#Oracle bone script

[peekofhistory]

The oracle bone script for "vegetable" (cai) comes from the image of a hand, harvesting some vegetables from the ground :D

The Oracle Bone Script（甲骨文) is the oldest form of written Chinese. They were carved into animal bones or shells as a form of divination. These artefacts have been found dating back four thousand years ago to 2000 BC (Shang Dynasty).

The Chinese characters used today have gone through many script evolutions, but the original oracle bone script design can still be seen.

[niteshade925]

April 13, Xi'an, China, Shaanxi Archaeology Museum/陕西考古博物馆 (Part 1 - Neolithic to pre-Qin dynasty):

Unfortunately I was not able to acquire tickets to the Shaanxi History Museum/陕西历史博物馆, which is one of my biggest regrets from this entire trip, because Shaanxi History Museum is the provincial-level museum, it has a lot more artifacts. Xi’an is the capital city of Shaanxi Province, so it has both the city-level museum and the provincial-level museum; the one I posted about previously, Xi’an museum, is just the city-level museum.

But fortunately Xi’an has a quite a few history museums, which makes sense considering the city’s very long history, so on we go to the Shaanxi Archaeology Museum:

For the longest time I also thought archaeology was a very European thing, but actually? It did also exist in ancient China. The word guxue/古学 (lit. “Antiquity Studies”) existed as early as Eastern Han dynasty (25 - 220 AD), and by Song dynasty (960 - 1279 AD), kaoguxue/考古学/archaeology was pretty well known. Sidenote: the word 考古学 may not mean exactly the same thing as archaeology in Song dynasty, but today it just means archaeology. Below is the Song-era kaoguxue work named 《考古图》 (this book on display was printed in Qing dynasty, judging by the cover):

Compare the above with the notes of a modern archaeologist:

A collection of interesting Neolithic era pottery artifacts with various faces on them. Some are from Yangshao culture/仰韶文化 (5000 - 2700 BC). I swear you can make reaction pics out of these lol

They even have these refrigerator magnet souvenirs lol

Is that a pottery piggy on the right? This piggy looks oddly familiar…

Which reminds me of this other pottery pig found near the Sanxingdui/三星堆 site (Picture from Douyin user 姜丝炒土豆丝). Looks very familiar indeed lol

A pottery drum reminiscent of an udu drum. The one in the front is a replica that visitors can try out

Left: a pottery artifact with a frog face on it. Right: a pottery tiger I think? Not sure.

Shang dynasty (1600 - 1046 BC) jade dragon:

Carved stone bricks from the neolithic site of Shimao/石峁 (~2000 BC). These were originally found in the outer walls of the site, which is why they are presented this way:

Mouth harp artifacts from Shimao culture (top one is a modern one, for comparison). There’s also a map on the many variations of mouth harps from cultures around the world, which is really cool:

Fragments of bone flutes. These were flutes fashioned from crane bones, the most famous of which were the intact flutes unearthed from the Jiahu/贾湖 site dating back to 7000 - 5700 BC, and they were still playable (first link is the 1999 Nature article regarding this discovery, second link goes to a recording of a modern musician playing the song 小白菜 on one of these bone flutes)

A Western Zhou dynasty (1046 – 771 BC) bone hairpin. There were quite a few hairpins in the exhibition, but this is my fav:

And now comes the really cool stuff: oracle/divination bones. Oracle/divination bones were animal bones that ancient Chinese people (mostly of Shang-era) used for divination. These bones have holes drilled into them in a pattern and have oracle bone script/jiaguwen/甲骨文 carved into them (the carved text consists of questions presented to the gods), and then they were heated slowly over a fire until the bone starts to crack. A priest or priestess would then interpret these cracks, as they were seen as answers from the gods, and record the answer on the bone. Sometimes these bones were used purely as records for important events:

Since oracle bone script is the oldest form of Chinese written language, it is possible to decipher the text carved onto these bones:

[elvenrunes]

I carved a little oracle bone stamp!

