Chinese Character Wiki
衰

shuāi, cuī

decline

Original meaning: 

raincoat made from straw or grass

Depicts a woven raincoat (衣) made from either grass or straw. Based on the original meaning "raincoat made from straw or grass", now written as 蓑. The meaning later shifted to "weaken" and "decline".

Components
衣 iconic component

衣  Iconic component

yī, yì

  

clothes

◎ iconic component

◎  Iconic component

  

characterless component

Depicts woven grass or straw.

Evolution

衰 Bronze script Western Zhou (1045-771 BC)

Bronze script

Western Zhou (1045-771 BC)
衰 Seal script Shuowen (~100 AD)

Seal script

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

Clerical script

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

Regular script

Modern
Definitions

衰  

shuāi

decline, falter, decrease; weaken; to decline; to wane; to become weak or feeble

衰  

cuī

mourning garments

Most common words with 衰
Freq.
Word
Meaning

衰

to wane

衰老

to age

衰竭

organ failure

衰退

to decline

衰落

to fall

Component uses

Sound component in 2 characters (0 verified)

蓑 榱

Historical pronunciation

Old Chinese

Middle Chinese

Pinyin

Gloss

*[s.r̥]ˤruj

tshwoj

cuī

mourning clothes

*[tsʰ]roj

tsrhjwe

cuī

reduce

*sruj

srwij

shuāi

diminish, decline


Statistics

Not found in HSK word list

Appears in 9.0021% of movies

2071st most common character in movies

1702nd most common character in books

Miscellaneous

Strokes

10

Unicode

U+8870

Shuowen

“衰，艸雨衣。秦謂之萆。从衣象形。，古文衰。”


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