兼
jiān HSK7

double

Depicts a hand (又) holding two stalks of grain (禾).

Components

禾
禾 Iconic component
hé grain stalk
Change in form
Due to historical stylistic changes, this component is less similar to 禾 than it was in ancient scripts.
禾
禾 Iconic component
hé grain stalk
Change in form
Due to historical stylistic changes, this component is less similar to 禾 than it was in ancient scripts.
又
又 Iconic component
yòu hand

Depicts a hand.

Change in form
Due to historical stylistic changes, this component is less similar to 又 than it was in ancient scripts.

Character Evolution

Bronze form
Bronze Late Spring and Autumn ~500 BC
Seal form
Seal Warring States (Chu) 475-221 BC
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 Western Han 202 BC-9 AD
Clerical form
Clerical Eastern Han 25-220 AD
Clerical form
Clerical Eastern Han 25-220 AD
Regular Modern

Component uses

Sound (6 of 13 verified)

Meaning (0 of 1 verified)

Historical Pronunciations

Middle ChineseOld ChineseGloss
Baxter-Sagartkem[k]ˤem combine; at the same time

說文解字

《說文》:“兼,并也。从又持秝。兼,持二禾。秉,持一禾。”

Sources

Character origin
漢語多功能字庫裘錫圭 "Chinese Writing" p.188
Readings & variants
Unicode
Historical pronunciations
Baxter-Sagart
Historical images
Academia Sinica