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CHALFANT: EARLY CHINESE WRITING 7 
thoroughness of this Chinese lexicographer, he remarks concerning the symbol 4, 
yé that on the standard measures of Er-shih Huang-ti = th @ 4 (B. C. 230) the 
form ¥ appears. For centuries nothing else was known of this unusual form until 
a set of these old “standard measures” was unearthed, and there appeared the 
sign % exactly as the lexicographer had noted. 
Unfortunately the original text of this famous dictionary is not extant, for all 
modern editions show the old symbols analyzed by the author Hsiti in the style 
called “small seal” —a refined form developed during the Han Dynasty (B. ©. 
206-A. D. 264).6 Another valuable work on the ancient language is the Liu Shu 
Tung (AZ z i) “Comparison of the Six Scripts.” 
Still another valuable treatise is that by a scholar of Shantung Province, Chou 
J3) by name, whose beautiful and accurate syllabary of the ancient Chinese language 
is based upon the Liu Shu T’ung. It appeared in the ninth year of the Emperor 
Kang-hsi (A. D. 1670), and is printed in black and red ink for perspicuity.’ The 
author adds a vast number of old symbols copied from antique bronzes and stone 
tablets, presumably in private collections of Chinese antiquarians. 
These works show evidence of careful transcription and classification of sym- 
bols, but with characteristic vagueness, the authors fail to record exactly how and 
where they obtained their information and data. Nevertheless I consider these 
catalogues fairly reliable, barring typographical errors so frequent in Chinese books. 
CHINESE IDEOGRAMS. 
Oriatn or Cuinesp Wrirrna. 
The beginning of the Chinese written language is lost in obscurity. The popular 
tradition that it began with knotted cords” and developed through the grotesque 
“tadpole letters,” has little to substantiate it. It is true that many ancient inscrip- 
tions are extant, the symbols in which are formed by alternating light and heavy 
strokes resembling the form of tadpoles, but when these are reduced to plain 
writing they will be found to belong to a highly developed orthography not differ- 
® As proof that the original text of the Shuo Wén was ina more archaic style, I notice that the forms quoted by a 
Chinese etymologist of A. D, 1670, differ from those now extant. This writer must have had access to a text of the 
Shuo Wén nearer to the original than that of to-day. 
°A complete copy of the first edition is in possession of the writer. 
Granted that the Chinese, like other peoples in their primitive state, used knotted cords, it does not follow that 
such a system of recording and transmitting ideas had intimate connection with a scheme of pictographs subsequently 
devised. It is even possible that at an early date the tradition of a knotted-cord system was so current as to lead writers 
to imitate it in inscribing their written signs, just as they delighted to make ornamental inscriptions, weaving birds, 
beasts, and insects into all the characters. 
