Chinese history

Chinese civilization originated in various regional centers along both the Yellow River and the Yangtze River valleys in the Neolithic era, but the Yellow River is said to be the Cradle of Chinese civilization.

The first Chinese dynasty is supposed to be the Xia Dynasty (夏朝; ca. 2070 BC–ca. 1600 BC) but the written history of China can be found as early as the Shang Dynasty (商朝 c. 1700 – c. 1046 BC). Oracle bones with ancient Chinese writing from the Shang Dynasty have been radiocarbon dated to as early as 1500 BC. The origins of Chinese culture, literature and philosophy developed during the Zhou Dynasty (周朝; 1045-256 BC).

A Chinese character, also known as a Han character (汉字; Hànzì), is a logogram used in writing Chinese (hanzi) Japanese (kanji). Chinese characters are also known as sinographs, and the writing system sinography. In the Chinese writing system, the characters are monosyllabic, each usually corresponding to a spoken syllable with a basic meaning.

The number of Chinese characters contained in the Kangxi dictionary compiled during the emperor Kangxi, in 1716, in the beginning of the Qing Dinasty, has 47.035 characters, but full literacy in Chinese language requires a knowledge of between three and four thousand characters.

Shāng dynasty, oracle bone script coexisted as a simplified form alongside the normal script of bamboo books (preserved for us in typical bronze inscriptions) as well as extra-elaborate pictorial forms (often clan emblems) found on many bronzes.

Mainland China adopted simplified characters in 1956, but Traditional Chinese characters are still used in Hong Kong, Macau and Taiwan. Singapore has also adopted simplified Chinese characters.