沙地 Origin — Dong Chinese Dictionary

shādì

sandy beach

shā sand

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

Components

氵 Meaning component

shui, shuǐ water

氵 is a component form of 水.

少 Sound Iconic component

shǎo, shao, shào few

少 depicts four small grains of sand.

Character Evolution

Bronze form — Bronze Mid Western Zhou ~900 BC

Bronze form — Bronze Late Western Zhou ~800 BC

Bronze form — Bronze Late Western Zhou ~800 BC

Bronze form — Bronze Late Western Zhou ~800 BC

Seal form — Seal Western Han 202 BC-9 AD

Seal form — Seal Shuowen ~100 AD

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

Clerical form — Clerical Western Jin 266-316 AD

Regular Modern

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Component uses

Sound (0 of 8 verified)

莎鲨娑裟挲痧桫鯊

Historical Pronunciations

	Middle Chinese	Old Chinese	Gloss
Baxter-Sagart	srae	sˤraj	sand

說文解字

《說文》：“沙，水石也。从水，从少，水少沙見。楚東有沙水。譚長說，沙，或从尐。”

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)

de, dì earth

Phonosemantic compound. 土 represents the meaning and 也 represents the sound.

Components

土 Meaning component

tǔ earth

也 Sound component

yě also

Change in sound

地 and 也 don't sound similar in modern Mandarin due to historical phonetic changes. They were more similar in Old Chinese.
地 *[l]ˤej-s
也 *lAjʔ

Character Evolution

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

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

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Historical Pronunciations

	Middle Chinese	Old Chinese	Gloss
Baxter-Sagart	dijH	[l]ˤej-s	earth, ground

說文解字

《說文》：“地，元气初分，輕、清、陽為天；重、濁、陰為地。萬物所陳列也。从土，也聲。墬，籀文地从。”

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)