Chinese Character Wiki
读

dú, dòu

read

Phonosemantic compound. 讠 represents the meaning and 𧸇 represents the sound. Simplified form of 讀.

Components
讠 meaning component

讠  Meaning component

yán

  

speech

讠 is a component form of 言.

卖 simplified component

卖  Simplified component

mài

  

sell

Simplified from the 𧸇 component in the traditional character 讀.

Evolution

读 Seal script Shuowen (~100 AD)

Seal script

Shuowen (~100 AD)
读 Clerical script Western Han dynasty (202 BC-9 AD)

Clerical script

Western Han dynasty (202 BC-9 AD)
读 Clerical script Cao Wei (Three Kingdoms: 222-280 AD)

Clerical script

Cao Wei (Three Kingdoms: 222-280 AD)
读 Traditional script Modern

Traditional script

Modern
读 Simplified script Modern

Simplified script

Modern
Definitions

读 (讀) 

dú

read, study; pronounce; to read; to study; reading of word (i.e. pronunciation), similar to 拼音[pīn​yīn]

读 (讀) 

dòu

comma; phrase marked by pause

Most common words with 读
Freq.
Word
Meaning

读

to read

读者

reader

读书

to study

阅读

to read

解读

to decipher

Statistics

HSK level 1

Appears in 46.6923% of movies

817th most common character in movies

752nd most common character in books

Miscellaneous

Strokes

10

Traditional

讀

Unicode

U+8BFB


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