Stroke order: Difference between revisions

Stroke order for the character 言 shown by shade going from black to red.

Stroke order (Chinese: 筆順 bǐshùn; Template:Lang-ja hitsujun or 書き順 kaki-jun) refers to the way in which Chinese characters are written. A stroke is a movement of the writing instrument, in modern times most commonly a pen, pencil, or writing brush. "Stroke order" can refer both to the numerical order in which the strokes of a given character are written and to the direction in which the writing instrument must move in producing a particular stroke.

Chinese characters are used in various forms in modern Chinese languages, Japanese, and, in South Korea, for Korean. They are known as hànzì in Mandarin, kanji in Japanese, and hanja or hanmun in Korean.

It is a common misconception that Chinese characters were originally encarved; in fact, Chinese characters are believed to have originally been brush-written on perishable materials such as bamboo or wood slats, which could then be bound together like Venetian blinds, and rolled for storage. Examples of such books have been found dating to the late Zhou dynasty.

Although it would take over a thousand years for uniform, defined forms for each character to appear, now, as then, each character comprises a number of strokes which must be written in a prescribed order.

The precise number of Chinese characters in existence is disputed. The Japanese "Daikanwa Jiten", a modern comprehensive dictionary of Chinese characters, includes fifty thousand, and more recently published Chinese dictionaries have included more than eighty thousand, although whether these are all unique characters or merely obscure variant forms is debated. Regardless of the total number, literacy in Chinese requires knowledge of three to five thousand characters, and Japanese two to three thousand characters.

The number of strokes per character for most characters is between one and thirty, but the number of strokes in some obscure characters can reach as many as seventy. In the twentieth century, simplification of Chinese characters took place in mainland China, greatly reducing the number of strokes in some characters, and a similar but more moderate simplification also took place in Japan. The basic rules of stroke order, however, remained the same.

Development of rules

Outline of the character 永. This character, meaning "eternity," contains 8 stroke shapes in 5 basic and compound strokes, and is often used for practice by beginning calligraphers.

The rules for stroke order evolved to facilitate vertical writing, to maximize ease of writing and reading, to aid in producing uniform characters, and — since a person who has learned the rules can infer the stroke order of most characters — to ease the process of learning to write. They were also influenced by the highly cursive Grass Script style of calligraphy.

While children must learn and use correct stroke order in school, adults may ignore or forget the normalised stroke order for certain characters, or develop idiosyncratic ways of writing. While this is rarely a problem in day-to-day writing, in calligraphy, stroke order is vital; incorrectly ordered or written strokes can produce a visually unappealing or, occasionally, incorrect character, particularly in styles such as Grass Script, in which individual strokes are often combined in fluid motions without lifting the brush from the paper.

The Eight Principles of Yong (永字八法 Pinyin: yǒngzì bā fǎ; Japanese: eiji happō; Korean: 영자팔법, yeongjapalbeop, yŏngjap'albŏp) uses the single character 永, meaning "eternity", to teach the eight most basic strokes.

Three national schools of stroke order

While the majority of characters are written in exactly the same stroke order everywhere because their shape clearly dictates a particular order, the "official" stroke order of CJK characters varies from country to country. This is largely because calligraphic styles evolved differently in Imperial China, Modern and Communist China, Japan, and Korea.

• Traditional stroke order: Imperial China, ROC in China from 1911 to 1949, modern Taiwan and Hong Kong. This system of stroke order follows traditional Chinese calligraphy and Chinese Grass Style.
• Japanese stroke order: Modern Japan and Korea. This stroke order follows the traditions of Japanese calligraphy and Japanese Grass Style. The occupation of Korea by Japan (1895-1945), and their close intellectual and artistic exchanges meant that they developed similar calligraphies and now follow the same stroke order. Some Japanese kanji were reformed in 1946.
• Modern stroke order: Modern Mainland China (PRC). The Chinese government reformed the Chinese character set in 1956, and also reformed the stroke order of some characters. A notable "innovation" of this stroke order reform was the conception of a "horizontal writing" stroke order, to facilitate horizontal writing. Some examples of stroke order simplification are : 廴，戈，方，母，瓦，癶，禸，舟，辶，阝，骨，鬼. Similar stroke order simplifications appear in characters that have such radicals or components, i.e. 免 (5th stroke) which present a component similar to that of 鬼.

