沈丘县 Origin — Dong Chinese Dictionary

shěn, chén, tán sink

Phonosemantic compound. 氵 represents the meaning and 冘 represents the sound.

Components

氵 Meaning component

shui, shuǐ water

氵 is a component form of 水.

冘 Sound component

yín, yóu to move on

Character Evolution

Bronze form — Bronze Early Western Zhou ~1000 BC

Seal form — Seal Warring States (Chu) 475-221 BC

Clerical form — Clerical Spring and Autumn 771-476 BC

Regular Modern

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Historical Pronunciations

	Middle Chinese	Old Chinese	Gloss
Baxter-Sagart	drim	C.[d]r[ə]m (~ *m-lr[ə]m)	sink (v.t.)
	drim	[d]r[ə]m (~ *m-lr[ə]m)	sink (v.i.)
	drim	[d]r[ə]m	sacrifice in which gifts are sunk in water
	drimH	[d]r[ə]m-s	sacrifice in which gifts are sunk in water
	syimX	[s.t][ə]mʔ	(name of a state)

說文解字

《說文》：“沈，陵上滈水也。从水，冘聲。一曰濁黕也。”

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)

qiū hill

Pictograph of two hills.

Character Evolution

Regular Modern

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Component uses

Historical Pronunciations

	Middle Chinese	Old Chinese	Gloss
Baxter-Sagart	khjuw	[k]ʷʰə	hill, mound

說文解字

《說文》：“丘，土之高也，非人所為也。从北，从一。一，地也。人居在丘南，故从北。中邦之居在崐崘東南。一曰四方高中央下為丘。象形。，古文从土。”

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)

xiàn county Simplified

Original meaning: suspend, hang

Simplified form of 縣. Pictograph of a severed head (首) hanging on a rope (系) from a tree (木). Based on the original meaning "hang" or "suspend". The current meaning is a phonetic loan. The traditional component 系 was removed for simplification.

Components

首 Iconic component

shǒu head

Depicts a severed head.

Change in form

Due to historical stylistic changes, this component is less similar to 首 than it was in ancient scripts.

木 Iconic component

mù tree

Change in form

Due to historical stylistic changes, this component is less similar to 木 than it was in ancient scripts.

系 Deleted component

xì, xi, jì system

Depicts a rope. The traditional component 系 was removed for simplification.

Component uses

Sound (1)

悬

Iconic (1)

悬

Sources

Character origin: 漢語多功能字庫
Readings & variants: Unicode

xiàn county Traditional

Original meaning: suspend, hang

Pictograph of a severed head (首) hanging on a rope (系) from a tree (木). Based on the original meaning "hang" or "suspend", now written as 懸. The current meaning is a phonetic loan.