Xu Shen () was a Chinese calligrapher, philologist, politician, and writer of the Eastern Han dynasty (25–189 CE). During his own lifetime, Xu was recognized as a preeminent scholar of the Five Classics. which was the first comprehensive dictionary of Chinese characters, as well as the first to organize entries by radical. This work continues to provide scholars with information on the development and historical usage of Chinese characters.
Life
Xu was born about 58 CE in the Zhaoling district of Run'an prefecture (modern Luohe in Henan). Under Jia, he established himself as a master in his own right and enjoyed a positive reputation. From this original binary contrast, Xu Shen formally delineated for the first time the six categories () of Chinese characters.
- Indicators of Function (), whose forms are iconic without being based on concrete objects. Examples include 上 (shàng) and 下 (xià), indicating up and down respectively. Furthermore, Xu Shen does not account for historical phonological change between the earliest days of Chinese writing and his own era. This results in inaccurate sound analyses.
See also
- List of Shuowen Jiezi radicals
References
Cited works
- Mair, Victor H. (ed.) (2001). The Columbia History of Chinese Literature. New York: Columbia University Press. . (Amazon Kindle edition.)
Further reading
- He Jiuying 何九盈 (1995). Zhongguo gudai yuyanxue shi (中囯古代语言学史 "A history of ancient Chinese linguistics"). Guangzhou: Guangdong jiaoyu chubanshe.