  Oracle Bone Script (OBS), one of the earliest known forms of ancient Chinese
writing, holds invaluable insights into the humanities and geography of the
Shang Dynasty, dating back 3,000 years. The immense historical and cultural
significance of these writings cannot be overstated. However, the passage of
time has obscured much of their meaning, presenting a significant challenge in
deciphering these ancient texts. With the advent of Artificial Intelligence
(AI), employing AI to assist in interpreting OBS has become a feasible option.
Yet, progress in this area has been hindered by a lack of high-quality
datasets. To address this issue, this paper details the creation of the
HUST-OBS dataset. This dataset encompasses 77,064 images of 1,588 individual
deciphered scripts and 62,989 images of 9,411 undeciphered characters, with a
total of 140,053 images, compiled from diverse sources. Additionally, all
images and labels have been reviewed and corrected by experts in oracle bone
studies. The hope is that this dataset could inspire and assist future research
in deciphering those unknown OBS. All the codes and datasets are available at
https://github.com/Pengjie-W/HUST-OBC.