Example of differing stroke orders for the characrer 戈 ("halberd")

Traditional stroke order, which developed in texts written from top to bottom. Ancient China, current Taiwan.

Modern stroke order, adapted for horizontal writing. PRC, post-1956 reform.

Basic rules of stroke order

1. Write from left to right, and from top to bottom

As a general rule, characters are written from left to right, and from top to bottom. For example, among the first characters usually learned is the number one, which is written with a single horizontal line: 一. This character has one stroke which is written from left to right.

The character for "two" has two strokes: 二. In this case, both are written from left to right, but the top stroke is written first. The character for "three" has three strokes: 三. Each stroke is written from left to right, starting with the uppermost stroke:

The Chinese character meaning "person" (, Chinese: rén, Korean: in, Japanese: hito, nin; jin). The character has two strokes, the first shown here in dark, and the second in red. The black area represents the starting position of the writing instrument.

This rule applies also to more complex characters. For example, 校 can be divided into two. The entire left side (木) is written before the right side (交). There are some exceptions to this rule, mainly occurring when the right side of a character has a lower enclosure (see below), for example 誕 and 健. In this case, the left side is written first, followed by the right side, and finally the lower enclosure.

When there are upper and lower components, the upper components are written first, then the lower components, as in 品 and 襲.

2. Horizontal before vertical

When strokes cross, horizontal strokes are usually written before vertical strokes: the character for "ten," 十, has two strokes. The horizontal stroke 一 is written first, followed by the vertical stroke → 十.

3. Cutting strokes last

Vertical strokes that "cut" through a character are written after the horizontal strokes they cut through, as in 書 and 筆.

Horizontal strokes that cut through a character are written last, as in 母 and 海.

4. Diagonals right-to-left before diagonals left-to-right

Right-to-left diagonals (ノ) are written before left-to-right diagonals (乀): 文.

5. Centre verticals before outside "wings"

Vertical centre strokes are written before vertical or diagonal outside strokes; left outside strokes are written before right outside strokes: 小 and 水.

6. Outside before inside

Outside enclosing strokes are written before inside strokes; bottom strokes are written last: 日 and 口. This applies also to characters that have no bottom stroke, such as 同 and 月.

7. Left vertical before enclosing

Left vertical strokes are written before enclosing strokes. In the following two examples, the leftmost vertical stroke (|) is written first, followed by the uppermost and rightmost lines (┐) (which are written as one stroke): 日 and 口.

8. Bottom enclosing strokes last

Bottom enclosing strokes are always written last: 道, 週, 画.

9. Dots and minor strokes last

Minor strokes are usually written last, as the small "dot" in the following: 玉.

Basic and compound strokes

There are some thirty distinct types of strokes recognized in Chinese characters, some of which are compound strokes (that is, single strokes comprising more than one movement of the writing instrument). Many of these have no agreed-upon name.

Each single stroke includes all the motions necessary to produce a given part of a character before lifting the writing instrument from the writing surface; thus, a single stroke may produce more than one line.

The character for "eternity" has five strokes, two of which (the second and third) are compound strokes.

Table of simple strokes

Name (Char, pinyin)	Stroke	Translation of Chinese name	Additional description
Basic strokes
點 diǎn	⼂	"Dot"	Tiny dash
横 héng	⼀	"Horizontal"	Rightward stroke
豎 shù	⼁	"Vertical"	Downward stroke
提 tí	㇀	"Rise"	Flick up and rightwards
捺 nà	㇏	"Press down"	Falling rightwards (fattening at the bottom)
撇 piě	⼃	"Throw away"	Falling leftwards (with slight curve)
Combining strokes
折 zhé	n/a	"Break"	Usually 90° turn, going down or going right only.
鉤 gōu	n/a	"Hook"	Appended to other strokes, suddenly going down or going left only.
彎 wān	n/a	"Bend"	Usually concave on the left
斜 xié	n/a	"Slant"	Usually concave on the right

The "dot" is rarely a real dot. Instead it usually takes the shape of a very small line pointing in one of several directions, and may be long enough to be confused with other strokes.

