fú​zhòu

talisman

tally, symbol, mark

Phonosemantic compound. ⺮ represents the meaning and represents the sound.

Components

Meaning component
zhú bamboo

⺮ is a component form of .

Sound component
fù, fu pay, hand over

Character Evolution

Bronze form
Bronze Late Warring States ~250 BC
Seal form
Seal Qin 221-206 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 Western Han 202 BC-9 AD
Clerical form
Clerical Eastern Han 25-220 AD
Clerical form
Clerical Eastern Han 25-220 AD
Regular Modern

Historical Pronunciations

Middle ChineseOld ChineseGloss
Baxter-Sagartbju[b](r)o a tally

說文解字

《說文》:“符,信也。漢制以竹,長六寸,分而相合。从竹,付聲。”

Sources

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

zhòu curse

Derived from , with the (show) component being replaced by (mouth) component when the meaning extended to "curse". Depicts a kneeling person () opening their mouth () to pray for disaster to happen on someone.

Components

Meaning component
kǒu, kou mouth
Iconic component
kǒu, kou mouth
Iconic component
jié person kneeling

Modern form looks like .

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

Historical Pronunciations

Old Chinese
Zhengzhangtjus

Sources

Readings & variants
Unicode
Historical pronunciations
Zhengzhang Shangfang