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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

努

/nu²¹⁴/
to exert; to strive; to make an effort
  • Phono-semantic compound 形聲
  • HSK 2
  • radical 力
  • 7 strokes

Etymology graph

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Origin

Phono-semantic compound (形聲 /形声, OC *naːʔ): semantic 力 (“strength”) + phonetic 奴 (OC *naː) – exert one’s strength.

From Proto-Sino-Tibetan *nwar; cognate with Mizo nawr (“push, thrust, urge, compel, attack”) < nɔɔr & Mizo nawrh (“to sulk, to be displeased, disgruntled, offended”) < nuar ~ nɔrʔ ~ nɔrh, & Khami *nuar "get angry" (Schuessler, 2007).

From Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.

Lineage

  • inheritedProto-Sino-Tibetan*nwar
  • meaningChinese力 “physical strength; physical power; energy”
  • soundChinese奴 “slave; servant”
    • ideaChinese女 “woman; (only of humans in Standard Chinese) female”
    • ideaChinese又 “again; once more”

Related: Mizo nawr, Mizo nawrh

Words built on it: 努力

Meanings

character
  1. to exert; to strive; to make an effort
  2. to bulge; to pout
  3. to injure oneself through overexertion
  4. to push something out of the body by contracting abdominal muscles and increasing abdominal pressure

國語辭典 definitions

  1. 使力、盡力。 例：努力
  2. 突起、鼓出。 例：努嘴

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

How 努 was written 字形演變

  1. 努 in Chu slips & silk script
    Chu slips & silk
    楚系簡帛
    Warring States
  2. 努 in Qin slips script
    Qin slips
    秦系簡牘
    Qin
  3. 努 in Small seal script
    Small seal
    說文小篆
    Shuowen, c. 100 CE
  4. 努 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

  • 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
  • Written form — n/a
  • Wiktionary (via Wiktextract / kaikki.org) — CC BY-SA 4.0
  • Wiktionary: 努