wū​lì

corrupt official

filthy

Phonosemantic compound. represents the meaning and () represents the sound.

Components

Meaning component
shui, shuǐ water

water

Sound component
at

and both come from the same ancient character.

Character Evolution

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 Western Han 202 BC-9 AD
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
Regular Modern

Historical Pronunciations

Middle ChineseOld ChineseGloss
Baxter-Sagart'waeqʷˤra impure, vile

說文解字

《說文》:“汙,薉也。一曰小池為汙。一曰涂也。从水,于聲。”

Sources

Character origin
漢語多功能字庫
Readings & variants
Unicode
Historical pronunciations
Baxter-Sagart
Historical images
Academia Sinica

government official

The characters (history), (government official), 使 (cause; use; instruct), and (matter; work; affair) are all etymologically related and all derive from the same ancient character, depicting a hand () holding a container for writing utensils. and were originally written the same, but later an extra mark was added to distinguish them.

Components

characterless component

Mark added to distinguish from .

SoundIconic component
shǐ history

Depicts a hand holding a container for writing utensils.

Change in sound

Character Evolution

Oracle form
Oracle Bone ~1250-1000 BC
Oracle form
Oracle Bone ~1250-1000 BC
Bronze form
Bronze Early Western Zhou ~1000 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
Regular Modern

Component uses

Sound (1)

Iconic (1)

Historical Pronunciations

Middle ChineseOld ChineseGloss
Baxter-SagartliH[r]əʔ-s officer

說文解字

《說文》:“吏,治人者也。从一,从史,史亦聲。”

Sources

Character origin
漢語多功能字庫
Readings & variants
Unicode
Historical pronunciations
Baxter-Sagart
Historical images
Academia Sinica