Qing scholar-official Wang Yirong identified unusual incised marks on so-called “dragon bones” as ancient Chinese writing, a turning point that launched modern scholarly study of oracle-bone inscriptions (jiaguwen).
Liu E issued Tieyun Canggui (鐵雲藏龜), widely cited as the first published collection of oracle-bone rubbings, helping establish oracle-bone study as a distinct branch of epigraphy.
Sun Yirang’s Qiwen Juli (契文舉例), published posthumously by Luo Zhenyu, is often credited as the first focused decipherment study of oracle-bone script, formalizing early methods for reading the inscriptions.
Luo Zhenyu’s Yin Xu Shu Qi (殷墟書契) appeared as an influential early compilation of oracle-bone materials, strengthening confidence that the texts were genuine Shang-period artifacts and expanding access for researchers.
Using oracle-bone inscriptions, Wang Guowei identified Shang royal names and constructed a genealogy that closely matched (and corrected parts of) Sima Qian’s received king list—an important step in confirming the Shang as historical.
The founding of Academia Sinica’s Institute of History and Philology (IHP) created a durable institutional base for scientific excavation and documentation of oracle bones and related Shang materials.
IHP-led excavations at Yinxu (Anyang) began, moving oracle-bone research from antiquarian collecting toward controlled archaeology and stratigraphic recording; tens of thousands of inscribed pieces were recovered in these campaigns.
Dong Zuobin’s Jiaguwen duandai yanjiu li (甲骨文斷代研究例) presented a systematic set of criteria for dating oracle-bone inscriptions within the Shang period, shaping subsequent periodization and historical interpretation.
During the 13th Yinxu excavation, the famed pit YH127 was found at Xiaotun; it contained over 17,000 oracle-bone pieces, becoming one of the most consequential single-context discoveries for the field.
The first sustained IHP excavation program at Yinxu (1928–1937) ended as war conditions intensified; its documentation and collections became foundational references for later oracle-bone scholarship.
The multi-volume Jiaguwen Heji (甲骨文合集), edited by Guo Moruo and Hu Houxuan, began publication, providing the modern standard comprehensive collection of oracle-bone rubbings for research and citation.
The publication run of Jiaguwen Heji (1978–1982) was completed, greatly stabilizing reference practices by consolidating large numbers of inscriptions into a standardized, widely used corpus.
Chinese oracle-bone inscriptions were inscribed on UNESCO’s Memory of the World Register, recognizing their global documentary significance and raising the profile of preservation and digitization initiatives.
A scholarly overview assessed “120 years of research” since the 1899 discovery, periodizing the field’s development from early collecting and epigraphy to scientific excavation traditions and modern compilation practices.
Researchers described the HUST-OBC open dataset for oracle-bone script recognition/decipherment, reflecting a growing computational turn in the field and enabling reproducible experiments in machine-assisted reading.
Discovery and scholarly study of oracle bones (1899–present)
