11. The culture prepared its oracle bones by drilling and polishing the bones before heating them. 12. Oracle bones contained descriptions of the date, ritual, person, ancestor, and questions associated with the divination.13. Although it was a fully functional writing system, the oracle bone script was not fully standardized. 14. These ancient characters are called oracle bone script. 15. Among Dong's achievements was his division of the evolution of the oracle bone writing into five stages. 16. Dong accepted an invitation to lecture on oracle bone inscriptions in the United States in January 1947. 17. The oracle bones bear the earliest known significant corpus of ancient some scholars had until then doubted. 18. Often, the king would even perform oracle bone divinations himself, especially near the end of the dynasty. 19. These questions were carved onto the bone or shell in oracle bone script using a sharp tool. 20. One good example is shown in the fragment below, labeled " oracle bone script for Spring ".