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Etymology data from Wiktionary via Wiktextract (CC BY-SA 4.0). Chinese character data from the 說文解字, the Taiwan MOE 國語辭典簡編本 (CC BY-ND 3.0 TW) and HSK/TOCFL lists.

Explanations are written by a local model (gemma4) and only published after a verification pass against the cited sources. How it works.

Chinese

備

/peɪ̯⁵¹/
to prepare
  • Phono-semantic compound 形聲
  • HSK 1
  • TOCFL 6
  • radical 人
  • 12 strokes

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Origin

Phono-semantic (形聲 /形声, OC *brɯɡs) and ideogrammic compound (會意 /会意): a person (亻) carrying a quiver (𤰈 OC *bɯɡ) – "ready; prepared".

Area word; compare Burmese ပြင် (prang, “to get ready; to prepare”), Jingpho hpra (pʰraʔ³¹, “to complete”), Mon ပြေၚ် (“to prepare; to arrange for”) (Schuessler, 2007).

From Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.

Lineage

  • partChinese亻 “Side form of the person (人 (rén)) radical.”
  • partChinese艹 “grass; plant”
  • partChinese厂 “cliff; habitable cave on a cliff”
  • partChinese用 “to use; to employ; to operate”

Related: Burmese ပြင်, Jingpho hpra, Mon ပြေၚ်

Meanings

character
  1. to prepare
  2. to provide or prepare against; to take precautions against
  3. equipment
  4. to possess
  5. complete
  6. fully

Shuowen Jiezi 說文解字

備：愼也。从人𤰈聲。

Xu Shen, c. 100 CE — the first analytical dictionary of Chinese characters.

國語辭典 definitions

  1. 事先安排好。 例：準備、預備
  2. 齊全。 例：完備、齊備
  3. 盡、皆，完全的意思。 例：備嘗辛苦、備受矚目
  4. 設施。 例：裝備、配備

© Ministry of Education, Taiwan — CC BY-ND 3.0 TW, shown unaltered.

How 備 was written 字形演變

  1. 備 in Oracle bone script
    Oracle bone
    甲骨文
    Shang, c. 1250–1050 BCE
  2. 備 in Bronze script
    Bronze
    金文
    Shang–Zhou
  3. 備 in Chu slips & silk script
    Chu slips & silk
    楚系簡帛
    Warring States
  4. 備 in Qin slips script
    Qin slips
    秦系簡牘
    Qin
  5. 備 in Small seal script
    Small seal
    說文小篆
    Shuowen, c. 100 CE
  6. 備 in Regular script
    Regular
    楷書
    since c. 200 CE

Historical forms collected by the legacy etymfun dataset; most characters have several attested variants.

Sources

  • Structural decomposition (chaizi) — See upstream
  • Historical glyph forms (zdic.net 字形演变) — Rights unverified
  • HSK / TOCFL word lists — Facts (levels)
  • 教育部《國語辭典簡編本》 (Taiwan MOE) — CC BY-ND 3.0 TW
  • 說文解字 Shuowen Jiezi (Xu Shen, c. 100 CE) — Public domain
  • Wiktionary (via Wiktextract / kaikki.org) — CC BY-SA 4.0
  • Wiktionary: 備