咅
pǒu

to spit out

Original meaning: not

Originally the same character as 否. A distinguishing mark was added later to the character to differentiate it from 咅. The current meaning "to spit out" is a phonetic loan.

Components

丶
丶 Distinguishing component
zhǔ dot

Mark used to differentiate 咅 from 否.

否
否 SoundMeaning component
fǒu not
Change in meaning
否 hints at the original meaning of 咅, "not", which is no longer the most common meaning of 咅 in modern Mandarin.

Character Evolution

Bronze form
Bronze Late Spring and Autumn ~500 BC
Seal form
Seal Shuowen ~100 AD
Seal form
Seal Shuowen ~100 AD
Clerical form
Clerical Qin 221-206 BC
Regular Modern

Component uses

Sound (4 of 16 verified)

部培倍陪赔菩剖焙碚涪瓿锫掊踣醅賠

Historical Pronunciations

Old Chinese
Zhengzhangpʰɯʔ
pʰl'oːs

說文解字

《說文》：“咅，相與語唾而不受也。从丶，从否，否亦聲。，咅或从豆，从欠。”

Sources

Character origin
李学勤《字源》p.448
Readings & variants
Unicode
Historical pronunciations
Zhengzhang Shangfang
Historical images
Academia Sinica
Etymology
Shuowen Jiezi (說文解字)