I; me

Original meaning: 

weapon

Pictograph of a weapon with a forked blade and long handle. The meaning "I; me" is a phonetic loan.

Evolution

我 Oracle script (~1250-1000 BC)

Oracle script

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

Bronze script

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

Seal script

Shuowen (~100 AD)
我 Clerical script Cao Wei (Three Kingdoms: 222-280 AD)

Clerical script

Cao Wei (Three Kingdoms: 222-280 AD)
我 Regular script Modern

Regular script

Modern
Definitions

 

our, us, i, me, my, we; I; me; my

Most common words with 我
Freq.
Word
Meaning

I

我们

we

我国

China

自我

self-

我方

we

Component uses

Sound component in 15 characters (6 verified)

饿

Simplified component in 1 character (1 verified)

Historical pronunciation

Old Chinese

Middle Chinese

Pinyin

Gloss

*ŋˤajʔ

ngaX

we, I


Statistics

HSK level 1

Appears in 99.9840% of movies

1st most common character in movies

9th most common character in books

Miscellaneous

Strokes

7

Unicode

U+6211

Shuowen

“我,施身自謂也。或說我,頃頓也。从戈,从。,或說古垂字。一曰古殺字。,古文我。”


This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.
Creative Commons License