歬
qián

go forward

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approved by cochleoid · Jun 2, 2022, 03:07 AM · Reviewed by cochleoid on Jun 2, 2022, 03:07 AM

Added a more recent etymology

Changed fields: hint, originalMeaning, components, customSources

Original meaning: washing feet

Original form of 前. Depicts washing feet. Borrowed very early for its sound to mean "go forward". Mistaken for depicting putting shoes on feet (止) to prepare to go forward.

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. A common corruption of 凡 (pan, tray), visually similar but unrelated to 舟 (boat). Sometimes the archaic form of 桶 (bucket, tub).

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)