賁
bēnBēnbì

forge ahead

Original meaning: adornment

Phonosemantic compound. 貝 represents the meaning and 卉 represents the sound. Based on the original meaning "adornment". The current meaning is a phonetic loan.

Components

犇
犇 Sound component
bēn run fast
Change in form
Due to historical stylistic changes, this component is less similar to 犇 than it was in ancient scripts.
貝
貝 Meaning component
bèi sea shell

Character Evolution

Seal form
Seal Shuowen ~100 AD
Clerical form
Clerical Qin 221-206 BC
Clerical form
Clerical Western Han 202 BC-9 AD
Clerical form
Clerical Western Han 202 BC-9 AD
Clerical form
Clerical Eastern Han 25-220 AD
Regular Modern

Component uses

Sound (0 of 3 verified)

憤墳噴

Historical Pronunciations

Middle ChineseOld ChineseGloss
Baxter-Sagartpwonpˤur ardent, brave
pjeHpor-s ornate (name of a hexagram)
bjun[b]ur great, big

說文解字

《說文》：“賁，飾也。从貝，卉聲。”

Sources

Character origin
漢語多功能字庫
Readings & variants
Unicode
Historical pronunciations
Baxter-Sagart
Historical images
Academia Sinica
Etymology
Shuowen Jiezi (說文解字)

贲 bēn, bì, fén forge ahead Simplified

Original meaning: adornment

Phonosemantic compound. 贝 represents the meaning and 卉 represents the sound. Based on the original meaning "adornment". The current meaning is a phonetic loan.

Components

犇
犇 Sound component
bēn run fast
Change in form
Due to historical stylistic changes, this component is less similar to 犇 than it was in ancient scripts.
贝
贝 Meaning component
bèi sea shell
Change in meaning
贝 hints at the original meaning of 贲, "adornment", which is no longer the most common meaning of 贲 in modern Mandarin.

Component uses

Sound (0 of 4 verified)

愤喷偾鲼

Sources

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