Strokes of genius that built a language for the world

The Chinese writing system is among the oldest in the world, stretching from the script carved on oracle bones during the Shang Dynasty (c.16th century-11th century BC) to text typed on today's computers.

Although the characters have evolved from pictograms to become more simplified, most Chinese would have no difficulty in recognizing many of the progenitors of current characters that go back hundreds of years.

Just as English words are made up of letters that in turn consist of strokes, Chinese characters are built using strokes, but that is about where the close similarity between the two writing systems ends.