源etymfun
About

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

樂

yuè
music; tune; melody; song
  • Ideogrammatic compound 會意
  • HSK 2
  • TOCFL 5
  • radical 木
  • 15 strokes

Etymology graph

  • inherited
  • borrowed
  • derived
  • parts
  • meaning component
  • sound component
  • related
React Flow
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

Ideogrammic compound (會意 /会意): 絲 (“string”) + 木 (“wood”) – strings on a piece of wood, i.e. a wooden musical instrument.

The oracle bone form shows two strings connected to the wood. In the bronze inscriptions, a 白 (OC *braːɡ) component was added in between the two strings, which may either represent the thumb (fiddling) or a phonetic part.

; “music; joyful”

: Also comparable is Middle Khmer leṅa (“to play”) and bhleṅa (“(playing) music”), whence Thai เล่น (lên, “to play”) and เพลง (pleeng, “music”).

From Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.

Lineage

  • ideaChinese絲 “silk (fibre, cloth, fabrics, etc.)”
    • ideaChinese糸 “thin silk”
  • ideaChinese木 “tree; woody plant”

Related: Middle Khmer leṅa, Thai เล่น

Words built on it: 藥, 快樂, 音樂

Meanings

character
  1. music; tune; melody; song
  2. to play music; to sing
  3. musician
  4. musical instrument
  5. a surname
  6. short form for 樂子

Shuowen Jiezi 說文解字

樂：五聲八音緫名。象鼓鞞。木，虡也。

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

國語辭典 definitions

  1. 有規律而和諧動人的聲音。 例：音樂、奏樂、軍樂
  2. 六經之一。即《樂經》，相傳亡於秦始皇焚書。 例：《詩》、《書》、《禮》、《樂》、《易》、《春秋》，謂之六經。
  3. 姓。

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

How 樂 was written 字形演變

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