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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

活

huó
to live; to exist
  • Phono-semantic compound 形聲
  • HSK 3
  • TOCFL 5
  • radical 水
  • 9 strokes

Etymology graph

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Origin

Phono-semantic compound (形聲 /形声, OC *koːd, *ɡoːd): semantic 氵 (“water”) + phonetic 𠯑 (OC *ɡroːd). The 𠯑 later transformed into 舌; a conservative variant is 𣴠.

Schuessler (2007) proposes possible Austroasiatic etymology; compare Wa-Lawa-Bulang *gɑs "alive (of plants)" & Aslian *gɔs "to live"

From Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.

Lineage

  • meaningChinese水 “water (Classifier: 瓶 m; 樽 c; 滴 m c; 池 m c; 盆 m c; 杯 m c)”
  • soundChinese𠯑 “to block the mouth”

Words built on it: 生活, 活動, 活力

Meanings

character
  1. to live; to exist
  2. life; existence
  3. to make live; to provide food for
  4. having life; live
  5. lively; vivid
  6. flexible; movable; moving; nimble; agile

Shuowen Jiezi 說文解字

活：水流聲。从水𠯑聲。

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

國語辭典 definitions

  1. 生存、具有生命的。與「死」相對。 例：活人、活魚、不管死活
  2. 使生存。 例：養家活口、濟世活人
  3. 生動、不死板。 例：靈活、活潑、活用
  4. 不固定的。 例：活頁、活塞、活門
  5. 逼真的。 例：你看他說的活像真的一樣。
  6. 工作。 例：細活、重活、做活兒

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

How 活 was written 字形演變

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