Stamp before and after use:

(This isn't meant to be historically accurate or grammatiaclly correct I just wanted to carve cool characters)

[noosphe-re]

"The so-called oracle bone inscriptions (jiaguwen 甲骨文 "plastron bone inscriptions") are remnants of archival documents from the late Shang period 商 (17th-11th cent. BCE) upon which records of royal divinations were carved or inscribed. The material is the plastrons (breastshields, gui fujia 龜腹甲) of tortoises or scapulae (shoulder-blades shou jiagu 獸胛骨) of different cattle. The oracle bone inscriptions are the oldest extant Chinese texts written in a perfectly developed script. Unfortunately there are no older stages of the Chinese script preserved (except some clan insignia and examples of logographs of uncertain meaning), but it appears in full maturity on the Shang oracle inscriptions." http://www.chinaknowledge.de/Literature/Historiography/oracle.html

[hennehirokane]

[panicinthestudio]

Oracle Bone, Shang Dynasty, October 8, 2016

Oracle Bone, Shang Dynasty, Reign of Zu Geng, c. 1191-1181 B.C.E. (Shanghai Museum, China) Speakers: Dr. Kristen Chiem and Dr. Beth Harris.

Smarthistory

[ultra-phthalo]

Oracle Bone Script - Cinnabar

Cinnabar is a mineral which can be processed into mercury. In the past mercury was incorrectly perceived as a medicine in many cultures or a part of the elixir of immortality. Mercury is toxic and it lead to the death of Qin Shi Huang who consumed the elixir out of the fear of death. '..."cinnabar; vermillion; elixir; alchemy" is the keyword for Chinese immortality elixirs.' The red mineral cinnabar was anciently used to produce the pigment vermilion and the element mercury '(shuǐyín 水銀 "watery silver")'. - Wikipedia Article

[grand-theft-carbohydrates]

stop using chatgpt!!!! take a bronze pin and carve your questions onto an ox scapula, then toss it into the fire!!!! use the cracks to divine the gods answer!!!!

[yesthatsatumbler]

TBF the Chinese also tried writing everything on (bone, in their case) tablets and hoarding them in their basement. Then some early-modern folks stumbled on that basement with a giant pile of bones in it and started grinding the bones down to sell as medicine. It was a miracle that enough of them actually survived long enough to be researched by modern archaeologists.

Unfortunately bones are also a lot less convenient than clay for writing really tiny symbols on, so a typical Chinese bone text is something like a dozen characters long.

(Also this still doesn't get us to the Xia, just [their successors] the Shang. Which is already much more than was known to be attested before that one pile of bones was discovered.)

The problem with ancient history is that ancient historians were not all that great from separating rumors from facts.

Like, you learn that China’s first dynasty was the Xia Dynasty, and at first that seems pretty solid.

But then you realize that all the knowledge we have about the Xia Dynasty’s existence can be traced to like twoish books from multiple dynasties later, which talk about how the Xia Dynasty was founded by Yu the Great, who had a pet dragon and defeated nine-headed monsters, because this is all knowledge that has been handed down in a giant game of Telephone and no one knows which part is even real.

And a lot of knowledge we have about ancient history is like this. Did Sun Tzu (creator of Sun Tzu’s Art of War) really exist? Or was The Art of War just a collection of common knowledge from the Warring States Period? Did Lao Tse (founder of Taoism) really exist? Or was the Tao Te Ching just a collection of Taoist thought?

Anyway, whenever we tell stories about things that happened in Whatever BC, remember to mentally add “according to this one guy from like 500-1500 years later, who learned it from bedtime stories”.

[gonchillunchis]

enterprise doodles yes i love eating from the supermarket's trash containers no i won't stop

[extrasfromthevoid]

been looking into oracle bone script for...reasons, and am losing my mind a little over the fact that the symbols in the Lady Bone Demon's spell rings are literally just the Chinese zodiac in oracle bone script.

