do not

Originally written and pronounced the same as (mother). Later it was slightly altered so the two characters could be distinguished.

Character Evolution

Bronze form
Bronze Mid Western Zhou ~900 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 Eastern Han 25-220 AD
Regular Modern

Component uses

Meaning (1)

Historical Pronunciations

Middle ChineseOld ChineseGloss
Baxter-Sagartmjumo don't

說文解字

《說文》:“毋,止之也。从女,有奸之者。”

Sources

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