Chinese calligraphy: brush, scripts and masters

A calligrapher works with four tools that Chinese calls the "Four Treasures of the Study" (文房四宝): brush, ink, paper and inkstone. 文房 means the scholar's study. The phrase appears to date from the Southern and Northern Dynasties (420-589).

• The brush: a handle, usually of bamboo (sometimes sandalwood, jade or ivory), and a head of animal hair, such as rabbit, goat, wolf or weasel. According to the Metropolitan Museum, the flexible hair brush came into regular use under the Han (汉朝); its supple tip made effects possible, such as long wavelike diagonal strokes, that could not be obtained by incising.

• The ink: a solid inkstick is ground on the stone with a little water to give a dark liquid.

• The paper: how fast it absorbs and its surface texture are among the main factors in the result.

• The inkstone: the stick is ground on it and the ink collects in a well. Inkstone making reached its peak under the Tang and Song, when some stones became intricate works of art.

Each treasure also has its famous products: the Hu brush (湖笔) from Huzhou, Zhejiang, Hui ink (徽墨), Xuan paper (宣纸) and Duan (端砚) or She (歙砚) inkstones. The hand-making of Xuan paper in Jing County (Anhui) has been on UNESCO's intangible heritage list since 2009: made from tree bark and rice straw, it takes more than a hundred steps and over two years.

Calligraphers distinguish five main script types: seal, clerical, cursive, running and regular. They are often listed as "seal, clerical, regular, running, cursive", but that is not quite the order in which they appeared. According to Britannica and the Metropolitan Museum, cursive script was already born under the Han, and running script grew out of clerical script while regular script was taking shape.

• Seal (篆书): evolved from bronze script under the Zhou (周). After unification in 221 BCE, chancellor Li Si (李斯) made the Qin (秦) "small seal" script the official script of the whole empire. Its English name comes from seals, on which it remained in use.

• Clerical (隶书): an early form appeared in the state of Qin in the late Warring States period (examples survive from the 3rd century BCE); it matured and became dominant under the Han. Tradition credited a Qin official, Cheng Miao, with inventing it; archaeology shows a gradual evolution instead.

• Cursive (草书): born under the Han, it had its greatest growth under the Tang (唐朝).

• Running (行书): a semi-cursive hand that developed out of clerical script between the 1st and 3rd centuries CE.

• Regular (楷书): formed under the Three Kingdoms and Western Jin (220-316), as clerical strokes took on some of the fluidity of cursive. Zhong You (钟繇, 151-230) is seen as its first master, and it matured under the Tang. It is still the standard script today.

Wang Xizhi (王羲之, c. 303 – c. 361), a scholar of the Eastern Jin (东晋), is for Encyclopaedia Britannica the most celebrated of Chinese calligraphers; he is called the "Sage of Calligraphy" (书圣). Even in his lifetime, it is said, a few of his characters were priceless.

His most famous work is the Preface to the Orchid Pavilion Poems (兰亭集序). In 353 CE, on the 3rd day of the 3rd month, scholars gathered at the Orchid Pavilion near today's Shaoxing (Zhejiang), where Wang Xizhi was then governor, for the spring purification festival (修禊): they drank wine, wrote poems, and Wang wrote the preface to the collection on the spot. Wang Xizhi hosted forty-one guests, forty-two people in all, and twenty-six of them wrote poems.

The text has 324 characters in 28 columns, in running script (行书), and it became the model for that style; it is nicknamed "the finest running script under Heaven" (天下第一行书).

The original is lost. Emperor Taizong of Tang (唐太宗, r. 626-649) made Wang's style the orthodox model, had his writings collected and ordered copies; according to tradition, the original was buried with him in his mausoleum, the Zhaoling (昭陵). The most prized copy, attributed to Feng Chengsu (冯承素) and called the "Shenlong version" after a small seal of the Shenlong era, is in the Palace Museum in Beijing.

Under the Tang (唐朝, 618-907), regular script reached maturity. One of its great masters was Yan Zhenqing (颜真卿, 709-784), a calligrapher, general and governor who stayed loyal to the dynasty. He gave his name to a style of regular script, the "Yan style" (颜体), known for strength, boldness and grandeur, and widely imitated. With Liu Gongquan (柳公权), he produced most of the finest regular-script works of the period, and almost every calligrapher after him was influenced by him to some degree.

Yet his most moving work is a rough draft. During the An Lushan rebellion (安史之乱), which broke out in 755, his cousin Yan Gaoqing (颜杲卿) and Gaoqing's son Yan Jiming (颜季明) were killed. In 758, when Jiming's head was recovered, Yan Zhenqing wrote the Draft of a Requiem to My Nephew (祭侄文稿) in running script, overcome by emotion: the text is full of crossings-out and corrections.

It is often called "the second-finest running script under Heaven", after Wang Xizhi's preface. The original is in the National Palace Museum in Taipei.

To practise the basic strokes of regular script, calligraphers work on a single character: 永 (yǒng, "forever, eternal", as in 永远). It contains the eight most common strokes of regular script. It was believed that practising these "eight principles of 永" (永字八法) often from the very start would ensure beautiful handwriting.

Each stroke has a vivid name that says how to write it: the dot is 侧, "side"; the horizontal stroke is 勒, "bridle"; the rising stroke is 策, "horsewhip". These old names sit on top of the modern names of the strokes (笔画): 点, 横, 竖, 钩, 提, 弯, 撇, 捺.

The method's origin is uncertain. One tradition says Wang Xizhi spent years writing this single character, convinced that it held the eight rules of regular script. Other accounts credit Cui Ziyu (崔子玉), Zhong You (钟繇), the monk Zhiyong (智永) of the Sui, who is said to have passed it on and spread it, or Zhang Xu (张旭) of the Tang.

In 2009 Chinese calligraphy was inscribed on UNESCO's Representative List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity. UNESCO's description stresses that it has always been more than a tool for communication: it is still valued as an art, even "in an age of ballpoint pens and computers". It is practised by professionals and keen amateurs alike; besides traditional master-to-apprentice teaching, it is taught at school. Many ceremonies marking national celebrations and religious rituals include it, and it has influenced modern art, architecture and design.

In parks, another practice can be seen every morning: water calligraphy, or "ground writing" (地书). Mostly retired people write characters on the paving stones with a long brush, often home-made with a foam head and an old handle, dipped in water instead of ink. The water soon evaporates and the text disappears. According to a study in the journal Cultural Studies, this public calligraphy appeared in Beijing in the early 1980s, after the start of the Reform and Opening-up policy, and then spread to parks all over China. In Beijing's large parks the calligraphers share the morning with tai chi groups, dancers, choirs and chess players.