Category Archives: Chinese Language

Various Variants – Antiquated or Alternate versions of Chinese Characters

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I started a collection of variants some time ago on Google Docs, but I gradually forgot about it – would be happy to hear from anyone about variants they have discovered in their language learning process.

Strokes (Original) Standard Form Character Variant pinyin 倉頡碼 Unicode Note
3 以 㠯 yi3 unknown u382f Classical only
5 冉 冄 ran3 月一一 u5184
8 姐 姊 jie3 女中x竹 u59ca
10 挽 輓 wan3 十十弓日山 u8f13
10 笑 咲 xiao4 口廿大 u54b2
10 鬥 鬭、鬬、閗 dou4 中弓口一中、中弓月一中、中弓卜十 U9B2D, u9b2c, u9597 found in 齊物論
12 普 暜 pu3 卜廿日 u669c
13 群 羣 qun2 尸口廿手 u7fa3
14 褒 闁 bao1 日弓日弓 u95c1
15 鋪 舖 pu4 人口戈十月 u8216 4th tone 鋪 only – both written 鋪 in classical, later 舍 replaced 金 as it reflected the noun’s meaning more accurately
15 璇 璿 xuan2 一土卜月山 u74bf
17 斂 歛 lian3 人人弓人 u6b5b

Comment below!

Font Matters 字體異型

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I’ve noticed certain interesting irregularities in Chinese fonts. The book I’m reading at the minute (《馬橋詞典》; the edition was originally published by 聯經出版社/Linking Books) in Feb. 2011, and this copy is the second printing) uses the form of the character 感 seen in the top line of the image below, as opposed to the one on the bottom. The character on the top line has a 丿that encloses the entire character, as opposed to the one on the bottom line in which the heart radical at the bottom is separate.
ganI’ve noticed similar differences in other characters before and was curious if anyone else had spotted any other slight differences that come to mind. Also curious if this is influenced by historic instances of difference in the way the character can be written.

The interesting thing for me as a Cangjie user is that it should technically change the way the character is written in Cangjie, as instead of 戈口心 it should follow the example of 威 (戈丿一女) and be written 戈丿一心, although obviously this is just a font.

Which form do you come across the most in the books you are reading? What are the names of the different fonts that use this form?

An alms bowl by any other name 盋／砵／缽／鉢 bō

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3542008756_b127c70724_oEver seen buddhist monks on the street collecting money with an alms bowl? Did you notice what it was made of? It’s interesting when you come across variants in Chinese based on the difference between the materials used to make it.

The Taiwanese Ministry of Education dictionary lists 缽 Bō as an alms bowl. I also found 缽 in 《馬橋詞典》：

他滋味無窮地搭嘴搭舌，突然想起什麼，轉身去他的窩邊取來一個瓦缽，向我展示裡面一條條黑色的東西。

I came across the character 盋 online and when I presented it to two Taiwanese colleagues, neither of them were able to identify it, however when I said it was pronounced Bō, one wrote 鉢 and the other wrote 缽.

盋 is a rare variant of Bō, made up of 犮 quǎn – itself a variant of 犬 （hound/dog) – and 皿 mǐn (dish/shallow container). 

The other three characters all combine 本 běn, which seems to be a phonetic component, with three different materials 缶 fǒu (pottery), 石 shí (stone) and 金 jīn (metal): 缽 砵 鉢

If you know of any other variants that follow this pattern, hit the comments section and I’ll feature them in a future post.

Photo credit: 心道法師

Side by side or top and bottom? Varying it up with variants

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m500_22024607701OK – just a quick post today! Am reading 《馬橋詞典》(Dictionary of Maqiao) by 韓少功 (Han Shaogong) at the minute and came across a word for a woman’s period or menstruation – 例假 – that I hadn’t seen before. For some reason I read this as 例期 however and looking it up I found the variant 朞 – a bottom top variant of 期 – combining 其 and 月. This reminded me of a few other variants that follow this pattern, like 峰 and 峯 feng1 “summit,” and 群 and 羣 for “qun1” crowd.

There’s also 鑒 and 鑑 jian4 which have their ingredients stirred around a little.

Let me know if you know of any others!