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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

間

jiān
within a definite time period or place
  • HSK 5
  • TOCFL 3
  • radical 門
  • 12 strokes
  • 閒

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Origin

Variant form of 閒 (OC *ɡreːn, “space, gap”) with 月 (“moon”) replaced by 日 (“day”).

The two pronunciations are related, with Pronunciation 2 (間 (OC *kreːns)) being the exoactive of Pronunciation 1 (間 (OC *kreːn)).

Related to:

* 隙 (OC *kʰraɡ, “crack; chink”), 澗 (OC *kreːns, *kraːns, “ravine; brook (between mountains)”) (Wang, 1982);

* 閒 (OC *ɡreːn, “lazy; leisure”) (Karlgren, 1957; Baxter, 1992).

Externally, likely related to Mizo kâr (“space between; interval”), Burmese ကြား (kra:, “in-between; interval; interim”), အကြား (a.kra:, “gap; break”) (Schuessler, 2007).

From Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.

Lineage

Related: Mizo kâr, Burmese ကြား

Words built on it: 時間

Meanings

character
  1. within a definite time period or place
  2. among; between
  3. a moment; a little while; instant
  4. room; chamber
  5. section of a room; lateral space between two pairs of pillars
  6. Classifier for smallest units of housing, such as rooms and shopfronts.

國語辭典 definitions

  1. 空隙。 例：間隙、親密無間、間不容髮
  2. 分隔。 例：間隔、間斷
  3. 挑撥、分化。 例：反間、挑撥離間
  4. 夾雜。 例：間雜、黑白相間
  5. 奸細。 例：秦間

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

How 間 was written 字形演變

  1. 間 in Bronze script
    Bronze
    金文
    Shang–Zhou
  2. 間 in Chu slips & silk script
    Chu slips & silk
    楚系簡帛
    Warring States
  3. 間 in Qin slips script
    Qin slips
    秦系簡牘
    Qin
  4. 間 in Small seal script
    Small seal
    說文小篆
    Shuowen, c. 100 CE
  5. 間 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
  • Written form — n/a
  • Wiktionary (via Wiktextract / kaikki.org) — CC BY-SA 4.0
  • Wiktionary: 間