髡
kūn

scalping, make the head bald as corporal punishment

Phonosemantic compound. 髟 represents the meaning and 元 represents the sound.

Components

髟
髟 Meaning component
biāo, piào, shān long hair

shave

元
元 Sound component
yuán first

Character Evolution

Seal form
Seal Shuowen ~100 AD
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
Regular Modern

Historical Pronunciations

Old Chinese
Zhengzhangŋ̊ʰuːn

說文解字

《說文》：“髡，髮也。从髟，兀聲。髡，或从元。”

Sources

Character origin
漢語多功能字庫
Readings & variants
Unicode
Historical pronunciations
Zhengzhang Shangfang
Historical images
Academia Sinica
Etymology
Shuowen Jiezi (說文解字)