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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

揮

huī
to wield; to wave; to brandish
  • Phono-semantic compound 形聲
  • HSK 4
  • TOCFL 6
  • radical 手
  • 12 strokes
  • 㩣
  • 𫾉

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 *qʰul): semantic 扌 (“hand”) + phonetic 軍 (OC *kun).

Compare perhaps Burmese ရွေ့ (rwe., “to move”).

Etymology 2

Borrowed from English fight.

From Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.

Lineage

  • meaningChinese手 “hand (Classifier: 隻／只 m c mn; 雙／双 m mn; 對／对 c)”
  • soundChinese軍 “armed forces; army; troops”
    • ideaChinese車 “land vehicle; (specifically) car (Classifier: 輛／辆 m; 部 m c; 臺／台 m mn; 架 c; 頂／顶 mn; 張／张 mn-t; 乘 m)”
    • ideaChinese勹 “person bending over”
  • borrowedEnglishfight “To engage in combat with; to oppose physically, to contest with.”
    • inheritedMiddle Englishfighten “to fight”
      • inheritedOld Englishfeohtan “to fight, combat, strive”
    • inheritedMiddle Englishfight
      • inheritedOld Englishfeoht

Related: Burmese ရွေ့

Meanings

character
  1. to wield; to wave; to brandish
  2. to direct; to command
  3. to wipe away
  4. to disperse; to scatter
  5. to squander

Shuowen Jiezi 說文解字

揮：奮也。从手軍聲。

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

國語辭典 definitions

  1. 搖動、擺動。 例：揮毫、揮扇、揮手　◎
  2. 發散、拋灑。 例：揮發、揮灑、揮金如土
  3. 發號、率領。 例：揮兵、指揮、揮令前進

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

How 揮 was written 字形演變

  1. 揮 in Bronze script
    Bronze
    金文
    Shang–Zhou
  2. 揮 in Small seal script
    Small seal
    說文小篆
    Shuowen, c. 100 CE
  3. 揮 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: 揮