12
votes
Accepted
Is the right componet of 龍 related to 弱?
No, they're not related. The right side of 「龍」 appearing similar to a reflected version of a part of 「弱」 is a coincidence, and is an artefact of seal script shapes.
「龍」 was originally a picture of a ...
- 23.4k
11
votes
Accepted
What’s the difference between 円 and 月 as character components?
円 and 月 are both graphical corruptions. The original form of the character did not have those components.
靑/青 was originally comprised of 屮 (sprouting plant) and 井, which gave the sound. The bronze ...
- 23.4k
11
votes
Accepted
Is there any sun 日 in 昌?
時期字體
字形
參考資料
商甲
甲185合集19924
戰國・燕古幣
108古幣文編
戰國・晉璽印
959古璽彙編
秦簡
日甲119睡虎地秦簡
篆
日部說文解字
楷
「昌」 (early morning call, e.g. to the day's labour) is comprised of semantic 「日」 (sun) on top of semantic 「...
- 23.4k
9
votes
Accepted
Origin of double phonetic component 静
Indeed, 「靜」 (Zhengzhang OC: /*zleŋʔ/, calm/quiet) is a phonetic loan character, and both its components 「青」 (/*sʰleːŋ/) and 「爭」 (/*ʔsreːŋ/) are phonetic components.
Unfortunately, the inscription ...
- 23.4k
9
votes
Accepted
Meaning of early written versions of 地 and etymology?
「地」 (Baxter-Sagart OC: /*[l]ˤej-s/, ground) is comprised of semantic 「土」 (picture of a lump of dirt) and phonetic 「也」 (/*lAjʔ/). This structure is found relatively late, derived from a graphical ...
- 23.4k
7
votes
What does 尔 really mean?
There are many resources which "decompose characters", but most of them do not give any insight as to how Chinese characters actually work in relation to the language, and looking at these ...
- 23.4k
7
votes
Accepted
What does rain 雨 have to do with mold 霉 and bad luck?
《說文・黑部》
黴，中久雨青黑。从黑，微省聲。
「黴」 (Zhengzhang OC: /*mrɯl/), blackening from being afflicted by prolonged rain. From semantic 「黑」 (black) and reduced phonetic 「微」 (/*mɯl/).
The character 「霉」 (mould, ...
- 23.4k
7
votes
Accepted
The walk radical in Traditional Chinese
That walk component is an abbreviation of the full form 「辵」, which is a combination of 「彳」 (left half of 「行」, picture of a road intersection, and 「止・龰」, picture of a foot > walking, movement). See, ...
- 23.4k
6
votes
Meaning of early written versions of 地 and etymology?
The first two (and the "Shizhoupian script" one) are 墬 in the 隶定 (transcription in modern type of characters component by component) , and this character (墬) was now considered as ancient ...
- 61
6
votes
Why is 钾 (jiǎ) the Chinese character for potassium?
It’s transliterated from Latin kalium, the first syllable.
To avoid confusion in symbols, please note k in Latin is /k/ in ipa and g in pinyin, voiceless but unaspirated. The pinyin k is voiceless and ...
- 4,485
6
votes
Are there any datasets or spreadsheets that contain the most popular Chinese characters and their components?
Make me a Hanzi
This database dictionary.txt gives the decompositions of characters into components:
{"character":"侈","definition":"luxurious, extravagant",&...
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6
votes
Are there any datasets or spreadsheets that contain the most popular Chinese characters and their components?
I created a Chrome extension that can track how frequent the word/character is used based on the Chinese websites you frequently read or visited
If you need to access the database, press F12 and then ...
- 261
5
votes
Why was the rice component added to 气 to form 氣?
The original character for the meaning gas, atmosphere is 「气」, while using 「氣」 for this meaning is strictly a phonetic loan.
「氣」 (Baxter-Sagart OC: /*qʰ(r)ə[t]-s/) originally meant gifting food to ...
- 23.4k
5
votes
Accepted
What is the meaning of 刚 in 变形金刚?
「剛」originally meant unyielding/stubborn/strong. 金剛 is a traditional phrase which is also used to translate a Buddhist word from Sanskrit (वज्र, vajra).
Vajra (PIE root: *weǵ-, English descendants: ...
- 23.4k
5
votes
Accepted
If 冬 in itself means winter, why add 天?
In short, for disambiguation, at least oral disambiguation.
Most of the words in Old Chinese are monosyllabic words. However, when it comes to oral speech, it is too ambiguous to use. As time went by,...
