Ancient Chinese Language

What is unique about Chinese culture is that it is continuous, or unbroken, from its earliest recorded history to today. Writing, art, artifacts, and archaeological remains reveal a culture that remained mostly unified over centuries.

The Chinese writing system developed more than 4,000 years ago. The oldest examples of written Chinese are from the 14th or 15th century B.C., in the Shang dynasty. We know about Chinese history from artifacts like tortoise shells and animal bones with writing on them.

The Chinese language is written in pictographs, or pictures that represent words. Many characters in the Chinese language have been written in similar ways for long periods of time. Scholars who recorded history could read and interpret other writers’ works written thousands of years before.