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The myth and legend of Cangjie’s creation of Chinese characters

The initial stereotype of Chinese characters is oracle bone inscriptions, and oracle bone inscriptions inherit the original depiction symbols, and then slowly develop into characters. It is recorded in Huainanzi Benjing: “In the past, Cangjie wrote books, but the sky rained millet, and ghosts cried at night.” “Shuowen Jiezi Sequence” records: “In the beginning of Cangjie’s writing, it was based on pictographs, so It is called the text; after that, the shape and sound are mutually beneficial, that is, the word.” That is, “Cangjie made the word”

The origin of Cangjie’s characters

According to the pre-Qin legend, Cangjie was the one who created the characters. “Xunzi · Jieshi” records: “There are many good books, and Cangjie is the only one.” “Lv’s Spring and Autumn” records: “Xizhong made cars, Cangjie made books.” According to legend, Cangjie was the historian of the Yellow Emperor and a representative of the ancient texts. “Shuowen Jiezi” records: Cangjie was the historian who created characters in the Yellow Emperor period, and was honored as “the saint who created characters”. Historian Xu Xu believes that the appearance of writing should be related to Cangjie.

Cangjie’s writing process

According to legend, Cang Jie was the emperor’s historian. After the Yellow Emperor unified China, he felt that the method of keeping things in knots was not enough, so he ordered Cang Jie to find a way. Cangjie built a house on a high platform on the south bank of the Wushui River at that time, and devoted himself to making characters. However, he thought hard, and after thinking for a long time, he could not compose a word.

Coincidentally, one day, when Cang Jie was thinking about it, he saw a phoenix flying from the sky, and the thing in his mouth fell, just in front of Cang Jie, Cang Jie picked it up and saw a hoof on it. But Cangjie couldn’t recognize the hoof print, so he asked a hunter who happened to come.

The hunter looked at it and said, “This is the hoof print of the Pixiu (píxiū), which is different from the hoof print of other beasts.” Cang Jie was very inspired by the hunter’s words. He thought that everything has its own characteristics. If you can grasp the characteristics of things and draw images, everyone can recognize them.

Isn’t this just a character? Since then, Cangjie has carefully observed the characteristics of various things, such as the sun, The moon, stars, clouds, and various birds and beasts, as well as the use of utensils, and according to their characteristics, draw figures and create many pictographs. Over time and over time, Cangjie created more characters.

The legend of Cangjie’s creation of Chinese characters

One: Once, Cangjie provided wrong historical facts, which caused the Yellow Emperor to lose the border negotiation with the Yan Emperor. Afterwards, Cangjie resigned from office ashamed and traveled around the world, a good way to visit and record historical events. Three years later, he returned to his hometown, Yangwu Village, Baishui, and lived alone in a deep ditch. He gave these symbols a name, and he called them words.

Second: Cangjie was an official under the Yellow Emperor. At that time, Cangjie’s job was to manage the number of livestock in the pen. Cang Jie was very smart and quickly became familiar with the number under his control. However, as time passed, the number of management gradually increased, and he couldn’t remember it with his head alone. .

Then I started making circles on the rope and hanging shells in the circles. This method worked very well and used it for a long time. Cangjie’s ability was strong, so the Yellow Emperor gave Cangjie more and more things to manage. After a long time, hanging shells would no longer work.

Cangjie began to think of a way again. When he came to a fork in the road one day, three old people were arguing about which way to go. An old man insisted on going east, saying there were antelopes; an old man wanted to go north, saying that he could catch a herd of deer not far ahead; an old man wanted to go west, saying that there were two tigers.

When Cang Jie asked, it turned out that they were all looking at the footprints of wild beasts on the ground. Cangjie was overjoyed: since a footprint represents a beast, why can’t I use a symbol to represent what I am in charge of? Later, he began to create various symbols to represent things. Sure enough, manage things wisely. Words were formed later.

Some scholars believe that Cangjie’s creation of Chinese characters is just a legend, but he may be the organizer of Chinese characters. He was called “the ancestor of Chinese characters” by later generations. He collected, organized and used the characters that were passed down among the ancestors, and later developed into oracle bone inscriptions.