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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

坐

zuò
to sit; to take a seat
  • Ideogrammatic compound 會意
  • HSK 1
  • TOCFL 1
  • radical 土
  • 7 strokes

Etymology graph

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  • derived
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Origin

Ideogrammic compound (會意 /会意): 留 (“to stay”) + 土 (“ground”).

Sino-Tibetan; cognate with Tangut 𗶠 (*dzu̱², “to sit”), Japhug amdzɯ (“to sit”) (Jacques, 2014; Zhang, Jacques, and Lai, 2019).

From Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.

Lineage

  • ideaChinese留 “to stay; to remain”
    • soundChinese卯 “fourth of twelve earthly branches (十二支)”
    • soundChinese丣
    • meaningChinese田 “farmland (Classifier: 塊／块 m c)”
  • ideaChinese土 “earth; soil”

Related: Tangut 𗶠, Japhug amdzɯ

Words built on it: 座, 坐下

Meanings

character
  1. to sit; to take a seat
  2. to go by; to travel by; to ride
  3. to bear fruit
  4. because of; on the ground of
  5. to be in charge of; to manage
  6. to uphold; to fight until the end without giving up

Shuowen Jiezi 說文解字

坐：止也。从土，从畱省。土，所止也。此與畱同意。

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

國語辭典 definitions

  1. 彎曲下肢，將臀部附著在座位上休息。與「站」相對。 例：坐著、正襟危坐、如坐針氈　◎
  2. 居、處。 例：坐落、坐北朝南、坐二望一
  3. 搭乘。 例：坐車、坐船
  4. 比喻平白的、不勞而獲的。 例：坐享其成、坐收漁利
  5. 指物體向後或向下壓。 例：槍的坐力大。
  6. 判決、定罪。 例：連坐

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

How 坐 was written 字形演變

  1. 坐 in Oracle bone script
    Oracle bone
    甲骨文
    Shang, c. 1250–1050 BCE
  2. 坐 in Chu slips & silk script
    Chu slips & silk
    楚系簡帛
    Warring States
  3. 坐 in Qin slips script
    Qin slips
    秦系簡牘
    Qin
  4. 坐 in Small seal script
    Small seal
    說文小篆
    Shuowen, c. 100 CE
  5. 坐 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: 坐