歬
qián

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approved by Prismcool · Apr 19, 2024, 03:10 PM · Reviewed by Prismcool on Apr 19, 2024, 03:10 PM

Edited for brevity

Changed fields: hint, components

Original meaning: washing feet

Original form of 前. Depicts feet (止) being washed on a basin (凡). The current meaning is a phonetic loan.

Components

止
止 Iconic component

Depicts a foot.

Change in meaning
止 hints at the original meaning of 歬, "washing feet", which is no longer the most common meaning of 歬 in modern Mandarin.
凡
凡 Iconic component

Depicts a basin. Modern form is unrelated to 舟. Sometimes may be archic form of 桶 in ancient forms.

Change in meaning
凡 hints at the original meaning of 歬, "washing feet", which is no longer the most common meaning of 歬 in modern Mandarin.
Change in form
Due to historical stylistic changes, this component is less similar to 凡 than it was in ancient scripts.

Character Evolution

Bronze form
Bronze Mid Western Zhou ~900 BC
Bronze form
Bronze Late Western Zhou ~800 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 Warring States (Chu) 475-221 BC
Seal form
Seal Warring States (Chu) 475-221 BC
Seal form
Seal Western Han 202 BC-9 AD
Seal form
Seal Shuowen ~100 AD
Clerical form
Clerical Qin 221-206 BC
Regular Modern

Historical Pronunciations

Old Chinese
Zhengzhangzleːn

說文解字

《說文》：“歬，不行而進謂之歬。从止在舟上。”

Sources

Character origin
漢語多功能字庫The Outlier Linguistics Dictionary of Chinese Characters
Readings & variants
Unicode
Historical pronunciations
Zhengzhang Shangfang
Historical images
Academia Sinica
Etymology
Shuowen Jiezi (說文解字)