què

(crane), very high

Original meaning: crane

Depicts a bird () with a line on its neck to either indicate a crane's long neck or loudness of its call. Based on the original meaning "crane", now written as . The meaning later shifted to "very high".

Components

Iconic component
characterless component

Line indicating a crane's long neck or its loudness of its call.

Iconic component
zhuī, cuī, wéi bird

Character Evolution

Seal form
Seal Shuowen ~100 AD
Clerical form
Clerical Eastern Han 25-220 AD
Regular Modern

Component uses

Sound (3 of 5 verified)

Meaning (1)

Historical Pronunciations

Middle ChineseOld ChineseGloss
Baxter-Sagarthowk[g]ˤawk high

說文解字

《說文》:“隺,高至也。从隹上欲出冂。《易》曰:‘夫乾隺然’。”

Sources

Readings & variants
Unicode
Historical pronunciations
Baxter-Sagart
Historical images
Academia Sinica