The large seal script or great seal script () is a traditional reference to

Chinese writing Written Chinese () comprises Chinese characters used to represent the Chinese language. Chinese characters do not constitute an alphabet or a compact syllabary. Rather, the writing system is roughly Logogram, logosyllabic; that is, a character gen ...

from before the

Qin dynasty The Qin dynasty ( ; zh, c=秦朝, p=Qín cháo, w=), or Ch'in dynasty in Wade–Giles romanization ( zh, c=, p=, w=Ch'in ch'ao), was the first dynasty of Imperial China. Named for its heartland in Qin state (modern Gansu and Shaanxi), ...

(i.e. before 221 BCE), and is now popularly understood to refer narrowly to the writing of the Western and early Eastern Zhou dynasties (i.e. 1046–403 BCE), and more broadly to also include the

oracle bone script Oracle bone script () is an ancient form of Chinese characters that were engraved on oracle bonesanimal bones or turtle plastrons used in pyromantic divination. Oracle bone script was used in the late 2nd millennium BC, and is the earliest k ...

(c.1250–1000 BCE). The term is in contrast to the name of the official script of the Qin dynasty, which is often called the small or lesser seal script (小篆 ''Xiǎozhuàn'', also termed simply ''seal script''). However, due to the lack of precision in the term, scholars often avoid it and instead refer more specifically to the provenance of particular examples of writing. In the

Han dynasty The Han dynasty (, ; ) was an Dynasties in Chinese history, imperial dynasty of China (202 BC – 9 AD, 25–220 AD), established by Emperor Gaozu of Han, Liu Bang (Emperor Gao) and ruled by the House of Liu. The dynasty was preceded by th ...

(202 BCE – 220 CE), when clerical script became the popular form of writing and (small) seal script was relegated to more formal usage such as on signet

seal Seal may refer to any of the following: Common uses * Pinniped, a diverse group of semi-aquatic marine mammals, many of which are commonly called seals, particularly: ** Earless seal, or "true seal" ** Fur seal * Seal (emblem), a device to imp ...

s and for the titles of stelae (inscribed stone memorial tablets which were popular at the time), the people began to refer to the earlier Qin dynasty script as 'seal' script (due to the continued use on signet seals, or name chops). At that time, there was still knowledge of even older, often more complex graphs (dating to the middle to late Zhou dynasty, and directly ancestral to the Qin forms) which differed from the Qin seal script forms, but which resembled them in their rounded, seal-script-like style (as opposed to the squared, rectilinear clerical script style).中國古代簡帛字形、辭例數據庫
/ref> As a result, two terms emerged to describe them: 'greater seal script' for the more complex, earlier forms, and 'small seal script' for the Qin dynasty forms. It is only more recently that the term 'greater seal script' has been extended to refer to

Western Zhou The Western Zhou ( zh, c=, p=Xīzhōu; c. 1045 BC – 771 BC) was a royal dynasty of China and the first half of the Zhou dynasty. It began when King Wu of Zhou overthrew the Shang dynasty at the Battle of Muye and ended when the Quanrong n ...

forms or even

oracle bone Oracle bones () are pieces of ox scapula and turtle plastron, which were used for pyromancy – a form of divination – in ancient China, mainly during the late Shang dynasty. '' Scapulimancy'' is the correct term if ox scapulae were used for ...

script, of which the Han dynasty coiners of this term were unaware. The term 'large seal script' is also sometimes traditionally identified with a group of characters from a book c. 800 BCE entitled ''

Shizhoupian The ''Shizhoupian'' () is the first known Chinese dictionary, and was written in the ancient Great Seal script. The work was traditionally dated to the reign of King Xuan of Zhou (827–782 BCE), but many modern scholars assign it to the State ...

'', preserved by their inclusion in the Han dynasty lexicon, the ''

Shuowen Jiezi ''Shuowen Jiezi'' () is an ancient Chinese dictionary from the Han dynasty. Although not the first comprehensive Chinese character dictionary (the ''Erya'' predates it), it was the first to analyze the structure of the characters and to give t ...

''.

Xu Shen Xu Shen ( CE) was a Chinese calligrapher, philologist, politician, and writer of the Eastern Han Dynasty (25-189). He was born in the Zhaoling district of Run'an prefecture (today known as Luohe in Henan Province). During his own lifetime, ...

, the author of ''Shuowen'', included these when they differed from the structures of the Qin (small) seal script, and labelled the examples Zhòuwén () or Zhòu graphs. This name comes from the name of the book and not the name of a script. Thus, it is not correct to refer to the c. 800 BCE Zhoū () dynasty script ''as'' Zhòuwén. Similarly, the Zhòu graphs are merely examples of large seal script when that term is used in a broad sense.

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). . (in Chinese) * Qiu Xigui ''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. . {{list of writing systems History of the Chinese script East Asian calligraphy Chinese script style

See also

References