When did the history of China's writing begin?

China's literary history began in Shang Dynasty.

China's literary history began in Shang Dynasty. In the late Shang Dynasty in China, the royal family had characters engraved on tortoise shells or animal bones, which were used for divination and recording. This kind of writing is called "Oracle Bone Inscriptions". It is an ancient script in China, also known as "Wen Qi", "Oracle Bone Inscriptions", "Yin Ruins Book" or "tortoise shell and beast bone book". This is the earliest known written form with a linguistic system in China, and today's Chinese characters are also closely related to Oracle Bone Inscriptions.

Oracle Bone Inscriptions already has the basic structure of Chinese characters, which is a relatively mature script. Oracle Bone Inscriptions's records are very rich, involving sacrifice, war, agriculture and animal husbandry, official system, criminal law, medicine, astronomical calendar and so on. It has a profound influence on the formation and development of China characters. Judging from the shape of Oracle Bone Inscriptions's characters, it has possessed the three elements of China's calligraphy, namely, writing with a pen, writing with a knot, and composing a composition, which has had an influence on later seal cutting with a pen and a knife. Judging from the structural fonts of Oracle Bone Inscriptions, the characters are not only unchanged, but also more balanced and symmetrical, showing a stable pattern.