孔
kǒng

hole, opening

Original meaning: fontanel

Depicts an opening in a child's (子) head, representing the fontanel. Based on the original meaning "fontanel". The meaning of this character has shifted over time and now means "hole" and "opening".

Components

子
子 Iconic component
zi, zǐ child
◎
◎ Iconic component
characterless component

Depicts an opening.


Character Evolution

Bronze form
Bronze Early Western Zhou ~1000 BC
Bronze form
Bronze Mid Western Zhou ~900 BC
Bronze form
Bronze Late Western Zhou ~800 BC
Bronze form
Bronze Late Spring and Autumn ~500 BC
Bronze form
Bronze Mid Warring States ~300 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 Western Han 202 BC-9 AD
Clerical form
Clerical Eastern Han 25-220 AD
Clerical form
Clerical Eastern Han 25-220 AD
Regular Modern

Component uses

Sound (0 of 2 verified)

吼芤

Historical Pronunciations

Middle ChineseOld ChineseGloss
Baxter-SagartkhuwngX[k]ʰˤoŋʔ (surname)

說文解字

《說文》：“孔，通也。从乙，从子。乙，請子之候鳥也。乙至而得子，嘉美之也。古人名嘉，字子孔。”

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)