shī​bài HSK4

fail

shī lose

Original meaning: leisure; carefree

Depicts a person with their hair loose. Based on the original meaning "leisure; carefree", now written as . The meaning later shifted to "lose" and "fail".

Character Evolution

Bronze form
Bronze Early Western Zhou ~1000 BC
Bronze form
Bronze Early Western Zhou ~1000 BC
Bronze form
Bronze Early Western Zhou ~1000 BC
Bronze form
Bronze Early Western Zhou ~1000 BC
Bronze form
Bronze Late Western Zhou ~800 BC
Bronze form
Bronze Late Western Zhou ~800 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

Component uses

Sound (2 of 11 verified)

Meaning (1 of 2 verified)

Historical Pronunciations

Middle ChineseOld ChineseGloss
Baxter-Sagartsyitl̥i[t] lose

說文解字

《說文》:“失,縱也。从手,乙聲。”

Sources

Character origin
何景成《甲骨文字詁林補編》p.26黃德寬《古文字譜系疏證》p.3349
Readings & variants
Unicode
Historical pronunciations
Baxter-Sagart
Historical images
Academia Sinica

bài be defeated Simplified

Phonosemantic compound. represents the meaning and represents the sound. Simplified form of .

Components

Sound component
bèi sea shell
Meaning component
tap

is a component form of .

Sources

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

bài be defeated Traditional

Phonosemantic compound. represents the meaning and represents the sound.

Components

Sound component
bèi sea shell
Meaning component
tap

is a component form of .

Character Evolution

Oracle form
Oracle Bone ~1250-1000 BC
Oracle form
Oracle Bone ~1250-1000 BC
Bronze form
Bronze Late Western Zhou ~800 BC
Bronze form
Bronze Early Warring States ~400 BC
Bronze form
Bronze Mid Warring States ~300 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 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 Western Han 202 BC-9 AD
Clerical form
Clerical Eastern Han 25-220 AD
Clerical form
Clerical Jin 266-420 AD
Regular Modern

Historical Pronunciations

Middle ChineseOld ChineseGloss
Baxter-SagartbaejHN-pˤra[t]-s suffer defeat
paejHpˤra[t]-s defeat (v.t.)

說文解字

《說文》:“敗,毁也。从攴、貝。敗賊皆从貝,會意。贁,籀文敗,从賏。”

Sources

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