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Oracle Bone ~1250-1000 BC
Bronze Early Western Zhou ~1000 BC
Bronze Late Western Zhou ~800 BC
Bronze Late Western Zhou ~800 BC
Bronze Late Western Zhou ~800 BC
Seal Warring States (Chu) 475-221 BC
Seal Shuowen ~100 AD
Seal Shuowen ~100 AD
Clerical Qin 221-206 BC
Clerical Qin 221-206 BC
Clerical Western Han 202 BC-9 AD
Clerical Eastern Han 25-220 AD
Clerical Eastern Han 25-220 AD
Clerical Eastern Han 25-220 AD Regular Modern
Change explanation
Changed fields: hint, components, customSources
Two spoons side-by-side, conveying the meaning "to put together", "match", or "compare". 匕 also represents the sound.
Components
Character Evolution
Historical Pronunciations
| Middle Chinese | Old Chinese | Gloss | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Baxter-Sagart | pjijX | C.pijʔ | compare |
| pjijH | pij-s | combine; all |
說文解字
《說文》:“比,密也。二人為从,反从為比。夶,古文比。”
Sources
- Character origin
- 尤梓竹《甲骨文字考釋提要(一)》p.56李学勤《字源》p.725
- Readings & variants
- Unicode
- Historical pronunciations
- Baxter-Sagart
- Historical images
- Academia Sinica
- Etymology
- Shuowen Jiezi (說文解字)