The Origin and Early Development of the Chinese Writing System: Vol 78 (American Oriental Series)

Presumed first printing of the first edition. 1994. Approx. 10.25 x 7.25 inches. Red cloth hardboards, with crisp gilt lettering to the spine. Lightly bumped spine head and tail, and with sharp corners. A very clean binding. Text block firmly bound in. With ix and 205 numbered pages on off-white, semi-glossy stock. Note that a previous owner has made a few tiny marks, mostly as tiny black ink circles, in the margins of the introductory section of the text; else an immensely clean interior. Illus. include several B&W figures and tables. No dust jacket is present. A Very Good Plus to Near Fine copy. 1 lb. 9 oz. William G. Boltz is an American sinologist. This book sketches with extraordinary precision the history of the Chinese writing system from the late Shang (ca. 1200 B.C.) when Chinese characters are first in evidence down to the script's standardization and codification a millennium later in the Ch'in and Han (221 B.C.-A.D. 220). Prof. Boltz takes in part a comparative approach to the origin and early structure and development of Chinese writing, suggesting that in its general principles the process was matched pari passu by the way writing first arose in Mesopotamia, Egypt, and among the Mayas (for example, that the Chinese script records the sounds of words, not ideas). The author also examines the question of why the Chinese script never became alphabetic, in spite of hints of such tendencies in the third and second centuries B.C.…