chū​sài

preliminaries

chū beginning

Depicts cutting out fabric () with a knife (), the first step in making clothes.

Components

Iconic component
clothes

is a component form of .

Iconic component
dāo knife

Character Evolution

Oracle form
Oracle Bone ~1250-1000 BC
Bronze form
Bronze Early Western Zhou ~1000 BC
Bronze form
Bronze Late Western Zhou ~800 BC
Bronze form
Bronze Late Spring and Autumn ~500 BC
Seal form
Seal Warring States (Chu) 475-221 BC
Seal form
Seal Warring States (Chu) 475-221 BC
Seal form
Seal Shuowen ~100 AD
Clerical form
Clerical Qin 221-206 BC
Regular Modern

Historical Pronunciations

Middle ChineseOld ChineseGloss
Baxter-Sagarttsrhjo[ts]ʰra beginning

說文解字

《說文》:“初,始也。从刀,从衣。裁衣之始也。”

Sources

Character origin
漢語多功能字庫
Readings & variants
Unicode
Historical pronunciations
Baxter-Sagart
Historical images
Academia Sinica

sài compete Simplified

Original meaning: thank offering

Simplified form of . Phonosemantic compound. represents the meaning and 𡨄 represents the sound. Based on the original meaning "thank offering". The meaning later shifted to "compete".

Components

𡨄
𡨄 Sound component
sāi, xià to stop up

𡨄 is a component form of .

Meaning component
bèi sea shell

Shells were used as currency in ancient China.

Sources

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

sài compete Traditional

Original meaning: thank offering

Phonosemantic compound. represents the meaning and 𡨄 represents the sound. Based on the original meaning "thank offering". The meaning later shifted to "compete".

Components

𡨄
𡨄 Sound component
sāi, xià to stop up

𡨄 is a component form of .

Meaning component
bèi sea shell

Shells were used as currency in ancient China.

Character Evolution

Seal form
Seal Warring States (Chu) 475-221 BC
Seal form
Seal Warring States (Chu) 475-221 BC
Seal form
Seal Warring States (Chu) 475-221 BC
Seal form
Seal Warring States (Chu) 475-221 BC
Seal form
Seal Warring States (Chu) 475-221 BC
Seal form
Seal Warring States (Chu) 475-221 BC
Seal form
Seal Warring States (Chu) 475-221 BC
Seal form
Seal Warring States (Chu) 475-221 BC
Seal form
Seal Shuowen ~100 AD
Regular Modern

Historical Pronunciations

Old Chinese
Zhengzhangslɯːɡs

說文解字

《說文新附》:“賽,報也。从貝,塞省聲。”

Sources

Character origin
漢語多功能字庫
Readings & variants
Unicode
Historical pronunciations
Zhengzhang Shangfang
Historical images
Academia Sinica