Chinese Character Wiki
卒

zú, cù

soldier, to finish

Original meaning: 

to finish sewing clothes

Depicts clothing (衣) with intersecting lines indicating that the clothing is done being sewed. Based on the original meaning, "to finish sewing clothes". The meaning later shifted to "to finish" and "to die" while it's other meaning "soldier" is a phoentic loan.

Components
衣 iconic component

衣  Iconic component

yī, yì

  

clothes

◎ iconic component

◎  Iconic component

  

characterless component

Here used to depict the intersecting lines indicating that the clothing is done being sewed.

Evolution

卒 Oracle script (~1250-1000 BC)

Oracle script

(~1250-1000 BC)
卒 Bronze script Early Western Zhou (~1000 BC)

Bronze script

Early Western Zhou (~1000 BC)
卒 Seal script Shuowen (~100 AD)

Seal script

Shuowen (~100 AD)
卒 Clerical script Eastern Han dynasty (25-220 AD)

Clerical script

Eastern Han dynasty (25-220 AD)
卒 Regular script Modern

Regular script

Modern
Definitions

卒  

zú

soldier; servant; at last, finally; to finish; to die; finally; at last; pawn in Chinese chess

卒  

cù

variant of 猝[cù]

卒 (䘚) 

zú

variant of 卒[zú]

Most common words with 卒
Freq.
Word
Meaning

卒

soldier

无名小卒

a nobody

卒中

stroke

士卒

soldier

狱卒

jailer (old)

Component uses

Sound component in 15 characters (0 verified)

碎 粹 醉 翠 猝 悴 萃 瘁 啐 窣 淬 谇 崒 晬 綷

Historical pronunciation

Old Chinese

Middle Chinese

Pinyin

Gloss

*[ts]ut

tswit

zú

finish, die

*[ts]ˤut

tswot

zú

soldier


Statistics

Not found in HSK word list

Appears in 2.0022% of movies

2963rd most common character in movies

2584th most common character in books

Miscellaneous

Strokes

8

Unicode

U+5352

Shuowen

“卒，隸人給事者衣為卒。卒，衣有題識者。”


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