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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

海

hǎi
sea; ocean
  • Phono-semantic compound 形聲
  • HSK 2
  • TOCFL 3
  • radical 水
  • 10 strokes

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Origin

Phono-semantic compound (形聲 /形声, OC *hmlɯːʔ): semantic 氵 (“water”) + phonetic 每 (OC *mɯːʔ).

Probably related to 晦 (OC *hmɯːs, “dark”); in numerous Zhou texts 海 is described as 晦 (Schuessler, 2007). Compare the parallelism in Chinese: 溟 (OC *meːŋ, *meːŋʔ, “ocean”) < 冥 (OC *meːŋ, “dark”).

STEDT compares 海 (OC *hmlɯːʔ) to Proto-Sino-Tibetan *muːŋ ~ r/s-muːk (“foggy; dark; sullen; menacing; thunder”), but the rhymes are incompatible.

Lai (2023) reconstructs a new cognate set connecting this word with Bokar simu (“lake”) and Khroskyabs rbó (“pond”). To cover these cognates, something like Proto-Sino-Tibetan *m̥əq would have to be reconstructed.

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每 “lush”
    • meaningChinese屮 “new birth of plant”
    • soundChinese母 “mother”

Related: Bokar simu, Khroskyabs rbó

Words built on it: 海洋, 海外, 大海

Meanings

character
  1. sea; ocean
  2. big lake
  3. wide river, especially the Pearl River
  4. big; large
  5. overseas; abroad
  6. sea; abundance; infiniteness

Shuowen Jiezi 說文解字

海：天池也。以納百川者。从水每聲。

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

國語辭典 definitions

  1. 地球上鄰接大陸而面積小於洋的水域。如南海、黃海、地中海。有些面積較大的湖也稱海。如青海、裡海。　◎
  2. 比喻積聚眾廣的人或事物。 例：人海、火海、學海無涯
  3. 巨大的。 例：海量、誇下海口
  4. 豪邁的、直爽的。 例：海派
  5. 姓。

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

How 海 was written 字形演變

  1. 海 in Bronze script
    Bronze
    金文
    Shang–Zhou
  2. 海 in Chu slips & silk script
    Chu slips & silk
    楚系簡帛
    Warring States
  3. 海 in Small seal script
    Small seal
    說文小篆
    Shuowen, c. 100 CE
  4. 海 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: 海