初潮
chū​cháo

menarche

初 chū beginning

Depicts cutting out fabric (衤) with a knife (刀), the first step in making clothes.

Components

衤
衤 Iconic component
yī clothes

衤 is a component form of 衣.

刀
刀 Iconic component
dāo knife

Character Evolution

Oracle form
Oracle Bone ~1250-1000 BC
Bronze form
Bronze Early Western Zhou ~1000 BC
Bronze form
Bronze Late Western Zhou ~800 BC
Bronze form
Bronze Late Spring and Autumn ~500 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
Clerical form
Clerical Qin 221-206 BC
Regular Modern

Historical Pronunciations

Middle ChineseOld ChineseGloss
Baxter-Sagarttsrhjo[ts]ʰra beginning

說文解字

《說文》：“初，始也。从刀，从衣。裁衣之始也。”

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)

潮 cháo tide

Phonosemantic compound. 氵 represents the meaning and 朝 represents the sound.

Components

氵
氵 Meaning component
shui, shuǐ water

氵 is a component form of 水.

朝
朝 Sound component
cháo, zhāo dynasty

Historical Pronunciations

Middle ChineseOld ChineseGloss
Baxter-Sagartdrjew[N]-t<r>aw morning tide

Sources

Character origin
漢語多功能字庫
Readings & variants
Unicode
Historical pronunciations
Baxter-Sagart