二里头文化的文字符号与礼制文明

The Written Symbols and Ritual Civilization of Erlitou Culture

近年来,河南偃师二里头、伊川南寨等遗址均出土了一定数量具有象形文字特征的符号,字形上可与商代金文相互对照。同时,二里头文化发现了成套的陶礼器和青铜礼器,表明该时期正是早期中国礼制趋于完备的阶段。晚商金文中一些器物类象形文字,在构型上与同时代器物存在明显的形态差异,反而与年代较早的二里头文化器物风格接近,字体创制时间可上溯至二里头文化时期。这批早期文字是中国古代文明独立孕育的产物,其发现与解读,见证了华夏文化礼器与文字的密切关系,以及中国古代文明核心的礼制文脉传承。

In recent years,a relatively large number of symbols with ideographic characteristics have been unearthed in sites including Erlitou in Yanshi and Nanzhai in Yichuan,Henan Province.The form of these symbols shares similarities with the bronze inscriptions of the Shang dynasty.At the same time,the discovery of complete sets of pottery and bronze ritual vessels in the Erlitou culture gives evidence that this period witnessed the gradual maturity of the early Chinese ritual system.Some ideographic bronze inscriptions carved in the late Shang dynasty are substantially different from the artifacts of the same era in terms of configuration,but akin to the artifacts of the earlier Erlitou culture in terms of style,suggesting that ideographic inscriptions of this type were created as early as the Erlitou period.This early ideographic script wasa product independently nurtured in ancient Chinese civilization,and its discovery and interpretation have witnessed an close relationship between Chinese ritual vessels and script,as well as the inheritance of a ritual system which was central to ancient Chinese civilization.