Original meaning: to hold in arms
Phonosemantic compound. 亻 represents the meaning and 壬 represents the sound.
Components
Character Evolution
Component uses
Historical Pronunciations
| Middle Chinese | Old Chinese | Gloss | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Baxter-Sagart | nyimH | n[ə]m-s | burden; charge (n.) |
說文解字
《說文》：“任，符也。从人，壬聲。”
Sources
- Character origin
- 漢語多功能字庫The Outlier Linguistics Dictionary of Chinese Characters
- Readings & variants
- Unicode
- Historical pronunciations
- Baxter-Sagart
- Historical images
- Academia Sinica
- Etymology
- Shuowen Jiezi (說文解字)
A single horizontal stroke, representing the number one.
Character Evolution
Component uses
Historical Pronunciations
| Middle Chinese | Old Chinese | Gloss | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Baxter-Sagart | 'jit | ʔi[t] | one |
說文解字
《說文》：“一，惟初太始，道立於一，造分天地，化成萬物。弌，古文一。”
Sources
- Readings & variants
- Unicode
- Historical pronunciations
- Baxter-Sagart
- Historical images
- Academia Sinica
- Etymology
- Shuowen Jiezi (說文解字)
Simplified
Pictograph of one stalk of bamboo. Same as one half of the character for bamboo (竹).
Character Evolution
Component uses
Iconic (1)
Historical Pronunciations
| Middle Chinese | Old Chinese | Gloss | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Baxter-Sagart | kaH | kˤa[r]-s | tally, piece, item |
Sources
- Character origin
- Wiktionary
- Readings & variants
- Unicode
- Historical pronunciations
- Baxter-Sagart
- Historical images
- Academia Sinica
Traditional
Components
Historical Pronunciations
| Middle Chinese | Old Chinese | Gloss | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Baxter-Sagart | kaH | kˤa[r]-s | piece, item |
Sources
- Readings & variants
- Unicode
- Historical pronunciations
- Baxter-Sagart