qiàn
moat
Phonosemantic compound. 土 represents the meaning and 斬 represents the sound.
Evolution

Seal script
Shuowen (~100 AD)
Seal script
Western Han dynasty (202 BC-9 AD)Regular script
ModernMost common words with 塹
Freq. | Word | Meaning |
---|---|---|
moat around a city | ||
(civil engineering) cutting (for a railway or highway) | ||
trench, rift valley |
Historical pronunciation
Old Chinese | Middle Chinese | Pinyin | Gloss |
*[tsʰ]am-s | tshjemH | qiàn | moat; dig out |
Statistics
Not found in HSK word list
3420th most common character in books
Miscellaneous
Strokes | 14 |
Simplified | |
Unicode | U+5879 |
Shuowen | “塹,阬也;一曰大也。从土,斬聲。” |
Sources
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