倉頡是什么人呢？他所處的時(shí)代大約是四千多年前的父系氏族社會(huì)的早期階段。據(jù)古籍記載，倉頡“首有四目，通于神明，仰觀奎星圜曲之勢(shì)，俯察龜文鳥跡之象，博采眾美，合而為字，是曰古文。”倉頡因此被稱為“萬代文字之宗，千古士儒之師?！?/span>

Who was Cangjie? The era he lived in was approximately the early stage of the patrilineal clan society over four thousand years ago. According to ancient records, Cangjie 'had four eyes on his head, which were in communication with deities. He could look up at the curved shape of the Kui star and look down at the patterns of turtle characters and bird traces, absorbing the beauty of all and combining them to form characters. This is called ancient literature.' Cangjie is thus called 'the master of writing for all ages and the teacher of scholars and scholars for all time.'

甲骨文之后便是金文，又叫做“鐘鼎文”，是商周時(shí)代可在青銅器上的文字，其中以周代金文最多。商代金文和殷墟甲骨文在形體上非常接近，而周代金文要簡(jiǎn)化的多，字體也整齊的多，這說明漢字到周代已經(jīng)有了長(zhǎng)足的進(jìn)步。

After oracle bone script came bronze inscriptions, also known as 'bell and tripod inscriptions', which were the characters that could be found on bronze wares during the Shang and Zhou dynasties. Among them, the bronze inscriptions of the Zhou Dynasty were the most numerous. The bronze inscriptions of the Shang Dynasty and the oracle bone inscriptions of the Yin Ruins are very similar in form, while the bronze inscriptions of the Zhou Dynasty are much more simplified and the characters are much neatser. This indicates that Chinese characters had made considerable progress by the Zhou Dynasty.

象形：屬于“獨(dú)體造字法”。用文字的線條或筆畫，把要表達(dá)物體的外形特征，具體地勾畫出來。例如“月”字像一彎明月的形狀，“龜”字像一只龜?shù)膫?cè)面形狀， “馬”字就是一匹有馬鬣、有四腿的馬，“魚”是一條有魚頭、魚身、魚尾的游魚，“艸”（草的本字）是兩束草，“門”字就是左右兩扇門的形狀。而“日”字就像一個(gè)圓形，中間有一點(diǎn)，很像我們?cè)谥币曁枙r(shí)，所看到的形態(tài)。

Pictographic: It belongs to the 'single-component character creation method'. Use the lines or strokes of words to specifically outline the shape features of the object to be expressed. For example, the character '月' is in the shape of a crescent moon, the character '龜' is in the side shape of a turtle, the character '馬' is a horse with a mane and four legs, the character '魚' is a swimming fish with a head, body and tail, the character '艸' (the original character for grass) is two bundles of grass, and the character '門' is the shape of two doors on the left and right. The character '日' is like a circle with a dot in the middle, very much like the shape we see when we look directly at the sun.

指事：屬于“獨(dú)體造字法”。與象形的主要分別，是指事字含有繪畫中較抽象的東西。例如“刃”字是在“刀”的鋒利處加上一點(diǎn)，以作標(biāo)示；“兇”字則是在陷阱處加上交叉符號(hào)；“上”、“下”二字則是在主體“一”的上方或下方畫上標(biāo)示符號(hào)；“三”則由三橫來表示。這些字的勾畫，都有較抽象的部分。

Note: It belongs to the 'individual character creation method'. The main difference from pictographic characters is that the character '事' contains more abstract elements in painting. For example, the character '' is marked by adding a dot to the sharp part of a' 刀 '. The character '' is formed by adding a cross symbol at the trap. The characters '上' and '下' are marked by symbols drawn above or below the main body '一'. The number 'three' is represented by three horizontal strokes. The delineations of these characters all have rather abstract parts.

