Abstract: The writing of painting inscriptions is closely related to the action of appreciating. The process of the appreciating directly determines the writing order as well as the organization and combination of the elements in inscription writing. Organizing words for an inscription is both linear and instantaneous. At the moment of watching a painting, the viewer has made a "choice" among everything in a painting, and the author of an inscription uses the text to make a second choice among the results of appreciating and present this second "choice". In the Song Dynasty, an inscription of a character painting was mainly focused on the realistic degree of the characters, while an inscription of a landscape painting was more focused on the overall momentum and pattern of the painting. Sometimes an author ignored his perceptions and created the inscription from three other aspects. Sometimes the image of the viewer is also directly presented in the inscription, in which sense the inscription has shaped the relationship between the viewer and the painting.

Key words: Song Dynasty, painting inscription, appreciating, writing