祇
qí

the spirit of the earth

Phonosemantic compound. 礻 represents the meaning and 氏 represents the sound.

Components

礻
礻 Meaning component
shì show

礻 is a component form of 示.

氏
氏 Sound component
shì clan

Character Evolution

Bronze form
Bronze Early Warring States ~400 BC
Seal form
Seal Shuowen ~100 AD
Clerical form
Clerical Eastern Han 25-220 AD
Clerical form
Clerical Jin 266-420 AD
Regular Modern

Historical Pronunciations

Middle ChineseOld ChineseGloss
Baxter-Sagartgjie[k.d]e (dialect: *k.d- > *ɡ.d- > *ɡ-, no palatalization)earth spirit
Zhengzhangɡe
Unicodejiɛ̌
ghiɛ

說文解字

地祇，提出萬物者也。从示氏聲。

Sources

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