Oracle Inscriptions: The earliest Chinese writing scripts 甲骨文：中国最早的文字

One may say that the evolution and gradual institutionalization of the Chinese writing system can be traced back to the fifth and fourth millennium BC when the earliest extant ancestors of modern Chinese characters were painted or engraved on ancient clay potsherds. However, the earliest examples of highly developed Chinese writing system could only be traced back to the late Shang (1766-1050 BC) period. These are the so-called Oracle Bone Inscriptions (jiaguwen) which were found at the site of the last Shang capital near present-day Anyang, Henan province. These earliest written records contain important historical information on politics, economy, military and science of the Shang dynasty.
Oracle bone characters were inscribed on tortoise shells and the shoulder bones of oxen with sharp instruments. Hence their name in Chinese: 甲骨文jiaguwen ‘shell bone writing’. While the Chinese term refers to the materials on which the writing was produced, the English term ‘oracle bone inscriptions’ tells us that the purpose of these early characters was mainly divination, i.e., fortune-telling, for matters such as the waging of wars.

The rulers of the Shang Dynasty were very superstitious so divination was basically a daily activity for almost everything, such as hunting, warfare, weather, health, farming and selection of auspicious days for ceremonies. The bones not only were used in divination as a tool, but also in recording the activities and results on them.
Although their shapes are very different from the characters of today, being less uniform in shape and more picture-like, oracle bone characters were already developed into a variety of mostly non-pictographic functions, including all the major types of Chinese characters now in use. It is indeed a fully functional and fairly mature writing system. Therefore, we think there must have been precursors to oracle bone characters, which represented the first attempts at Chinese writing.
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我们可以说中国文字的发展和逐渐形成，可以追溯到公元前4或5千年。现代中国文字之最早前身被画或刻于古代陶器的破片中。然而，高度发展的中国文字的证据只能追溯到商朝（公元前1766-1050）末期。这些被称为甲骨文在商朝最后国都-现在的河南安阳被发现。这些古代书写记载有关商朝政治、经济、军事与科学的重要历史记录。
甲骨文是以尖锐工具刻画在龟甲和牛肩骨上，所以称为甲骨文。在中文指的是文字书写的载体，而英文却称为‘刻于骨之神谕’，告诉我们这些文字的目的主要是为了占卜，就是预测如战争成败之类事情。
商朝统治者相当迷信，所以占卜成为每天例行公事，包括行猎、战争、天气、健康、农耕与选择仪式的良辰吉日。甲骨不但成为占卜之工具，亦用以记录活动与占卜结果。
虽然甲骨文的形状比较不均匀和较近形象，与我们今天所用的文字不尽相同；但是，它的字形已经演变出相当多非形象功能，包括许多当今所用的中文字。它其实已经是一种具有功能与相当成熟的文字系统。所以，我们认为在甲骨文之前，应有另一种先驱文字，代表中国文字发生的更早尝试。