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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

唱

chàng
to lead in singing
  • Phono-semantic compound 形聲
  • HSK 1
  • TOCFL 2
  • radical 口
  • 11 strokes
  • 暢
  • 畅

Etymology graph

  • inherited
  • borrowed
  • derived
  • parts
  • meaning component
  • sound component
  • related
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Origin

Etymology 1

Phono-semantic compound (形聲 /形声, OC *tʰjaŋs): semantic 口 + phonetic 昌 (OC *tʰjaŋ).

Same word as 倡 (OC *tʰjaŋs, “to lead; to advocate”). Schuessler (2007), reconstructing the Old Chinese minimally as *k-hlaŋh, considers it to be a Sino-Tibetan word; compare Burmese အချင်း (a.hkyang:, “song, poem”) and perhaps also Proto-Bodo-Garo *lʔəŋ (“to sing”).

Etymology 2

Borrowed from English change.

From Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.

Lineage

  • meaningChinese口 “mouth, especially the lips and internal mouth cavity (Classifier: 把 c)”
  • soundChinese昌 “prosperous; flourishing”
    • meaningChinese日 “Sun”
  • borrowedEnglishchange “To become something different.”
    • inheritedMiddle Englishchaungen
      • borrowedAnglo-Normanchaunger

Related: Burmese အချင်း, Proto-Bodo-Garo *lʔəŋ

Words built on it: 唱歌, 演唱

Meanings

character
  1. to lead in singing
  2. to sing
  3. to call; to cry out; to chant
  4. song
  5. to spread (usually negative) information or rumours
  6. to advocate; to initiate

Shuowen Jiezi 說文解字

唱：導也。从口昌聲。

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

國語辭典 definitions

  1. 發出歌聲。 例：唱歌、合唱
  2. 高聲呼叫。 例：唱名、唱票
  3. 泛稱歌詩詞曲。 例：絕唱、新唱

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

How 唱 was written 字形演變

  1. 唱 in Small seal script
    Small seal
    說文小篆
    Shuowen, c. 100 CE
  2. 唱 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
  • 說文解字 Shuowen Jiezi (Xu Shen, c. 100 CE) — Public domain
  • Written form — n/a
  • Wiktionary (via Wiktextract / kaikki.org) — CC BY-SA 4.0
  • Wiktionary: 唱