(source)

From left to right: horse, tiger, boar, dragon, rabbit, bull, rooster, bull (again), monkey, rat, dragon (again), rooster (again)

(source)

maybe not the most reputable academic source, but just look at it. they're identical, and match up with other reference sites i found (this one just happens to be the nicest graphic, clearly sporting all twelve of the zodiacs in both oracle script and the modern Chinese).

top row, left to right: rat, bull, tiger, rabbit, dragon, snake

bottom row, left to right: horse, goat, monkey, rooster, dog, boar

like seriously? how cool is this?

[peekofhistory]

[鼎] Ding: A 3 or 4 legged cooking cauldron from ancient China.

Ding were initially created using clay, a fire would be set underneath and rice or meat would be placed inside for cooking. During the Shang and Zhou dynasties (1600 BC - 256 BC) bronze ding were created and they evolved into becoming a symbol of status and power.

The oracle bone script (oldest script of Chinese approx. 2000BC) for "Ding" looks like a cat, with the two "ears" replicating the two handles on the vessels.

[louderfade]

i know nothing about the chinese language but apparently the way you say "bunny" is by combining the characters for rabbit and child. it doesn't mean a baby rabbit though, that's different. it's just the informal way of saying rabbit, like bunny in english.

so then i looked up the etymology and it showed me its older versions:

amazing. the second one is my favorite.

[hanzioftheday]

April 9th

Today's Hanzi character of the day is 车 (車 traditional)

In Mandarin pinyin it is pronounced "chē" and it means cart, or in modern language typically, car.

This is a common radical used in other characters.

Below is the Oracle Bone script where you can more clearly see how it's a pictogram representing a cart.

[anoixtobiblio]

Η ιστορία της κινεζικής γραφής

Η κινεζική γραφή έχει μια πλούσια και συν��ρπαστική ιστορία και έχει τροποποιηθεί πολλές φορές, προκειμένου να αντιπροσωπεύει τα κοινωνικά και πολιτιστικά ρεύματα της κάθε εποχής. Ένα από τα πιο πρώιμα συστήματα γραφής είναι το λεγόμενο Oracle Bone Script ( jiǎgǔwén ), όπου το όνομα περιγράφει το γεγονός πως τα περισσότερα ιδεογράμματα αυτού του είδους γράφονταν- σχεδιάζονταν πάνω σε οστά από…

[leighsartworks216]

Understanding

dragon!Sylus x blind!oracle!Reader

Series Masterlist - Chapter One - Prev Chapter - Next Chapter

I DIDN'T FORGET TO POST THIS ON THURSDAY!!! I found updating on Thursdays actually a horrible idea considering it's one of my busiest days of the week, so I'm shifting to post on Saturdays now. Sorry for anyone who was looking forward to an update then and didn't see one <333

Warnings: none that I know of, but lmk if I missed something

Word Count: 1,910

Main Masterlist

AO3

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You’re scared to leave your room the next day. Not for fear of being hurt… or worse, surprisingly enough. You spent all night (day? It’s hard to keep track of time here) organizing your thoughts and morals. You couldn’t rest until you figured them out, and you were awake still long after, figuring out what to say to him.

With a deep breath and a quick run-through of the script you put together, you follow the rocky walls through the lair. You feel like a child again, trying to sneak out of the temple. As though any moment you’ll be caught and forced to recite hymns to atone for your mischief.

Your search for the fiend is made easy when you hear the quiet clink of metal hitting each other. It leads you to the treasure room, far more echoey than any other room you’ve been to thus far and with air that doesn’t feel as condensed.

Something is tossed into a pile of coins. You can hear them sliding down the side, scraping over one another before coming to rest on the floor. And again.

“Are you… organizing?”

The coins still and you’re left in the silence. You can just barely hear his breathing, the swish of air around the tail you’ve seen in your visions.

“You…” You inhale, trying to find the words you rehearsed to yourself over and over again, lost somewhere in the aether, never to return. “I don’t think you’re… as much of a monster as you make yourself out to be.”

He chuckles humorlessly. You startle at the sound. “No? How come, pet? Is it not in my nature to desecrate the world and its innocents? Is it not destiny that makes me maim?” Something is lifted from one pile and tossed into another with a loud clatter.

