Sorting Of "zi" Of Yinxu Oracle Bone Inscriptions And Study Of Its Characters

Except for "king" oracle bone, the Yinxu oracle bone inscriptions also include "zi" oracle bones which used by noble leaders to divine."zi" refers to the noble leaders of Shan Dynasty. The materials of "zi" oracle bones are important in study of society and forms of family in Shan Dynasty. Through the comparative study of several groups of "zi" oracle bones,"zi" oracle bones and "king" oracle bones, and the research of features of organization of "zi" in oracle bones, we can provide more elaborate materials to the classification and division of oracle bones.This thesis starts form the sorting of materials of "zi" oracle bones and consults newest achievements of conjugation of oracle bones to carding the mistakes in oracle bones such as wrong explanations and careless omissions. The materials of "zi" oracle bones are based on the Doctoral Dissertation of Jiang Yubin and the further research upon his classification of "zi" oracle bones.Here is the structure of my thesis:The first chapter "Introduction" is summarization of the survey of "zi" oracle bones, which is divided into traditional "zi" oracle bones and"hua dong"oracle bones. The traditional "zi" oracle bones include"午"group, women group,"zi" group, group of rounded body, group of inferior body and other kinds of "zi" oracle bones. Firstly summarize the whole situation of study, then narrative elaborately the use of characters in study. From the speculation of the outside features of Shan Dynasty by Dong Zuobing in1931, I introduce the founds and cognition of former scholars about oracle bones which were not "king", such as opinions of beizhongmaoshu,chen mengjia,li xueqin,lin yun,pen yushang,fang shuxin,huang tianshu,wei cide,chang yaohua and jiang yubin. With the"hua dong"oracle bones were divided by the publication of oracle bones of "yinxu huayuangzhuang dongdi", and focuses on the use of characters to summarize the research work. The framework of this thesis is also setting "zi" oracle bones and"hua dong"oracle bones under separately study; the later one was seemed as one special and important "zi" oracle bones to discuss.The second chapter is about the use of characters of "zi" oracle bones. Section One is"午"group, women group and study of use of characters in "zi" group (including the use of tagged characters, word style, variant characters, habit on use of characters, combined characters, mirror writings, reoccurred characters, omission and discuss of some special writing and use etc.). Section Two is study about use of the sort of round body, of inferior body and other kinds of use in characters of "zi" oracle bones. The content is the same as first section. Section Three is the survey of use about "hua dong" oracle bones, and the structure is also similar with before. Section Four is comparative study between the habits of characteristic use in "zi" oracle bones, such as in"午"group, women group use"禦"instead of it; round body and inferior body use"猷"to display "worried"; differences in expressions on"有/又/侑/右"of varied groups of "zi" oracle bones; distributions of"月"and"夕"in different groups; the use of"弜/勿/弗/不''and so on. It is valuable to survey the habits in using of words and characters. Then I compare them with the "king" oracle bone to get a systemic understanding of all use of oracle inscriptions. And this is a prospective research project. Chapter Three is monographic study of "zi" oracle bones. Section One discusses some problems in traditional classification of "zi" oracle bones, judged the sorts of oracle bones by habits of use in characters, the content of oracle bones, the results of combination, to modify mistakes of classification in recording documents. Section Two is study of "hua dong" oracle bones, such as primitiveness, variant characters, and new characters of "hua dong" oracle bones. Oracle bones discovered in huayuangzhuang dongdi in1991are very precious materials of "zi" oracle bones. Numerous fonts were seen for the first time, they are more primitive and more hieroglyphic compared with contemporary characters, such as"面","首","从","(?)","我","羔''and so on. The discussion about fonts and meaning of"寮","(?)","(?)","灉","(?)","(?)","委","圅","勿","(?)","新","求","俆","媀"and so on in this section is one of my thesis's achievements. Some of the fonts even explain the basic meaning of oracle bones in forming structure and provide more referential evidence in former doubtful opinions. Section Three provide supplementary comments on "zi" oracle bones. It is about some problems I met in carding, proofreading and annotation of "zi" oracle bones. They are sorted as reading notes, for example:affirmation of lacked font of"禦"and the discussion about"(?)"oracle bones, survey about the primitive meaning of"求"and so on.Chapter Four is proofreading and sorting of "zi" oracle bones. Section One is proofreading and examples of each group of "zi" oracle bones. For there are many wrong and omitted explanations of "zi" oracle bones in current works. This section will solve them one by one example, and to solve plenty of issues in paraphrase of fonts. Section Two is sorting of materials about "zi" oracle bones. The sorting style combines with current combination achievements to carding out complete paraphrases. That's different with the way used in摹释总集,合集释文,校释总集and etc. Some experiences are declared in "Note".Appendixes is the form of features of "zi" oracle bones which enumerates the typical fonts of groups of "zi" oracle bones to reckon the feature of characters of "zi" oracle bones directly.As a conclusion, the major content of the thesis are:a whole research over features in use of characters of"zi"oracle bones; a special discussion on huadong oracle bones; an careful carding, proofreading and annotation on" zi "oracle bones; a correction over numerous problems existed in works such as wrong and omitted explanations and a formulation of sheet over features about characters of "zi" oracle bones.