𠩺
líxī

to split

Original meaning: to harvest wheat

Depicts a person (人) carrying wheat (來) while a hand threshes (攵) it. Based on the original meaning "to harvest wheat". The meaning later shifted to "crack" and "to split".

Components

來
來 Iconic component
lái come

Depicts a stalk of wheat.

Change in form
Due to historical stylistic changes, this component is less similar to 來 than it was in ancient scripts.
攵
攵 Iconic component
pū tap

Depicts a hand holding a hitting implement.

人
人 Iconic component
rén, ren person
Change in form
Due to historical stylistic changes, this component is less similar to 人 than it was in ancient scripts.

Character Evolution

Oracle form
Oracle Bone ~1250-1000 BC
Oracle form
Oracle Bone ~1250-1000 BC
Oracle form
Oracle Bone ~1250-1000 BC
Oracle form
Oracle Bone ~1250-1000 BC
Oracle form
Oracle Bone ~1250-1000 BC
Bronze form
Bronze Mid Western Zhou ~900 BC
Bronze form
Bronze Late Western Zhou ~800 BC
Seal form
Seal Shuowen ~100 AD
Regular Modern

Component uses

Sound (2)

嫠釐

Meaning (1)

釐

Unknown (1)

氂

說文解字

《說文》：“，坼也。从攴，从厂。厂之性坼，果孰有味亦坼，故謂之。从未聲。”

Sources

Character origin
漢語多功能字庫季旭昇《說文新證》p.245
Readings & variants
Unicode
Historical images
Academia Sinica
Etymology
Shuowen Jiezi (說文解字)