a hill with trees or grass-- some give the opposite meaning

Components

Meaning component
shān mountain

mountain

Sound component
self

Character Evolution

Seal form
Seal Shuowen ~100 AD
Regular Modern

Historical Pronunciations

Old Chinese
Zhengzhangkʰɯʔ

說文解字

山無草木也。从山己聲。《詩》曰:“陟彼屺兮。”

Sources

Readings & variants
Unicode
Historical pronunciations
Zhengzhang Shangfang
Historical images
Academia Sinica