- 1,877
5
votes
Accepted
Explanation of character decomposition for 缺
「缺」 (Baxter-Sagart OC: /*Nə-[k]ʷʰˤet/, to damage/break vessels [pots, dishes, urns, etc.] > flawed, deficient, lacking) is comprised of semantic 「缶」 (clay jar) and phonetic 「夬」 (/*[k]ʷˤret-s/). ...
- 23.4k
5
votes
Accepted
Does this character 𡗗 have a meaning?
A first reminder:
Chinese characters represent Chinese morphemes;
In addition to meaning, Chinese morphemes overwhelmingly have one-syllable sounds as a core part of their property;
As character ...
- 23.4k
5
votes
Are there any tools for combining multiple radicals into a single character?
The closest thing I can think of 字统 is https://zi.tools. (There's also 字海 http://www.yedict.com which you cannot search Ideographic Description Character sequence and GlyphWiki which I trust much less....
- 4,485
5
votes
Accepted
船 composed of characters for vessel, 8, and person?
Unfortunately the glyph origin is not correct. It seems like the method you are using is more aligned into the "break every component down into parts you can recognize" way of memorizing ...
- 766
4
votes
When 马 is used as the left component (e.g. in 骑), does the 一 héng stroke change to ㇀ tí?
According to 《通用规范汉字表》("General Standard Chinese Character Table"), "左部件或左上部件末笔为横的，应该变形为提"(The end stroke of the left part or the upper left part is horizontal character stroke(横), ...
- 1,283
4
votes
Accepted
What does "GHTJK" stand for in this part of a Wiktionary: entry: "...composition ⿸丆卜(GHTJK) or ⿻丆"
They're one-letter abbreviations for different standards, because some characters appear differently in different standards. From https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Template:Han_char#Notes:
G = the PRC ...
- 23.4k
4
votes
Accepted
How do I understand Ni (you) character correctly?
Outlier
FORM
你 consists of 尔 (a shorthand form of 爾 “you”), and 亻 (person), indicating the original meaning “you.” 尔 also gives the sound.
[Reference, p. 1253]
COMPONENTS
亻
In 你, 亻“...
Mou某♦
- 36.3k
4
votes
How can I get a list of all the characters containing the "flowing water" component that is in 益?
The top part of 「益」 is just a 「氺」 (水) rotated 90 degrees.
秦簡12.47睡虎地秦簡篆皿部說文解字東漢隸華山廟碑 楷
秦簡25.46睡虎地秦簡篆水部說文解字東漢隸郙閣頌 楷
This makes the top part of 「益」 just a variant of 「水」. Predictably, the character 「㳑」...
- 23.4k
4
votes
Chinese character decomposition
Chinese characters were originally unique pictographic symbols depicting more or less the concept of the words they stood for. Over time as the written language evolved, many of these symbols were ...
- 544
4
votes
Why is there an 'ear' component in the character for smell? 闻 聞
「聞」(Baxter-Sagart OC: /*mu[n]/) is comprised of semantic「耳」(ear) and phonetic「門」(/*mˤə[r]/), indicating the meaning to hear. For example,「新聞」means news (literally meaning new information passed on by ...
- 23.4k
4
votes
Accepted
How do I know whether to write the written character or printed character?
This question is a tautology - of course you would write the written character and not the printed character!
The written characters and printed characters nowadays are both typeface/font variations ...
- 23.4k
4
votes
Accepted
What's the relationship between 暖, 爱 and 愛?
If you look carefully the components are different:
爰
vs.
爱
爱 has a 冖 where 爰 is just a 一.
The Outlier dictionary gives us the origins of 暖:
COMPONENTS
日
In 暖, 日 “the sun; light; ...
Mou某♦
- 36.3k
4
votes
What's the relationship between 暖, 爱 and 愛?
The right part of 暖(nuǎn) is 爰(yuán) and it's not 爱 or the traditional form 愛.
In ancient Chinese, 爰 is a kind of pronoun, like "where/which". And it also has other meanings, one is "to change". But ...
- 326
4
votes
Chinese character decomposition
recent studies called them components (部件). there're 1300+ basic component:
http://chardb.iis.sinica.edu.tw/system_intro.jsp
- 16.3k
4
votes
Accepted
Glyph origin of 款
Seeing as all the other answers are getting downvoted - I'll just leave this short reference here:
Outlier
FORM
款 kuǎn was originally composed of 柰 nài (now written 𰧭) and 欠 “person with their mouth ...
Mou某♦
- 36.3k
Only top scored, non community-wiki answers of a minimum length are eligible