舅妈
jiù​mā

aunt

舅 jiù, jiu mother's brother

Phonosemantic compound. 男 represents the meaning and 臼 represents the sound.

Components

男
男 Meaning component
nán male
臼
臼 Sound component
jiù mortar

Character Evolution

Seal form
Seal Shuowen ~100 AD
Clerical form
Clerical Eastern Han 25-220 AD
Clerical form
Clerical Western Jin 266-316 AD
Regular Modern

Historical Pronunciations

Middle ChineseOld ChineseGloss
Baxter-SagartgjuwX[ɡ](r)uʔmother"s brother
Zhengzhangɡuʔ
Unicodeghiǒu

說文解字

母之兄弟爲𦥶，妻之父爲外𦥶。从男臼聲。

Sources

Readings & variants
Unicode
Historical pronunciations
Baxter-SagartZhengzhang Shangfang
Historical images
Academia Sinica
Etymology
Shuowen Jiezi (說文解字)

妈 mā, ma mother Simplified

Simplified form of 媽. Phonosemantic compound. 女 represents the meaning and 马 represents the sound.

Components

女
女 Meaning component
nǚ, nü woman
马
马 Sound component
mǎ horse

Sources

Character origin
漢語多功能字庫
Readings & variants
Unicode

媽 mā, ma mother Traditional

Phonosemantic compound. 女 represents the meaning and 馬 represents the sound.

Components

女
女 Meaning component
nǚ, nü woman
馬
馬 Sound component
mǎ horse

Historical Pronunciations

Old Chinese
Zhengzhangmaːʔ

Sources

Character origin
漢語多功能字庫
Readings & variants
Unicode
Historical pronunciations
Zhengzhang Shangfang