鳩
jiū

pigeon

Phonosemantic compound. 鳥 represents the meaning and 九 represents the sound.

Components

鳥
鳥 Meaning component
niǎo bird
九
九 Sound component
jiǔ nine

Character Evolution

Seal form
Seal Shuowen ~100 AD
Regular Modern

Historical Pronunciations

Middle ChineseOld ChineseGloss
Baxter-Sagartkjuw[k](r)u(a kind of bird)
Zhengzhangku
Unicodegiou

說文解字

鹘鵃也。从鳥九聲。

Sources

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

鸠 jiū, qiú, zhì pigeon Simplified

Phonosemantic compound. 鸟 represents the meaning and 九 represents the sound. Simplified form of 鳩.

Components

鸟
鸟 Meaning component
niǎo bird
九
九 Sound component
jiǔ nine

Sources

Readings & variants
Unicode