zhēngzhǐ

invade

Original meaning: 

to punish

Originally written as 𱖔, which depicts a knife with tooth-shaped decorations on the back. The components (walk) and (tap) were added later to indicate movement and action. Based on the original meaning "to punish". The meaning later shifted to "invade", "to summon" and "to recruit" while its other meaning used as a musical note is a phonetic loan.

Components
彳 meaning component

  Meaning component

chì

  

walk

is a component form of . Here used to indicate movement.

𱖔 iconic component

𱖔  Iconic component

  

to punish

Depicts a knife with tooth-shaped decorations on the back.

攵 meaning component

  Meaning component

  

tap

is a component form of . Used here to indicate action.

Evolution

徵 Oracle script (~1250-1000 BC)

Oracle script

(~1250-1000 BC)
徵 Bronze script Early Western Zhou (~1000 BC)

Bronze script

Early Western Zhou (~1000 BC)
徵 Seal script Shuowen (~100 AD)

Seal script

Shuowen (~100 AD)
徵 Clerical script Eastern Han dynasty (25-220 AD)

Clerical script

Eastern Han dynasty (25-220 AD)
徵 Regular script Modern

Regular script

Modern
Definitions

() 

zhēng

summon, recruit; musical note; to invite; to recruit; to levy (taxes); to draft (troops); phenomenon; symptom; characteristic sign (used as proof); evidence

 

zhǐ

4th note in pentatonic scale 五音[wǔ​yīn], roughly sol; see also |[zhēng]

Most common words with 徵
Freq.
Word
Meaning

see also 徵|征[zhēng]

宫商角徵羽

pre-Tang names of the five notes of the pentatonic scale, corresponding roughly to do, re, mi, sol, la

变徵之声

modified fifth note of the pentatonic scale

Component uses

Sound component in 1 character (0 verified)

Historical pronunciation

Old Chinese

Middle Chinese

Pinyin

Gloss

*trəŋ

tring

zhēng

examine


Statistics

Not found in HSK word list

4086th most common character in books

Miscellaneous

Strokes

15

Simplified

Traditional

Unicode

U+5FB5

Shuowen

“徵,召也。从微省,壬為徵,行於微而文達者即徵之。,古文徵。”


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