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

繫

/t͡ɕi⁵¹/

to tie, to fasten, to button up

Phono-semantic compound 形聲
HSK 1
radical 糸
19 strokes

Etymology graph

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Origin

Phono-semantic compound (形聲 /形声, OC *keːɡs, *ɡeːɡs): phonetic 毄 + semantic 糸 (“thread”)

From Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.

Lineage

soundChinese毄 “to hit against; to collide with; to strike”
- ideaChinese軎 “axle tip”
- ideaChinese殳 “shu (an ancient Chinese weapon)”
  - ideaChinese𠘧 “used in 𠘧𠘧; refers to the wings of a bird in flight (according to the Shuowen Jiezi)”
  - ideaChinese又 “again; once more”
meaningChinese糸 “thin silk”

Words built on it: 系

Meanings

character

to tie, to fasten, to button up

Shuowen Jiezi 說文解字

繫：繫𦃇也。一曰惡絮。从糸毄聲。

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

國語辭典 definitions

拴住、綑綁。例：繫馬、繫頸、繫足
聯綴、連接。例：聯繫、維繫
留意、牽掛。例：繫念、繫懷、繫心
逮捕、監禁。例：繫囚、繫獄

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

How 繫 was written 字形演變

Small seal
說文小篆
Shuowen, c. 100 CE
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
Wiktionary (via Wiktextract / kaikki.org) — CC BY-SA 4.0
Wiktionary: 繫