懂中文 Dong Chinese
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怎
zěn HSK1

what? why? how?

Definitions Defs Origin Strokes Stroke Words Sentences Sents

Phonosemantic compound. 心 represents the meaning and 乍 represents the sound.

Components

心
心 Meaning component
xīn, xin heart
乍
乍 Sound component
zhà, zuò suddenly
Change in sound
怎 and 乍 don't sound similar in modern Mandarin due to historical phonetic changes. They were more similar in older Chinese.

Sources

Character origin
漢語多功能字庫
Readings & variants
Unicode