叶 — Edit Snapshot — Chinese Character Wiki

yèxiéYè HSK4

be in harmony, leaf

approved by Peter Olson · Dec 22, 2021, 05:26 PM · Reviewed by Peter Olson on Dec 22, 2021, 05:26 PM

in harmony old phone

Changed fields: historicalPronunciations

Phonosemantic compound. 口 represents the meaning and 十 represents the sound. Originally a variant of 協 (cooperate). Later used as the simplified form of the phonetically similar character 葉 (leaf).

Components

口 Meaning component

kǒu, kou mouth

Based on the meaning "cooperate", "be in harmony". Unrelated to "leaf".

十 Sound component

shí ten

Change in sound

叶 and 十 don't sound similar in modern Mandarin due to historical phonetic changes. They were more similar in Old Chinese.
叶 *l[a]p
十 *t.[g]əp

Historical Pronunciations

Sources

Character origin: Wiktionary
Readings & variants: Unicode