You clear your throat. Destiny is a complicated topic, one that has no tried and true answer. Thinking such is blasphemous in itself. You banish the thought quickly before you call down Astra’s ire upon you.

“You said they were trying to kill you. If that is the truth, then you are the innocent here. Everyone will do anything in their power to save their own life, even if that means taking another.” You exhale unevenly. “As far as I’m concerned, their lives were forfeit as soon as they encroached on your…” You gesture vaguely around. “Home.”

“Does your god share your opinion?”

A weak laugh jostles out of you. “Probably not,” you admit. You swallow nervously. “I’m sure He’ll let me know if He doesn’t. But He doesn’t speak for me, and I can only speak so much of His will into existence. Whether He likes it or not, I have beliefs outside of Him, and I believe that you’re not as unredeemable and unforgivable as the stories say… If you were, I wouldn’t be alive right now.”

Your heart thuds uncomfortably in your chest as you wait for any sort of response from him. Maybe you said something wrong, somewhere, somehow, and made things worse. Maybe calling him innocent was an insult, a miscommunication between dragons and mortals, blindly overstepped. But you wait. You listen.

Slowly, you hear him moving again. “Come here.”

For a moment, you think he’s calling you over so he can kill you, strip your bones and discard you with the rest. You force that assumption down, despite how tempting it sounds to get the hell out of there. You wouldn’t get very far anyway.

Carefully, you step further into the room. You have to abandon the reassurance of the doorway in favor of wide open space. Sliding your feet across the floor, you’re careful not to step on anything, with your arms outstretched to feel for anything solid. Some ways from the door, something hard and strong wraps around your waist and drags you to the side. You jump, yelping uncertaintly as you’re nudged to sit down on something plush and soft. It’s unlike anything else you’ve felt around the tunnels.

“I am organizing,” he confirms, as though your outpouring of sympathy never happened. “You can sit here while I do.”

You hesitantly, curiously, feel the plush cushion. It’s almost velvety beneath your fingers, if not a bit rough. “How long has this been here?”

It’s rhetorical, but you hear him chuckle. “Long before you got here, oracle.”

You try not to show your surprise at the new nickname for you. Anything aside from “pet” is greatly welcomed. It does more to ease your nerves than anything else he could have chosen to say.

“Speaking of which, any new insights on your prophecy?”

Gods, you’d nearly forgotten all about it. “Not especially,” you say, “though you being a fiend does answer some of my questions.”

More clinking metal. Rather than being thrown, it sounds like it was carefully placed on the floor. “How so?”

“Your appearance, primarily. It’s unlike anything I’ve seen before.”

“‘Seen’? Did you forget you’re blind, or have you lost your wits in the short time you’ve been here?”

You laugh. Ah, right, he’s never met a Chosen before. You find a back to the furniture you sit on. It’s wooden and intricate. You adjust to lean up against it, legs stretched out along the rest of the cushion. It feels heavenly after days of sleeping on hard rock. “No, I’m as sane as I can be. It’s how I receive the prophecies from Astra; he plays the events in my mind and I can see them actually played out before me as I sleep.”

He hmphs. Something heavy shifts across the floor. “That’s a bit cruel.”

“How do you mean?”

“How long have you been blind?”

“Um, my whole life. I was born this way.”

“And yet he dangles the gift of sight before you every time you need to relay the future. You’d think a god like him could find a better way to do so.”

You pick at the cloth on your hands. “I… I have no comment.”

“Do you miss it when you wake up? Being able to see?”

Do you? You’ve become so intimately accustomed to it, you don’t think about it anymore. Being allowed to see prophecies in such a unique way has become so detached from your blindness; you can’t seem to reconcile them together anymore. The waking world and the world of dreams are two separate entities, incomparable.

“I guess I just don’t think about it once I’ve woken up,” you choose to say.

“Do you wish you could see?”

