Oracle bones

Examples of Oracle bones in the following topics:

• Shang Religion

  • The oldest surviving form of Chinese writing is inscriptions of divination records on the bones or shells of animals—so-called oracle bones.
  • Oracle bones were pieces of bone or turtle shell used by the ancient Chinese, especially Chinese kings, in attempts to predict the future.
  • Questions were carved into oracle bones, such as, "Will we win the upcoming battle?"
  • Many of the oracle bones ask questions about war, harvests, and childbirth.
  • This oracle bone from the Shang Dynasty dates to the reign of King Wu Ding.

• Advancements Under the Shang

  • Oracle bone inscriptions show that the Shang used chariots as mobile command vehicles and in royal hunts.
  • A significant number of Shang oracle bones were concerned with battle.
  • The oracle bones also show deep concern over the "barbarians" living outside the empire, who were a constant threat to the safety and stability of the kingdom; the military had to be constantly ready to fight them.

• Introduction to the Shang Dynasty

  • These have included 11 major Yin royal tombs and building sites of palaces and rituals, as well as weapons and remains of human and animal sacrifices, and artifacts, including bronze, jade, stone, bone, and ceramic.
  • The oldest surviving form of Chinese writing is inscriptions of divination records on the bones or shells of animals—so-called oracle bones.
  • However, the writing on the oracle bones shows evidence of complex development, indicating that written language had existed for a long time.
  • This site yielded large numbers of oracle bones that describe the travels of eleven named kings.

• Ceramics and Bronze in the Shang Dynasty

  • Tens of thousands of bronze, jade, stone, bone, and ceramic artifacts have been obtained.
  • With over 200 bronze ritual vessels and 109 inscriptions of Lady Fu Hao's name, archaeologists realized they had stumbled across the tomb of the militant consort to King Wu Ding, as described in 170 to 180 Shang oracle bones.
  • Bronze vessels, stoneware and pottery vessels, bronze weapons, jade figures, hair combs, and bone hairpins were found.
  • The Shang had a fully developed system of writing, preserved on bronze inscriptions and a small number of other writings on pottery, jade, horn, and oracle bones.
  • With over 200 bronze ritual vessels and 109 inscriptions of Lady Fu Hao's name, archaeologists realized they had stumbled across the tomb of the militant consort to King Wu Ding, as described in 170 to 180 Shang oracle bones.

• The Oracles Fulfilled

• Gross Anatomy

  • All the bones in the body can be described as long bones or flat bones.
  • Bone is made of bone tissue, a type of dense connective tissue.
  • Cortical bone is compact bone, while cancellous bone is trabecular and spongy bone.
  • The outer shell of the long bone is compact bone, below which lies a deeper layer of cancellous bone (spongy bone), as shown in the following figure.
  • These are flat bone, sutural bone, short bone, irregular, sesamoid bone, and long bone.

• Bone Remodeling and Repair

  • Bone is remodeled through the continual replacement of old bone tissue, as well as repaired when fractured.
  • Bone remodeling is the replacement of old bone tissue by new bone tissue.
  • It involves the processes of bone deposition or bone production done by osteoblasts and bone resorption done by osteoclasts, which break down old bone.
  • Bone turnover rates, the rates at which old bone is replaced by new bone, are quite high, with five to seven percent of bone mass being recycled every week.
  • Compact bone is added to create bone tissue that is similar to the original, unbroken bone.

• Bone Grafting

  • Bone grafting is a surgical procedure that replaces missing bone in order to repair bone fractures.
  • Bone grafting is a surgical procedure that replaces missing bone in order to repair bone fractures that are extremely complex, pose a significant health risk to the patient, or fail to heal properly .
  • Bone grafts may be autologous (bone harvested from the patient's own body, often from the iliac crest), allograft (cadaveric bone usually obtained from a bone bank), or synthetic (often made of hydroxyapatite or other naturally-occurring and biocompatible substances) with similar mechanical properties to bone.
  • Most bone grafts are expected to be reabsorbed and replaced as the natural bone heals over a few months' time.
  • Bone grafting is also used to fuse joints to prevent movement, repair broken bones that have bone loss, and repair broken bone that has not yet healed.

• Bone Scans

  • Bone scans are a special type of nuclear scanning test that is often used to find bone cancer or bone inflammation.
  • A bone scan is a nuclear scanning test to find certain abnormalities in bone that are triggering the bone's attempts to heal.
  • A nuclear bone scan is a functional test, which means it measures an aspect of bone metabolism or bone remodeling .
  • Nuclear bone scans are not to be confused with the completely different test often termed a "bone density scan," DEXA or DXA, which is a low exposure X-ray test measuring bone density to look for osteoporosis and other diseases where bones lose mass, without any bone re-building (osteoblastic) activity.
  • The technique, therefore, is sensitive to fractures and bone reaction to infections and bone tumors, including tumor metastases to bones, because all these pathologies trigger bone osteoblast activity.

• Microscopic Anatomy of Bone

  • The basic microscopic unit of bone is an osteon, which can be arranged into woven bone or lamellar bone.
  • Bones are composed of bone matrix, which has both organic and inorganic components.
  • Osteons can be arranged into woven bone or lamellar bone.
  • Woven bone is replaced by lamellar bone during development.
  • Lamellar bone makes up the compact or cortical bone in the skeleton, such as the long bones of the legs and arms.