觀
guānguànGuàn

observe

Phonosemantic compound. 見 represents the meaning and 雚 represents the sound.

Components

見
見 Meaning component
jiàn, xiàn, jian see
雚
雚 Sound component
guàn, huán heron

Character Evolution

Oracle form
Oracle Bone ~1250-1000 BC
Bronze form
Bronze Mid Western Zhou ~900 BC
Bronze form
Bronze Late Warring States ~250 BC
Seal form
Seal Warring States (Chu) 475-221 BC
Seal form
Seal Warring States (Chu) 475-221 BC
Seal form
Seal Warring States (Chu) 475-221 BC
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

Middle ChineseOld ChineseGloss
Baxter-SagartkwanC.qʷˤar look (v.)
kwanHC.qʷˤar-s watchtower
kwanHC.qʷˤar-s 榮觀 imperial palace; walls and watchtowers

說文解字

《說文》：“觀，諦視也。从見，雚聲。，古文觀从囧。”

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)

观 guān observe Simplified

Simplified form of 觀. Phonosemantic compound. 见 represents the meaning and 雚 represents the sound.

Components

见
见 Meaning component
jiàn, xiàn, jian see
又
又 Simplified component
yòu again

Shorthand for the 雚 component in the traditional character 觀.

Sources

Character origin
漢語多功能字庫
Readings & variants
Unicode