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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

晚

wǎn
evening; night
  • Phono-semantic compound 形聲
  • HSK 1
  • TOCFL 2
  • radical 日
  • 11 strokes

Etymology graph

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

Phono-semantic compound (形聲 /形声, OC *monʔ): semantic 日 + phonetic 免 (OC *mronʔ).

Related to rGyalrongic cognates like Japhug tɯ-ɣmɯr (“night”) and Situ tə-mōr (“night”) (Zhang, Jacques & Lai 2019). From this, one can reconstruct Proto-Sino-Tibetan *mor.

For the term meaning both “evening” and “late”, compare typologically Mongolian орой (oroj), Spanish tarde, Latin sērōtinus. Also compare Italian sera, French soir (< Latin sērus).

From Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.

Lineage

  • inheritedProto-Sino-Tibetan*mor
  • meaningChinese日 “Sun”
  • soundChinese免 “to take off; to remove from the body”

Related: Japhug tɯɣmɯr, Situ təmōr

Words built on it: 晚上, 晚安, 晚餐

Meanings

character
  1. evening; night
  2. late (near the end of a period of time)
  3. late (in relation to the expected or proper time)
  4. succeeding
  5. old age; later years
  6. Classifier for the number of nights.

Shuowen Jiezi 說文解字

晚：莫也。从日免聲。

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

國語辭典 definitions

  1. 黃昏、日落時分。與「早」相對。 例：晚霞、從早到晚
  2. 夜間。 例：晚間、昨晚、晚上
  3. 晚間的。 例：晚飯、晚課
  4. 將盡的、末期的。 例：晚年、晚歲
  5. 遲。 例：大器晚成、相見恨晚
  6. 繼任的、後來的。 例：晚娘、晚輩

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

How 晚 was written 字形演變

  1. 晚 in Small seal script
    Small seal
    說文小篆
    Shuowen, c. 100 CE
  2. 晚 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: 晚