會(huì)意：屬于“合體造字法”。會(huì)意字由兩個(gè)或多個(gè)獨(dú)體字組成，所以組成的字形或字義，合并起來，表達(dá)此字的意思。例如“酒”字，以釀酒的瓦瓶“酉”和液體 “水”合起來，表達(dá)字義；“解”字的剖拆字義，是以用“刀”把“?！焙汀敖恰狈珠_來字達(dá)；“鳴”指鳥的叫聲，于是用“口”和“鳥”組成而成。

Associative meaning: It belongs to the 'compound character creation method'. Ideographic characters are composed of two or more single characters, so the combined form or meaning of the formed characters, when combined, conveys the meaning of the character. For example, the character '酒' (wine) is expressed by combining the earthenware bottle '' (you) used for brewing wine with the liquid' 水 '(water). The split meaning of the character '解' is to separate the characters '牛' (ox) and '角' (horn) with the character '刀'. 'Ming' refers to the call of a bird, so it is formed by combining 'mouth' and 'bird'.

形聲：屬于“合體造字法”。形聲字由兩部分組成：形旁(又稱“義符”)和聲旁(又稱“音符”)。形旁是指示字的意思或類屬，聲旁則表示字的相同或相近發(fā)音。例如“櫻”字，形旁是“木”，表示它是一種樹木，聲旁是“嬰”，表示它的發(fā)音與“嬰”字一樣；“籃”字形旁是“竹”，表示它是竹制物品，聲旁是 “監(jiān)”，表示它的韻母與“監(jiān)”字一樣（古音及部分方言）；“齒”字的下方是形旁，畫出了牙齒的形狀，上方的“止”是聲旁，表示兩字韻母相同。

Phonogram: It belongs to the 'combined character creation method'. Phonogram characters consist of two parts: the radical (also known as the 'semantic component') and the phonetic component (also known as the 'musical note'). A radical indicates the meaning or category of a character, while a phonetic component shows the same or similar pronunciation of a character. For example, the character '' has the radical' 木 '(wood), indicating that it is a kind of tree, and the phonetic component' '(infant), suggesting that its pronunciation is the same as that of the character' '. The radical of the character 'baskets' is 'bamboo', indicating that it is made of bamboo. Its phonetic radical is 'supervision', suggesting that its vowel is the same as that of the character 'supervision' (in ancient pronunciation and some dialects). The lower part of the character '齒' is the phonetic component, which depicts the shape of a tooth. The upper part, '止', is the phonetic component, indicating that the two characters have the same final.

轉(zhuǎn)注：屬于“用字法”。各說文家解釋不同。大致有“形轉(zhuǎn)”“音轉(zhuǎn)”“義轉(zhuǎn)”三說。江聲認(rèn)為所謂“建類一首”是指部首，“考”和“老”同屬老部。戴震認(rèn)為轉(zhuǎn)注就是互訓(xùn)，《說文解字》“考”字下說“老也”，“老”字下說“考也”，“轉(zhuǎn)相為注，互相為訓(xùn)”的例子。

Note: It belongs to the 'method of using characters'. Different commentators have different explanations. There are roughly three theories: 'form transformation', 'sound transformation' and 'meaning transformation'. Jiang Sheng believes that the so-called 'Jian Le Yi' refers to the radical, and 'kao' and 'Lao' both belong to the Lao radical. Dai Zhen believes that the transformation and annotation is mutual training. In 'Shuowen Jiezi', the character '考' is said to have '老也' under it, and the character '老' is said to have '考也' under it. This is an example of 'transforming each other into a annotation and training each other'.

假借：漢字是由象形 、象意的文字發(fā)展起來的。有的外物有形象可以描繪，有的意思可以利用圖像和筆畫來表現(xiàn) ，可是有很多代表某些事物的概念不能用象形、指意的方式隨時(shí)造出文字來表現(xiàn)，于是就假借已有的音同或音近的字來代表 ，這種跟借用的字的形義完全不合的字就稱為假借字。

Borrowing: Chinese characters have developed from pictographic and ideographic writing. Some external objects have images that can be depicted, and some meanings can be expressed through images and strokes. However, there are many concepts representing certain things that cannot be represented by creating characters at any time through pictographic or indicative methods. Therefore, existing characters with the same or similar pronunciations are borrowed to represent them. Such characters that are completely inconsistent in form and meaning with the borrowed characters are called borrowed characters.