须
xū HSK2

must

Original meaning: beard

Pictograph of a person with a bearded face. Simplified form of 須. The meaning "must" is a phonetic loan.

Components

彡
彡 Iconic component
shān, xiǎn hair
页
页 Iconic component
yè page

Depicts a head.

Sources

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

須 xū must Traditional

Original meaning: beard

Pictograph of a person with a bearded face. Based on the original meaning "beard", now written as 鬚. The current meaning is a phonetic loan.

Components

彡
彡 Iconic component
shān, xiǎn hair
頁
頁 Iconic component
yè (head), page

Depicts a head.


Character Evolution

Oracle form
Oracle Bone ~1250-1000 BC
Bronze form
Bronze Late Western Zhou ~800 BC
Bronze form
Bronze Warring States 475-221 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 Western Han 202 BC-9 AD
Clerical form
Clerical Eastern Han 25-220 AD
Clerical form
Clerical Western Jin 266-316 AD
Regular Modern

Component uses

Sound (1)

Iconic (1)

Historical Pronunciations

Middle ChineseOld ChineseGloss
Baxter-SagartsjuC-[s.n]o beard
sju[s]o 斯須 a short time

說文解字

《說文》:“須,面毛也。从頁,从彡。”

Sources

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

鬚 beard Traditional

Phonosemantic compound. 髟 represents the meaning and 須 represents the sound.

Components

髟
髟 Meaning component
biāo, piào, shān long hair
須
須 SoundIconic component
xū must

Depicts a head with a beard.

Historical Pronunciations

Middle ChineseOld ChineseGloss
Baxter-SagartsjuC-[s.n]o beard

Sources

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