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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

笑

xiào
to laugh; to smile
  • Phono-semantic compound 形聲
  • HSK 1
  • TOCFL 3
  • radical 竹
  • 10 strokes
  • 咲
  • 关

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Origin

Originally phono-semantic compound (形聲 /形声, OC *sqʰows): phonetic 艸 (OC *sʰuːʔ, “grass”) + semantic 犬 (“dog”).

Later, phono-semantic compound (形聲 /形声, OC *sqʰows): semantic 竹 + phonetic 夭 (OC *qoːwʔ, *qrow, *qrowʔ).

From Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.

Lineage

  • soundChinese艸 “grass”
  • meaningChinese竹 “bamboo (Classifier: 枝; 棵 m; 根 m; 轆／辘 c)”
  • meaningChinese犬 “dog”
  • soundChinese夭 “to die young, to die prematurely”

Words built on it: 微笑

Meanings

character
  1. to laugh; to smile
  2. to laugh at; to ridicule
  3. funny; amusing
  4. to blossom; to bloom
  5. a surname
  6. lying face-up toward the sky; supine

Shuowen Jiezi 說文解字

笑：此字本闕。

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

國語辭典 definitions

  1. 臉上露出快樂的表情，或嘴巴發出歡樂的聲音。 例：嬉笑、微笑、哈哈大笑　◎
  2. 譏嘲、諷刺。 例：五十步笑百步

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

How 笑 was written 字形演變

  1. 笑 in Chu slips & silk script
    Chu slips & silk
    楚系簡帛
    Warring States
  2. 笑 in Small seal script
    Small seal
    說文小篆
    Shuowen, c. 100 CE
  3. 笑 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: 笑