Chinese Character Wiki
雞

jī

chickens

Originally was a pictograph of a chicken. Later changed to a phonosemantic compound of 奚 and 隹 (bird).

Components
奚 sound component

奚  Sound component

xī

  

where? what? how? why?

隹 meaning component

隹  Meaning component

zhuī

  

bird

Evolution

雞 Oracle script (~1250-1000 BC)

Oracle script

(~1250-1000 BC)
雞 Bronze script Late Shang dynasty (~1100 BC)

Bronze script

Late Shang dynasty (~1100 BC)
雞 Seal script Shuowen (~100 AD)

Seal script

Shuowen (~100 AD)
雞 Clerical script Qin dynasty (221-206 BC)

Clerical script

Qin dynasty (221-206 BC)
雞 Regular script Modern

Regular script

Modern
Definitions

鸡 (雞) 

jī

chickens; domestic fowl; fowl; chicken; CL:隻|只[zhī]; (slang) prostitute

Most common words with 雞
Freq.
Word
Meaning

鸡

fowl

鸡蛋

(chicken) egg

鸡肉

chicken meat

火鸡

turkey

鸡尾酒

cocktail (loanword)

Historical pronunciation

Old Chinese

Middle Chinese

Pinyin

Gloss

*kˤe

kej

jī

fowl, chicken


Statistics

Not found in HSK word list

Appears in 36.3607% of movies

870th most common character in movies

1391st most common character in books

Miscellaneous

Strokes

18

Simplified

鸡

Unicode

U+96DE

Shuowen

“雞，知時畜也。从隹，奚聲。鷄，籀文雞从鳥。”


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