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

圈

/t͡ɕy̯ɛn⁵¹/

pen; sty; fold

Phono-semantic compound 形聲
HSK 4
TOCFL 6
radical 囗
11 strokes

Etymology graph

inherited
borrowed
derived
parts
meaning component
sound component
related

Press enter or space to select a node. You can then use the arrow keys to move the node around. Press delete to remove it and escape to cancel.

Press enter or space to select an edge. You can then press delete to remove it or escape to cancel.

點擊節點放大 · Click a node to zoom in

Origin

Phono-semantic compound (形聲 /形声, OC *kʰron, *ɡronʔ, *kʰon, *ɡlonʔ, *ɡlons): semantic 囗 + phonetic 卷 (OC *ɡron, *kronʔ, *krons, *ɡonʔ).

From Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.

Lineage

meaningChinese囗 “box, enclosure”
soundChinese卷 “reel of books”

Meanings

character

pen; sty; fold
state; city
a surname, Juan

Shuowen Jiezi 說文解字

圈：養畜之閑也。从囗卷聲。

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

國語辭典 definitions

外圓中空的環狀物。例：花圈、項圈、橡皮圈
畫環形記號。例：圈點、圈選
指某些特定行業的範疇。例：演藝圈、廣告圈、圈內人
量詞。計算環繞次數的單位。例：三圈鐵絲、繞場一圈

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

How 圈 was written 字形演變

Chu slips & silk
楚系簡帛
Warring States
Qin slips
秦系簡牘
Qin
Small seal
說文小篆
Shuowen, c. 100 CE
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
Wiktionary (via Wiktextract / kaikki.org) — CC BY-SA 4.0
Wiktionary: 圈