老翁 Origin — Dong Chinese Dictionary

lǎowēng

old man

lǎo old

Pictograph of an old person with long hair bent over and leaning on a cane.

Character Evolution

Oracle form — Oracle Bone ~1250-1000 BC

Oracle form — Oracle Bone ~1250-1000 BC

Oracle form — Oracle Bone ~1250-1000 BC

Oracle form — Oracle Bone ~1250-1000 BC

Oracle form — Oracle Bone ~1250-1000 BC

Oracle form — Oracle Bone ~1250-1000 BC

Bronze form — Bronze Late Western Zhou ~800 BC

Bronze form — Bronze Late Western Zhou ~800 BC

Bronze form — Bronze Spring and Autumn 771-476 BC

Bronze form — Bronze Early Spring and Autumn ~700 BC

Bronze form — Bronze Mid Spring and Autumn ~600 BC

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

Clerical form — Clerical Qin 221-206 BC

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 Jin 266-420 AD

Regular Modern

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Component uses

Sound (0 of 5 verified)

姥佬铑栳咾

Meaning (1 of 5 verified)

姥佬耆耄耋

Iconic (1)

Remnant (1)

Historical Pronunciations

	Middle Chinese	Old Chinese	Gloss
Baxter-Sagart	lawX	C.rˤuʔ	old

說文解字

《說文》：“老，考也。七十曰老。从人、毛、匕。言須髮變白也。”

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)

wēng old man

Phonosemantic compound. 羽 represents the meaning and 公 represents the sound.

Components

羽 Meaning component

yǔ feather

公 Sound component

gōng public

Character Evolution

Seal form — Seal Shuowen ~100 AD

Regular Modern

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Component uses

Sound (0 of 6 verified)

嗡蓊暡塕螉瞈

Meaning (0 of 1 verified)

Historical Pronunciations

	Middle Chinese	Old Chinese	Gloss
Baxter-Sagart	ʔuwng	qˤoŋ	old man (Han?)
Zhengzhang		qloːŋ
Unicode	qung

說文解字

頸毛也。从羽公聲。

Sources

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