Dong Chinese dictionary

yǐ

chair

Phonosemantic compound. 木 represents the meaning and 奇 represents the sound.

Components

木 Meaning component

mù

tree

奇 Sound component

qí, jī

strange

椅 and 奇 don't sound similar in modern Mandarin due to historical phonetic changes. They were more similar in older Chinese.椅 /*Cə.q(r)ajʔ/
奇 /*[k](r)aj/, /*N-k(r)aj/

Evolution

Seal script

Shuowen (~100 AD)

Regular script

Modern

Definitions

椅

yǐ

chair, seat; chair

Most common words with 椅

Freq.	Word	Meaning
	椅子	chair
	椅	chair
	轮椅	wheelchair
	座椅	seat
	长椅	bench

Sources

MTSU Chinese text computing

漢語多功能字庫

Freq.

Word

Meaning