新古典 Origin — Chinese Character Wiki

xīn new

Original meaning: firewood

Phonosemantic component. 辛 represents the sound, and 斤 (axe) and 木 (tree) represent the original meaning "firewood", now written as 薪. The meaning later shifted to "fresh" and "new".

Components

辛 Sound component

xīn laborious

木 Iconic component

mù tree

Depicts a tree being cut for firewood.

Change in meaning

木 hints at the original meaning of 新, "firewood", which is no longer the most common meaning of 新 in modern Mandarin.

斤 Iconic component

jīn axe

Depicts an axe cutting a tree for firewood.

Change in meaning

斤 hints at the original meaning of 新, "firewood", which is no longer the most common meaning of 新 in modern Mandarin.

Character Evolution

Bronze form — Bronze Early Western Zhou ~1000 BC

Seal form — Seal Warring States (Chu) 475-221 BC

Regular Modern

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Component uses

Sound (1)

薪

Historical Pronunciations

	Middle Chinese	Old Chinese	Gloss
Baxter-Sagart	sin	s.tsʰi[n]	new

說文解字

《說文》：“新，取木也。从斤，新聲。”

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)

gǔ old

Original meaning: firm, solid

Depicts a shield. Based on the original meaning "firm, solid", which is now written as 固. The current meaning "old" is a phonetic loan.

Components

盾 Iconic component

dùn shield

Depicts a shield.

Change in form

Due to historical stylistic changes, this component is less similar to 盾 than it was in ancient scripts.

口 Meaning component

kǒu, kou mouth

The 口 component is sometimes used to indicate an abstract meaning taken from a concrete object. Here, the concrete object "shield" evokes the abstract meaning "firm, solid".