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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

復

/fu⁵¹/
to return
  • Phono-semantic compound 形聲
  • HSK 2
  • radical 彳
  • 12 strokes

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  • derived
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Origin

Phono-semantic compound (形聲 /形声, OC *buɡs, *buɡ): semantic 彳 (“walk”) + phonetic 复 (OC *buɡ, “repeat”).

Walk back and forth.

Compare Proto-Tibeto-Burman *m-p(j)up, whence Tibetan འབུབ་པ ('bub pa, “turned over or upside down”), Proto-Lolo-Burmese *pup (“to turn over; to search for”) (STEDT, Schuessler, 2007).

Within Chinese, cognate with 複 (OC *puɡ, “lined (garment); double”), 覆 (OC *pʰuɡs, “to cover”), 覆 (OC *pʰuɡ, “to turn over”) (Schuessler, 2007).

From Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.

Lineage

  • meaningChinese彳 “to walk slowly”
  • soundChinese复 “to go back”

Related: Proto-Tibeto-Burman *m-p(j)up, Tibetan འབུབ་པ, Proto-Lolo-Burmese *pup

Meanings

character
  1. to return
  2. to recover; to resume
  3. to revenge; to avenge
  4. to reply
  5. 24th hexagram of the I Ching

Shuowen Jiezi 說文解字

復：往來也。从彳复聲。

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

國語辭典 definitions

  1. 還原，回到原來的狀態。 例：康復、恢復、收復
  2. 再、又。 例：舊病復發、去而復返、死灰復燃
  3. 回報，多指仇恨而言。 例：報復、復仇
  4. 六十四卦之一。震（☳）下坤（☷）上。陽爻再現，象徵機運的循環改變。 例：剝而復始

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

How 復 was written 字形演變

  1. 復 in Oracle bone script
    Oracle bone
    甲骨文
    Shang, c. 1250–1050 BCE
  2. 復 in Bronze script
    Bronze
    金文
    Shang–Zhou
  3. 復 in Chu slips & silk script
    Chu slips & silk
    楚系簡帛
    Warring States
  4. 復 in Qin slips script
    Qin slips
    秦系簡牘
    Qin
  5. 復 in Small seal script
    Small seal
    說文小篆
    Shuowen, c. 100 CE
  6. 復 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
  • Wiktionary (via Wiktextract / kaikki.org) — CC BY-SA 4.0
  • Wiktionary: 復