areas. The inscriptions are written on the exterior and interior of the rim, and the exterior of the belly of the large type of vats. The characters are mostly written singly; character compounds or sentences are rarely seen. The contemporary Chinese character's set principles were clearly visible in ancient China's Jiǎgǔwén characters(甲骨文) carved on ox scapulas and tortoise plastrons around 14th - 11th century BCE (). Brush-written examples decay over time and have not survived. During the divination ceremony, after the cracks were made, characters were written with a brush on the shell or bone to be later carved (Keightley, 1978). Each archaic kingdom of current China continued to revise its set of characters. Imperial China For more than 2,000 years, China's literati—Confucian scholars and literary men who also served the government as officials—have been connoisseurs and practitioners of this art. In Imperial China, the graphs on old steles — some dating from 200 BC, and in Xiǎozhuàn style (small seal script) — are still accessible. Scribes in China and Mongolia practiced the art of calligraphy to copying Buddhist texts. Since these texts were so venerated, the act of copying them down (and the beautiful calligraphy employed, was supposed to have a purifying effect on the soul. "The Act of copying them [Buddhist texts] could bring a scribe closer to perfection and earn him merit." In about 220 BC, the emperor Qin Shi Huang(秦始皇, 259–210 BC), the first to conquer the entire Chinese basin, imposed several reforms, among them Li Si's (李斯, 246 BC - 208 BC) character unification, which created a set of 3300 standardized Xiǎozhuàn characters. Although the main writing implement of the time was already the brush, little paper survives from this period, and the main examples of this style are on steles. The Lìshū style (clerical script) which is more regularized, and in some ways similar to modern text, were also authorised under Qin Shi Huang. While it is a common mistake to believe that Lishu was created by Cheng Miao alone during Qing Shi Huang's regime, Lishu was developed from pre-Qin era to the Han dynasty (202 BC-220 AD). During the fourth century AD, calligraphy came to full maturity. The Kǎishū style (traditional regular script) — still in use today — and attributed to Wang Xizhi (王羲之, 303 CE-361 AD) and his followers, is even more regularized. reached its peak in the Tang Dynasty, when