Chinese Seals

History
In China, seal (seal carving), handwriting, painting, and poem are called Chinese four traditional arts.

At first, seal, also called official seal, was the symbol of power.

In the Qin Dynasty, the first emperor Shun Zhi made strict regulations about seal in order to maintain his prestige: the emperor's personal seal was also the national seal, while the official’s seal were called Yin or Zhang. The names could not be confused. Before Ying Cheng unified China, he had robbed Lantian Jade, the famous "He Shi Bi", the national treasure of the Zhao principality, and made the national seal out of the jade.

When the Han Dynasty came, the creation of seal became of a kind of artistic production. In addition to the "Six National Seals", the emperor also stipulated that the seal of officials who got more than 2,000-dan (dan, a unit of dry measure for grain equal to 100 liters in ancient China) grains as salary was called Zhang; while the seal of officials who got salary from 200-dan to 1000-dan grains was called Yin. The rest seals were called personal seal. At that time, the official seals were about a cubic inch, while personal seals were smaller. The sealed clod was called lute. The Han Dynasty was the Golden Age of seal. Seal in the Han Dynasty, together with the Tang poetry, the Song Ci, and Yuan Qu, is the brilliant heritage of ancient people.

After the Song Dynasty, people began to use seal when they working on handwritings and paintings. They were accustomed to dedicate their names on paintings after they finished them. So that we can find the seal of many famous calligraphers and painters such as Su Dongpo, Huang Tingjian, and the emperor Hui of the Song Dynasty. Seal is not only a constituent of ancient graphic arts, but also an independent art itself.

Use of Seal
Chinese seals are in special patterns. After accomplishment, people can stamp their seals after dipping the red ink paste. So we can find that ink paste is inseparable from seals. Ink paste is made of vermilion (a kind of mercury compound). High quality ink paste must have bright color and will not fade after a long time. And the ink paste containers are supposed to be made of magnetic materials. And we should concoct the ink paste by ivory ink paste chopsticks as often as we can in order that the ink paste will not harden or the ink oil will not overflow. If paid particular attention, the ink paste containers are supposed to put inside wood or silk boxes so as not to be collided or covered with dust.