bái'é​hù

streaked shearwater

bái, bai white

Origin unclear. Possibly depicts a thumb or a person's face.

Character Evolution

Oracle form
Oracle Bone ~1250-1000 BC
Oracle form
Oracle Bone ~1250-1000 BC
Oracle form
Oracle Bone ~1250-1000 BC
Bronze form
Bronze Early Western Zhou ~1000 BC
Seal form
Seal Warring States (Chu) 475-221 BC
Seal form
Seal Qin 221-206 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 Eastern Han 25-220 AD
Regular Modern

Component uses

Historical Pronunciations

Middle ChineseOld ChineseGloss
Baxter-Sagartbaekbˤrak white

說文解字

《說文》:“白,西方色也。陰用事,物色白。从入合二。二,陰數。,古文白。”

Sources

Character origin
季旭昇《說文新證》p.625漢語多功能字庫
Readings & variants
Unicode
Historical pronunciations
Baxter-Sagart
Historical images
Academia Sinica

é forehead Simplified

Phonosemantic compound. represents the meaning and represents the sound. Simplified form of .

Components

Meaning component
page
Sound component
guest

Sources

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

Simplified

Components

Meaning component
niǎo bird

bird

Sound component
huò, wò catch, get

Sources

Readings & variants
Unicode

é forehead Traditional

Phonosemantic compound. represents the meaning and represents the sound.

Components

Meaning component
(head), page
Sound component
guest

Historical Pronunciations

Middle ChineseOld ChineseGloss
Baxter-SagartngaekC.ŋˤrak (no pre-Qín exx?)forehead

Sources

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

Traditional

Historical Pronunciations

Old Chinese
Zhengzhangqʷaːɡ

Sources

Readings & variants
Unicode
Historical pronunciations
Zhengzhang Shangfang