殡葬
bìn​zàng

funeral and burial

殡 bìn encoffin Simplified

Phonosemantic compound. 歹 represents the meaning and 宾 represents the sound. Simplified form of 殯.

Components

歹
歹 Meaning component
dǎi, è, dāi evil, bad
宾
宾 Sound component
bīn guest

Sources

Readings & variants
Unicode

葬 zàng bury

Depicts burying a dead body (死) beneath the grass (茻).

Components

茻
茻 Iconic component
mǎng, mǔ vegetation, overgrown weeds

Bottom part looks like unrelated 廾.

死
死 Iconic component
sǐ die

Used here to depict a dead body.


Character Evolution

Oracle form
Oracle Bone ~1250-1000 BC
Oracle form
Oracle Bone ~1250-1000 BC
Oracle form
Oracle Bone ~1250-1000 BC
Oracle form
Oracle Bone ~1250-1000 BC
Oracle form
Oracle Bone ~1250-1000 BC
Oracle form
Oracle Bone ~1250-1000 BC
Bronze form
Bronze Late Warring States ~250 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
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 Eastern Han 25-220 AD
Clerical form
Clerical Three Kingdoms (Cao Wei) 222-280 AD
Clerical form
Clerical Western Jin 266-316 AD
Clerical form
Clerical Western Jin 266-316 AD
Regular Modern

Component uses

Sound (1)

髒

Historical Pronunciations

Middle ChineseOld ChineseGloss
Baxter-SagarttsangH[ts]ˤaŋ-s bury

說文解字

《說文》：“葬，藏也。从死在茻中。一其中，所以薦之。《易》曰：‘古之葬者，厚衣之以薪。’”

Sources

Character origin
漢語多功能字庫zi.tools
Readings & variants
Unicode
Historical pronunciations
Baxter-Sagart
Historical images
Academia Sinica
Etymology
Shuowen Jiezi (說文解字)

殯 encoffin Traditional

Phonosemantic compound. 歹 represents the meaning and 賓 represents the sound.

Components

歹
歹 Meaning component
dǎi, è, dāi evil, bad
賓
賓 Sound component
bīn guest

Character Evolution

Seal form
Seal Shuowen ~100 AD
Regular Modern

Historical Pronunciations

Old Chinese
Zhengzhangpins

說文解字

死在棺，將遷葬柩，賓遇之。从歺从賓，賓亦聲。夏后殯於阼階，殷人殯於兩楹之閒，周人殯於賓階。

Sources

Readings & variants
Unicode
Historical pronunciations
Zhengzhang Shangfang
Historical images
Academia Sinica
Etymology
Shuowen Jiezi (說文解字)