Depicts an adult man facing forward and standing erect. The meaning later shifted to "big".
Character Evolution
Component uses
Historical Pronunciations
| Middle Chinese | Old Chinese | Gloss | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Baxter-Sagart | daH | lˤat-s (MC F!) | big |
| dajH | lˤa[t]-s | big |
說文解字
《說文》：“大，天大、地大、人亦大，故大象人形。”
Sources
- Character origin
- 季旭昇《說文新證》p.764
- Readings & variants
- Unicode
- Historical pronunciations
- Baxter-Sagart
- Historical images
- Academia Sinica
- Etymology
- Shuowen Jiezi (說文解字)
Original meaning: building
Phonosemantic compound. 宀 represents the meaning and 夗 represents the sound. Based on the original meaning "building", now written as 館. The current meaning is a phonetic loan.
Components
Character Evolution
Component uses
Historical Pronunciations
| Middle Chinese | Old Chinese | Gloss | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Baxter-Sagart | 'jwonX | [ʔ]o[r]ʔ | curved; to bend |
說文解字
《說文》：“宛，屈艸自覆也。从宀，夗聲。惌，宛或从心。徐灝注箋：“夗者，屈曲之義，宛从宀，蓋謂宮室窈然深曲，引申為凡圓曲之偁，又為屈折之偁。屈草自覆未詳其恉。”
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)