The Calligrapher — Yán Zhēnqīng 颜真卿

Tang master of robust regular script; co-creator of the enduring 'Yan style'.

Tang calligrapher (709–784), master of regular script/running script — the Tang moral paragon whose upright, muscular regular script became the model of Chinese integrity in writing. Tang dynasty

Cultural Story

Zhou began as three islets in a stream, the Shuo Wen picturing mounds in the water. It named the jiu zhou (nine regions of ancient China), the classical map of the realm. Later it became an administrative prefecture, and today it sits in city names like Guang Zhou (Guangzhou), Su Zhou (Suzhou) and Hang Zhou (Hangzhou). The small islet grew into the shape of the state itself.

Common words & phrases

• 广州 Guangzhou
• 苏州 Suzhou
• 杭州 Hangzhou
• 九州 nine regions of China
• 州长 governor

Read the story behind the character

You fly to Guang Zhou (Guangzhou) for the fair and later tour Su Zhou (Suzhou) gardens and Hang Zhou (Hangzhou) lake. A history show maps the jiu zhou (nine regions of China) of antiquity, and an American friend is amused that his zhou zhang (governor) shares the word with an old Chinese prefecture. You text which zhou are you in, and a map lights up the provinces.

Why this character belongs on skin

The ancients drew 州 as three tongues of earth rising from a flooded world—islands, or perhaps the first dry ground a survivor clung to when the waters would not recede. It became the word for a province, a settled place, a human claim staked in the middle of chaos. We too build our small 州: a city, a marriage, a self assembled on the shifting tide. The waters do not stop; we simply learn to stand. To wear this character is to honor the courage of settlement, the refusal to be swept, the dry ground you make by staying. Not conquest of the flood, just presence within it. Let it mark you as one who plants a flag in the wet and says: here, against the odds, I am home, and the river can do its worst.