夫
fūfú HSK3

man

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approved by inralback19 · Feb 13, 2026, 02:07 AM · Reviewed by inralback19 on Feb 13, 2026, 02:07 AM

Rollback 5gY4mJe3jKpBhYLB9

Changed fields: hint, isVerified, components, customSources

Pictograph of a man. The top horizontal stroke is traditionally explained as a hairpin which was only worn by adults.

Components

◎
◎ Iconic component

Depicts a hairpin.

大
大 Iconic component

Pictograph of a person standing up.


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
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
Clerical form
Clerical Qin 221-206 BC
Clerical form
Clerical Western Han 202 BC-9 AD
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-Sagartpjup(r)a man
bju[b]a this, that
bjuba final particle

說文解字

《說文》：“夫，丈夫也。从大，一以象簪也。周制以八寸為尺，十尺為丈，人長八尺，故曰丈夫。”

Sources

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