秊
nián HSK1

year

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approved by Peter Olson · Feb 18, 2022, 08:17 PM · Reviewed by Peter Olson on Feb 18, 2022, 08:17 PM

年

Variant form of 年. Pictograph of a person (人) harvesting grain (禾). The harvest season is a yearly event.

Components

禾
禾 Iconic component
人
人 Iconic component
Change in form
Due to historical stylistic changes, this component is less similar to 人 than it was in ancient scripts.

Character Evolution

Oracle form
Oracle Bone ~1250-1000 BC
Oracle form
Oracle Bone ~1250-1000 BC
Oracle form
Oracle Bone ~1250-1000 BC
Bronze form
Bronze Early Western Zhou ~1000 BC
Bronze form
Bronze Early Western Zhou ~1000 BC
Bronze form
Bronze Early Spring and Autumn ~700 BC
Bronze form
Bronze Early Spring and Autumn ~700 BC
Bronze form
Bronze Late Spring and Autumn ~500 BC
Bronze form
Bronze Late Spring and Autumn ~500 BC
Bronze form
Bronze Late Spring and Autumn ~500 BC
Bronze form
Bronze Late Warring States ~250 BC
Bronze form
Bronze Late Warring States ~250 BC
Seal form
Seal Warring States (Chu) 475-221 BC
Seal form
Seal Warring States (Chu) 475-221 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

說文解字

《說文》：“年，穀孰也。从禾，千聲。”

Sources

Character origin
季旭昇《說文新證》p.574-575漢語多功能字庫
Historical images
Academia Sinica
Etymology
Shuowen Jiezi (說文解字)