Certain strokes (such as zhé and gōu, the "hook" and "break") never occur alone, but always in compound strokes. Thus, they are not in themselves individual strokes.

The character for "eternity" shown at right demonstrates some of these compound strokes. The centre line is a compound stroke that combines three stroke shapes in a single stroke.

Complex strokes in Unicode

The Unicode "CJK Strokes" range encodes 16 basic strokes, at codepoints U+31C0–31CF (as of Unicode version 4.1):

Another classification showing 37 strokes: 8 basic stokes, and 29 complex strokes.

codepoint		name	Chinese name Trad. (Simp.)
31C0	㇀	CJK STROKE T	提
31C1	㇁	CJK STROKE WG	彎鈎 (弯钩)
31C2	㇂	CJK STROKE XG	斜鈎 (斜钩)
31C3	㇃	CJK STROKE BXG	扁斜鈎 (扁斜钩)
31C4	㇄	CJK STROKE SW	豎彎 (竖弯)
31C5	㇅	CJK STROKE HZZ	橫折折 (横折折)
31C6	㇆	CJK STROKE HZG	橫折鈎 (横折钩)
31C7	㇇	CJK STROKE HP	橫撇 (横撇)
31C8	㇈	CJK STROKE HZWG	橫折彎鈎 (横折弯钩)
31C9	㇉	CJK STROKE SZWG	竪折彎鈎 (竖折弯钩)
31CA	㇊	CJK STROKE HZT	橫折提 (横折提)
31Cb	㇋	CJK STROKE HZZP	橫折折撇 (横折折撇)
31CC	㇌	CJK STROKE HPWG	橫撇彎鈎 (横撇弯钩)
31CD	㇍	CJK STROKE HZW	竪折彎 (竖折弯)
31CE	㇎	CJK STROKE HZZZ	橫折折折 (横折折折)
31CF	㇏	CJK STROKE N	捺

References

Traditional Chinese stroke order

• 常用國字標準字體筆順手冊 by the Taiwan Ministry of Education. Book available online (authoritative work)

Japanese stroke order

• Hadamitzky, Wolfgang & Mark Spahn. A Handbook of the Japanese Writing System. Charles E. Tuttle Co. ISBN 0-8048-2077-5.
• Henshall, Kenneth G. A Guide to Remembering Japanese Characters. Charles E. Tuttle Co. ISBN 0-8048-2038-4.
• O'Neill, P.G. Essential Kanji: 2,000 Basic Japanese Characters Systematically Arranged for Learning and Reference. Weatherhill. ISBN 0-8348-0222-8.
• Pye, Michael The Study of Kanji: A Handbook of Japanese Characters. Hokuseido Press.
  • Includes a translation of the Japanese Ministry of Education rules on Kanji stroke order.

Others

• Keightley, David N. (1978). Sources of Shang History: The Oracle-Bone Inscriptions of Bronze Age China. University of California Press, Berkeley. ISBN 0-520-02969-0

See also

• Chinese character
• East Asian calligraphy
• Horizontal and vertical writing in East Asian scripts

External links

• Animated stroke order from USC Chinese Department
• Learn Chinese and Chinese radicals
• Kanji alive, an interactive online tool for learning Japanese kanji, featuring stroke order animations.
• cchar.com Online query of stroke order animations.
• SODER Project, lets you even download Japanese kanji stroke order diagrams.
• CJK stroke order project, Free Wikipedia project making and sharing animations and images showing stroke order according to the 3 ways (Traditional hanzi, Modern hanzi, Japanese kanji).