jí, jǐ
spine
Originally was a pictograph of a fish spine. Later changed into a phonosemantic compound with ⺼ representing the meaning and 朿 representing the sound.
Components
Evolution

Bronze script
Late Shang dynasty (~1100 BC)
Seal script
Shuowen (~100 AD)
Clerical script
Western Han dynasty (202 BC-9 AD)Regular script
ModernMost common words with 脊
Freq. | Word | Meaning |
---|---|---|
vertebra | ||
spinal cord | ||
spinal column | ||
spine | ||
mountain ridge |
Component uses
Meaning component in 1 character (0 verified)
Historical pronunciation
Old Chinese | Middle Chinese | Pinyin | Gloss |
*[ts]ek | tsjek | jǐ | spine, backbone |
Statistics
Not found in HSK word list
Appears in 5.9587% of movies
2303rd most common character in movies
2228th most common character in books
Miscellaneous
Strokes | 10 |
Unicode | U+810A |
Shuowen | “脊,背呂也。从,从肉。” |
Sources
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