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词汇 means vocabulary or words and phrases.
In traditional characters (I noticed today) that would be: 詞彙 and 彙 is a word for hedgehog (刺猬）。(詞彙: word hedgehog)
Did the ancient Chinese gather hedgehogs? Did 彙 mean "gather" first and "hedgehog" later?
How are "hedgehog" and "gather" related? As far as I know, hedgehogs are not gregarious little beasts, too spiky!
(I know the British used to catch hedgehogs, cover them in mud and bake them in a fire. Probably still do 'up North'. Mmmm, delicious!)
2: 類; 4: 聚合
If 彙 in 辭彙 means '類' (type), the explanation would be: 辭彙 = word types
If 彙 in 辭彙 means '聚合' (gather), the explanation would be: 辭彙 = gathering of words
辭彙: 一種語言裡所有語詞和固定詞組等的總稱。除一般語詞外，還包括古語、方言、外來語詞及各科術語。 (A general term for all words and fixed phrases in a language. In addition to general words, it also includes archaic words, dialects, foreign words and terms of various subjects.)
My theory on how the meaning of 'gather' was extended from hedgehog:
When someone got shot by many arrows, it is commonly described as 被射成刺蝟一般 (be shot to look like a hedgehog). Similar to pin cushion gathering pins We can compare a pin cushion to an empty field and compare the pins as words and particles. A language is like a pin cushion gathered many 'pins' -- like quills gathering on a hedgehog's back
Since '匯' and '彙' sound the same and both contain the meaning of 'gather', 辭匯 had become an accepted variant of 辭彙 in modern Chinese.
词汇, in traditional chinese should be: 辞匯
匯, means put together. 例如: 江河汇入大海
辞, means words.
彙 means animals or something, but it also equals to 匯. refer to: https://hanyu.baidu.com/zici/s?wd=%E6%B1%87&query=%E6%B1%87%20%E7%B9%81%E4%BD%93&srcid=28236&from=kg0
