酷似 Origin — Dong Chinese Dictionary

kùsì HSK7

resemble

kù strong (wine), cool

Phonosemantic compound. 酉 represents the meaning and 告 represents the sound.

Components

酉 Meaning component

yǒu wine

告 Sound component

gào tell

Change in sound

酷 and 告 don't sound similar in modern Mandarin due to historical phonetic changes. They were more similar in Old Chinese.
酷 *kʰˤuk
告 *kˤuk

Character Evolution

Seal form — Seal Warring States (Chu) 475-221 BC

Clerical form — Clerical Eastern Han 25-220 AD

Regular Modern

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Historical Pronunciations

	Middle Chinese	Old Chinese	Gloss
Baxter-Sagart	khowk	kʰˤuk	cruel

說文解字

《說文》：“酷，酒厚味也。从酉，告聲。”

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)

shì, sì resemble

Phonosemantic compound. 亻 represents the meaning and 以 represents the sound.

Components

亻 Meaning component

rén person

亻 is a component form of 人.

以 Sound component

yǐ by means of

Change in sound

似 and 以 don't sound similar in modern Mandarin due to historical phonetic changes. They were more similar in Middle Chinese.
似 ziX
以 yiX

Character Evolution

Regular Modern

▼ More ▲ Less

Historical Pronunciations

	Middle Chinese	Old Chinese	Gloss
Baxter-Sagart	ziX	sə.ləʔ	resemble

Sources

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

酷 kù strong (wine), cool

Components

Character Evolution

Historical Pronunciations

說文解字

Sources

似 shì, sì resemble

Components

Character Evolution

Historical Pronunciations

Sources

kù strong (wine), cool

shì, sì resemble