大
From Wiktionary, the free dictionary
From Wiktionary, the free dictionary
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大 (Kangxi radical 37, 大+0, 3 strokes, cangjie input 大 (K), four-corner 40030 or 40800, composition ⿻一人 or ⿸𠂇㇏)
Historical forms of the character 大 | |||||||||||
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Shang | Western Zhou | Spring and Autumn | Warring States | Shuowen Jiezi (compiled in Han) | Liushutong (compiled in Ming) | Libian (compiled in Qing) | |||||
Bronze inscriptions | Oracle bone script | Bronze inscriptions | Oracle bone script | Bronze inscriptions | Bronze inscriptions | Chu slip and silk script | Qin slip script | Shizhoupian script | Small seal script | Transcribed ancient scripts | Clerical script |
Ideogram (指事): a person 人 with arms stretched out as far as possible, implying the meaning of big/great/large.
Compare with 尢, which is a man with bent legs. Compare also 立, similar to 大, and 交, in which the legs are crossed. Compare also 文, which is a man with arms outstretched and a crest or tattoo on his chest, and to 夭, which is a man with arms outstretched and leaning to side (running or marching vigorously).
See the top component of 泰 in the original version (𡙌), the top component of 赤 and the bottom component of 奐 (well visible in some fonts). Related to 太.
Unrelated to 买, in which the bottom component is the stylization of a cowrie.
Cognate with 太 (OC *tʰaːds, “too, excessively”), 泰 (OC *tʰaːds, “big”). Wang (1982) also lists 誕 (OC *l'aːnʔ, “big, magniloquent, ridiculous”) as a cognate, which Schuessler (2007) suggests is cognate with 延 (OC *lan, *lans, “to extend”) instead. There are no unambiguous Tibeto-Burman cognates. Proto-Tibeto-Burman *taj (“big”), from which came Written Tibetan མཐེ་བོ (mthe bo, “thumb”), Anong tʰɛ (“big, large, great”), Mikir tʰè, ketʰè (“big, large, great”), Burmese တယ် (tai, “very”), is often compared with. There is no final –s in the Tibeto-Burman words, but a –y, which, according to James Matisoff, “indicates emergent quality in stative verbs”. Also compare Chinese 多 (OC *ʔl'aːl, “many, much”), 都 (OC *taː, “all”).
大
Others:
大
大
For pronunciation and definitions of 大 – see 太 (“too; so; etc.”). (This character is an ancient form of 太). |
For pronunciation and definitions of 大 – see 泰 (“big; large; great; extensive; etc.”). (This character is an ancient form of 泰). |
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