shēn

pregnant

Phonosemantic compound. represents the meaning and represents the sound.

Components

Meaning component
nǚ, nü woman
Sound component
chén early morning

Character Evolution

Oracle form
Oracle Bone ~1250-1000 BC
Seal form
Seal Shuowen ~100 AD
Clerical form
Clerical Eastern Han 25-220 AD
Regular Modern

Historical Pronunciations

Middle ChineseOld ChineseGloss
Baxter-Sagartsyins-tərpregnant
tsyinHtər-spregnant
Zhengzhangtjɯns
hljɯn

說文解字

女妊身動也。从女辰聲。《春秋傳》曰:“后緡方娠。”一曰宮婢女隸謂之娠。

Sources

Readings & variants
Unicode
Historical pronunciations
Baxter-SagartZhengzhang Shangfang
Historical images
Academia Sinica