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

醉

/t͡su̯eɪ̯⁵¹/

to become drunk; to become intoxicated

Phono-semantic compound 形聲
HSK 5
TOCFL 5
radical 酉
15 strokes

Etymology graph

inherited
borrowed
derived
parts
meaning component
sound component
related

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

Phono-semantic compound (形聲 /形声, OC *ʔsuds): semantic 酉 (“alcoholic drink”) + phonetic 卒 (OC *ʔsuːd, *sʰuːd, *ʔsud).

From Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.

Lineage

meaningChinese酉 “an alcoholic drink vessel”
soundChinese卒 “soldier”

Meanings

character

to become drunk; to become intoxicated
to intoxicate; to make someone drunk
to be fascinated with; to be enchanted by; to be crazy about; to be addicted to
to marinate in cooking wine
to drink alcoholic drink moderately

Shuowen Jiezi 說文解字

醉：卒也。卒其度量，不至於亂也。一曰潰也。从酉从卒。

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

國語辭典 definitions

飲酒過量以致神志不清。例：醉倒、酒醉、爛醉如泥　◎
用酒浸漬的。例：醉蝦、醉雞
沉迷、迷戀。例：沉醉、心醉、陶醉

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

How 醉 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: 醉