“No.” There’s no hesitation, no doubt. You feel his eyes on you as you smile. “For all the hardships and struggles, I wouldn’t trade it for anything. Do you wish you weren’t a dragon?”

He scoffs, amused, but a sour note lingers. He doesn’t answer. You suspect he may just wish such a thing.

You undo the messy knot in the cloth around your left hand and begin to unwrap it. Your hands don’t hurt anymore, so perhaps they’ve healed? Either way, these things probably need to be changed out. You clear your throat. “I don’t know much about dragons. Nothing that I’d consider trustworthy information, anyway.”

“What have you heard?”

“The usual: fiends are terrifying beasts that feed on human flesh and steal innocent girls for their own pleasure. They have huge lairs full of gold and priceless treasures.” You set the first wrap aside and begin working on the second. “The lair and hoard are true, I would assume, since…” You gesture around.

“Yes, those are true,” he laughs. You hear his footsteps getting closer. “I can’t say anything for my appearance, but we don’t eat human flesh. I’m sure some of us have stolen girls in the past. As for myself, you’re the first mortal I’ve brought back here.”

“What do you eat?” You can’t recall hearing him eat anything since you arrived. Even from afar, you could usually pinpoint the distinct chewing sounds, as unpleasant as they are. And for how many skeletons you stumbled upon yesterday…

He doesn’t respond right away. His steps stop in front of you, halting your wrapping as you wait for what will happen next. You nearly startle when his voice returns beside your ear, hot breath fanning against your skin and drawing goosebumps along your arms against your will. “Human souls,” he says. You think he’s smirking. He sounds far too amused. “The bones you found. They’re from hunters who come to kill me. Thieves who try to claim my treasures. I ate their souls.”

You swallow. “Will you eat mine?”

He chuckles as he backs away, speaking to you face to face. “Would you like me to?”

“No,” you answer sharply.

“Then I won’t.”

“I assume this is a very rare special treatment, not extended to others.”

“As curious as I am to know what an oracle’s soul tastes like,” he teases with a mournful sigh. “Let me see your hands.”

You finish unwrapping your right hand. The cloth drops into a pile with the other, and you hold both your hands in front of you, palms up. Something hard and sharp holds the back of your hands, startling you. They leave for a second, before holding them again.

“Are those… your hands?”

He hums an affirmative. He tilts your hands from side to side, examining the old injuries you sustained. “They’ve healed well,” he says, sounding impressed. “I guess I was wrong to underestimate you.”

You huff a laugh. “I told you! The people in the city are rough; even I picked up some things here and there for my own sake. I probably wouldn’t have been able to run away if I hadn’t been just a little resourceful.”

“You’re getting cocky now, oracle. Mind your head doesn’t get too big and fall from your shoulders.” He lets go of your hands. Something flicks your forehead. You grab it before he can fully pull away.

It’s sharp and tough, with ridges and plating coming together to form gauntlet-like fingers and a rough palm. He doesn’t take his hand back. You can feel his eyes watching you, staring you down like a bird of prey, but your curiosity fends off the embarrassment.

When you find his wrist, you think maybe you’ll find soft skin. Instead, it’s just more hard plating, as high up as you dare to feel. It’s cold, texture akin to a beetle’s shell. You hold the back of his hand in your palm, as he’d just done to you, and trace the other overtop. A small heart shape catches your attention. You follow its contour a few times, before lightly feeling up the lengths of his fingers. The tips are pointed, enough that if you dared press any harder, they’d surely break through your skin and draw blood.

“Why did you run away?” he asks, voice reduced to a low rumble.

You release his hand. “Astra gave me a prophecy that they didn’t like,” you explain matter-of-factly. Though, maybe he can see the sorrow that crosses your face. “It’s not the first time, but this one predicted the coming of doomsday. It topped the pile of bad prophecies, tipped the scale too far, and they decided I was the one wishing doom on their families. I heard them talking wherever I went, plotting to kill me at dawn’s first light, as a sacrifice to appease Astra. So, I ran.”

“Just the messenger, right?”

“Precisely.”

---

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