承担
chéng​dān HSK4

undertake

承 chéng bear, carry

Pictograph of hands (廾, 手) carrying a person.

Components

卩
卩 Iconic component
jié person kneeling

Depicts a person being carried.

Change in form
Due to historical stylistic changes, this component is less similar to 卩 than it was in ancient scripts.
手
手 Iconic component
shǒu, shou hand
廾
廾 Iconic component
gǒng two hands
Change in form
Due to historical stylistic changes, this component is less similar to 廾 than it was in ancient scripts.

Character Evolution

Oracle form
Oracle Bone ~1250-1000 BC
Bronze form
Bronze Early Western Zhou ~1000 BC
Bronze form
Bronze Early Warring States ~400 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 Shuowen ~100 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 Western Jin 266-316 AD
Regular Modern

Historical Pronunciations

Middle ChineseOld ChineseGloss
Baxter-Sagartdzying[m-t]əŋ receive

說文解字

《說文》：“承，奉也，受也。从手，从卪，从。”

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)

担 dān, dàn, dan carry Simplified

Phonosemantic compound. 扌 represents the meaning and 旦 represents the sound. Simplified form of 擔.

Components

扌
扌 Meaning component
shou, shǒu hand

扌 is a component form of 手.

旦
旦 Sound component
dàn dawn

Character Evolution

Seal form
Seal Warring States (Chu) 475-221 BC
Regular Modern

Historical Pronunciations

Old Chinese
Zhengzhangtaːnʔ

Sources

Character origin
漢語多功能字庫
Readings & variants
Unicode
Historical pronunciations
Zhengzhang Shangfang
Historical images
Academia Sinica

擔 dān, dàn, dan carry Traditional

Phonosemantic compound. 扌 represents the meaning and 詹 represents the sound.

Components

扌
扌 Meaning component
shou, shǒu hand

扌 is a component form of 手.

詹
詹 Sound component
zhān, dàn talk too much

Historical Pronunciations

Middle ChineseOld ChineseGloss
Baxter-Sagarttammə-tˤam carry on the shoulder
tamtˤam burden
tamHmə-tˤam-s burden

Sources

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