phonographs can be seen. Ideographs and phonographs are more advanced than simple pictographs as they represent abstract ideas and sounds.

The abstractr hinese characters was further strengthene raphic and phonographic characters of Chinese characters was further strengthened and more ideographic and phonographic characters were standardize the many different writing styles after he united China. Xiaozhuan (xidozhudn), a simplified type of seal characters, became commonly used throughout the empire. Xiaozhuan had a simpler structure and was easier to write.

These characters were further simplified as lishu (lishu characters, a kind of official script. The lishu had fewer strokes and simplified writing; curved strokes became straight strokes. The transformation of xiaozhuan to lishu completely changed the look of Chinese char From the 4th to the 6th century, Chinese characters became andardized based on the lishu script. In the 6th century, formal script called kaishukaishu书) was adopted throughout. Although the kaishu have seen minor changes, these characters are basically the same as the Chinese characters in use today.

Chinese calligraphy has seen many artistic and talented giants. They ve infused the characters with a rich artistic dimension beyond the meaning of the character itself. The characters themselves have developed deep and subtle connotations, and when coupled with Chinese poetry, the characters themselves become works of art.

Religion in China are main Over the ages, many religions have entered China, and at present there are five religions: Buddhism, Taoism, Islam, Catholicism and Protestantism Each religion has added its own mark to the cultural history of China.

According to recent surveys, China has over 100 million followers of various religions.to come by because Buddhism and Taoism have become a blended faith with many following both religions.