Situated in western China, the Qin state, from whom the name China derived, became a superpower after a political reform of 356 BC. By 221 BC a series of wars enabled the Qin rulers to conquer the whole of China and ruled it as one state. The political chaos that lasted for five centuries temporarily halted.

Small seal script.   The early years of the Qin saw many stern measures toward reorganization. Among them was mandatory writing system reform. As part of an attempt to unify culturally diverse feudal states which had preceded it, the Qin standardized the writing forms then in use, thereby creating one of the most enduring of all ancient scripts, the small seal script. Based on many regional variants and contained nearly 12,000 characters on which later scripts were based, this script simplified big seal script by fixing character components placement and reducing stroke number. The writing of small seal script is very regular, with each character the same size and brushstroke the same thickness, regardless of complexity.

Heavenly spirit blesses our dynasty for ever with peace.

Clerical script.   With greatly increased clerical work, literate bondmen were assigned to help, and their hastily folk style was named clerical script, the second scriptural style of Chinese calligraphy. Clerical script simplified seal script by making up new character components and stretching its pictographic winding strokes straight. Individual strokes vary in width, with considerable contrast between the thick and thin parts of a single stroke, and certain characters have stressed strokes, especially the powerful right-falling stroke, the hallmark of clerical script, which runs diagonally towards the lower fight-hand corner. This script was fully developed in Han, and has been remaining in use to the present day.

For accounting mistakes, a disciplinary warning will be issued if the amount is under 220 copper coins; a fine of a shield will be imposed if the amount is between 220 to 2,200 copper coins; a fine of a suit of armor will be imposed if the amount is over 2,200 copper coins.