The Calligrapher — Sū Língzhī 苏灵芝

Tang running-script master and prolific stele-writer, ranked with Li Yong and Yan Zhenqing.

Tang calligrapher (), master of running script — known for 《易州铁像颂》. Tang dynasty

Cultural Story

口 was the mouth and any opening like it. Lin Sihuan's essay 口技 described a performer in old Beijing who, with only his voice, filled the room with a fire and a crowd -- "京中有善口技者". The word measured a gate, a well, a port. A city's 关口 was its mouth on the road, the place all traffic passed.

Common words & phrases

• 门口 doorway · entrance · gate
• 出口 exit · export · outlet
• 进口 import · entrance · inlet
• 口语 spoken language · colloquial · oral
• 口袋 pocket · bag · pouch
• 口音 accent · voice · tone

Read the story behind the character

A traveler shows the 口音 of a province he left at ten; a 口袋 holds the phone and the keys. The 出口 ships the goods; the 进口 brings the parts. Two friends speak 口语, not the written form. The 门口 queues at the clinic. The word opens and closes the day -- the entrance, the accent, the bag, the trade flowing out and in through the city's mouths.

Why this character belongs on skin

口 is the mouth — a simple square, the gate through which everything enters and leaves. The Chinese counted people by 口, as if each human were chiefly an opening: to eat, to speak, to sing, to lie, to pray. To carry 口 is to reckon with that power, the small square that can feed a love or end it. We forget how much passes the lips — vows, insults, the names of the dead. This mark is the reminder to guard the gate and to open it wisely. It is for the person who has learned that silence and speech are both weapons and gifts, and the mouth is where you choose. There is an ancient weight to 口, the understanding that the body's smallest door is its most dangerous. Ink it where your own words form, a quiet sentinel over the opening. What you let through the 口 becomes the world. Choose, each time, like it matters. It does.