故而
gù'ér

therefore

故 gù incident, happening, cause

Phonosemantic compound. 攵 represents the meaning and 古 represents the sound.

Components

古
古 Sound component
gǔ old
攵
攵 Meaning component
pū tap

攵 is a component form of 攴.

Character Evolution

Bronze form
Bronze Early Western Zhou ~1000 BC
Bronze form
Bronze Early Western Zhou ~1000 BC
Bronze form
Bronze Early Spring and Autumn ~700 BC
Bronze form
Bronze Late Warring States ~250 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 Eastern Han 25-220 AD
Clerical form
Clerical Eastern Han 25-220 AD
Regular Modern

Historical Pronunciations

Middle ChineseOld ChineseGloss
Baxter-SagartkuHkˤa(ʔ)-s fact; reason
kuHkˤaʔ-s old (not new)

說文解字

《說文》：“故，使為之也。从攴，古聲。”

Sources

Character origin
李学勤《字源》p.250
Readings & variants
Unicode
Historical pronunciations
Baxter-Sagart
Historical images
Academia Sinica
Etymology
Shuowen Jiezi (說文解字)

而 ér and

Original meaning: beard

Originally a pictograph of a beard, now written as 耏. The current use as a conjunction is a phonetic loan.

Character Evolution

Bronze form
Bronze Late Western Zhou ~800 BC
Bronze form
Bronze Late Spring and Autumn ~500 BC
Bronze form
Bronze Warring States 475-221 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
Clerical form
Clerical Eastern Han 25-220 AD
Clerical form
Clerical Western Jin 266-316 AD
Regular Modern

Component uses

Sound (4 of 8 verified)

需耐鸸恧鲕耎耏鴯

Iconic (2)

耐耏

Meaning (0 of 1 verified)

耍

Simplified (1)

斋

Historical Pronunciations

Middle ChineseOld ChineseGloss
Baxter-Sagartnyinə and, but

說文解字

《說文》：“而，頰毛也。象毛之形。《周禮》曰：‘作其鱗之而。’”

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)