短缺 Origin — Chinese Character Wiki

duǎnquē HSK7

shortage

duǎn short

Phonosemantic compound. 矢 represents the meaning and 豆 represents the sound.

Components

矢 Meaning component

shǐ arrow

豆 Sound component

dòu bean

Change in sound

短 and 豆 don't sound similar in modern Mandarin due to historical phonetic changes. They were more similar in Old Chinese.
短 *tˤorʔ
豆 *[N.t]ˤo-s

Character Evolution

Regular Modern

▼ More ▲ Less

Historical Pronunciations

	Middle Chinese	Old Chinese	Gloss
Baxter-Sagart	twanX	tˤorʔ	short

說文解字

《說文》：“短，有所長短，以矢為正。从矢，豆聲。”

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)

quē be short of, lack

Original meaning: damaged object

Phonosemantic compound. 缶 represents the meaning and 夬 represents the sound.

Components

缶 Meaning component

fǒu pottery

Change in meaning

缶 hints at the original meaning of 缺, "damaged object", which is no longer the most common meaning of 缺 in modern Mandarin.

夬 Sound component

guài, jué parted

Change in sound

缺 and 夬 don't sound similar in modern Mandarin due to historical phonetic changes. They were more similar in Old Chinese.
缺 *Nə-[k]ʷʰˤet
夬 *[k]ʷˤret-s

Character Evolution

Regular Modern

▼ More ▲ Less

Historical Pronunciations

	Middle Chinese	Old Chinese	Gloss
Baxter-Sagart	khwet	Nə-[k]ʷʰˤet	break; defective

說文解字

《說文》：“缺，器破也。从缶，決省聲。”

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)

短 duǎn short

Components

Character Evolution

Historical Pronunciations

說文解字

Sources

缺 quē be short of, lack

Components

Character Evolution

Historical Pronunciations

說文解字

Sources

duǎn short

quē be short of, lack