苛
kē HSK7

small

Phonosemantic compound. 艹 represents the meaning and 可 represents the sound.

Components

艹
艹 Meaning component
cao, cǎo grass

艹 is a component form of 艸.

可
可 Sound component
kě able to

Character Evolution

Bronze form
Bronze Late Warring States ~250 BC
Seal form
Seal Warring States (Chu) 475-221 BC
Seal form
Seal Shuowen ~100 AD
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
Regular Modern

Historical Pronunciations

Middle ChineseOld Chinese
Zhengzhangɡaːl
Unicodehɑ

說文解字

小艸也。从艸可聲。

Sources

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