The Yin Ruins and the Origin of Chinese Characters

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Among all the letter systems worldwide，the Chinese character is very unique and generates great interest.Let’s go visit the origin of Chinese characters，the Yin Ruins.The Yin Ruins is the relics that the capital of the Shang Dynasty left，located around Xiaotun Village 25 kilometers northwest of Anyang，Henan.During the 1 4th century BC，the tenth king of Shang，Pan Geng，moved the capital from Yan of Shangdong to Yin.Historians call this period the YinShang Dynasty，which became the political，economic，and cultural center of that time.During the 11th century BC，the son of Diyi succeeded the throne and became King Zhou.He was a notorious tyrant in history that doted on Daji，his beautiful concubine，and cruelly treated his ministers and people.His violent reign led to mass betrayal.The Zhou Tribe，located in today’s Shaanxi，aligned the leuds and crusaded against King Zhou，who was defeated at Muye and burned himself at Lutai terrace.The Yin-Shang Dynasty thus passed eight generations with ten kings and ruled for 273 years.After Zhou took over Yin-Shang，the prosperous royal capital around Xiaotun gradually declined.The Yin-Shang civilization had been buried and become the Yin Ruins.

Three thousand years passed. At the end of the 19th century, the peasants in Xiaotun often found pieces of bones during cultivation. Some of them have carvings on surface so they call them”dragon bones”and sold them to pharmacies to treat malaria and wounds. Antique traders sold them as rare medicines to a pharmacy in Beijing, the Darentang Pharmacyat Caishikou in Beijing. The”dragon bones”were encountered by epigraphy expert Wang Yirong.

Wang Yirong was suffering from malaria then and went to get some Chinese medicine. When he checked the medicine, he was surprised by the carvings on the “dragon bones,”in shapes of human and animals. After careful examination, he realized that they are image characters of the ancient times. The carvings recorded the names of the Shang Emperors, so he realized that they are bones for augury in Shang. Along with ancient writing expert Luo Zhenyu and writer Liu E, he traced the origin and found the antique trader who transported these “drago bones.”The trader cheated him and said the bones were from Tangyin of Henan. Wang Yirong purchased a thousand pieces of bones with a high price, but did not obtain the information on the real location of the dragon bones. Luo Zhenyu bribed out the real location of the dragon bones and continued with further research. The discovery of inscriptions on bones and tortoise shells became great news for archaeology. The Yin Ruins began to attract great attention worldwide. The description of the Shang Dynasty in Shi Ji(Historical Records) by Sima Qian can be testified. It’s very regretful that after one year of research, Wang Yirong went to war against the aggression of the aligned troops of eight Western nations. The Chinese were defeated and Wang Yirong committed suicide with his wife.

From 1928 to 1937, China organized 15 excavations at the Yin Ruins. War between China and Japan broke again. The Japanese aggressors came to Yin Ruins for excavations and transported relics. After 1949, archaeological activities began to be organized by the Chinese government. For eighty years since its discovery, the Yin Ruins has been excavated and archives have been opened. The structure and statistics of the Yin Ruins gradually became clarified to us. The total area of the Yin Ruins is 30 square kilometers. There are more than 50 relics of palaces, temples, and other architectural clusters. There are 12 royal mausoleums, several thousand graves for the noble and common people,1,000 sacrificial pits,1,700 some moatditches,5 handicraft workshops,1 60 thousand pieces of bones, with a total number of1.6 million words and 4,500 characters,1,700 of them can be recognized as Chinese characters.

The inscriptions on bones and tortoise shells of the Yin Ruins are among the most important archaeological discoveries of the Shang Dynasty.The collection，compilation，decoding，and study of these inscriptions over the past century have born fruitful achievements.The inscriptions are proven to be a relatively mature letter system，a stage in the legend of Cang Jie’s invention of the Chinese characters.The Chinese written language，with the jumping off point of these inscriptions，is a letter system of hieroglyphic characters.It differs much from today’s universal spelling letters. It has gone through inscriptions on bronze, bamboo slips, and developed to written characters on paper. It has formed different fonts like regular script, running script, official script, cursive style, etc. And it also brought into being the art of Chinese calligraphy. China is a country with a vast territory and various ethnic groups and dialects. The Chinese written language has been functioning greatly to the unification of the country and intercommunion of the people.

In 1961, the state Council listed the Yin Ruins as State Protected Cultural Relic. The main protected area includes the palaces and temples around Xiaotun Village. That used to be the heart of the Imperial Capital where the Emperor lived and dealt with administrative affairs.

North to Wuguan Village at the north bank of Heng River is where the Imperial Mausoleum located. All the Emperors after Pan Geng moved the capital to Yin lie beneath this place. This was also a grand sacrificial place that held slaughterings for ancestor worship rituals.

The restored Xiang Hall of the Fuhao Grave and Fuhao Statue.The name of”Fuhao”was found in the inscriptions on bones and tortoise shells of the Wuding Pe riod.Welearnt that Fuhao used totake charge in sacrificial ceremonies and war affairs.Due to her prestiged status，she should have been the mate of Wuding.