How Chinese Characters Evolved
A Chinese character has not always looked the way it does now. Looking up its etymology means following two stories at once: the story of its meaning, and the story of its shape. This tool shows the second. Enter a character below and you will see its attested forms, as they were carved into bone and shell thirty-three centuries ago, cast in Zhou bronze, brushed on the silk and bamboo of the Warring States, then settled by the Han clerks — each one dated and traced to the collection it is recorded in.
Browse by radical
The database of ancient forms covers 7836 characters, filed here under the radical that builds them — the original drawing, the one the timeline brings back. Pick one, or type a character straight into the field above.
- 一 one 20 characters
- 丨 line 5 characters
- 丶 dot 3 characters
- 丿 slash 10 characters
- 乙 second 6 characters
- 亅 hook 3 characters
- 二 two 10 characters
- 亠 lid 11 characters
- 人 man 278 characters
- 儿 legs 19 characters
- 入 enter 4 characters
- 八 eight 10 characters
- 冂 wide 7 characters
- 冖 cloth cover 5 characters
- 冫 ice 13 characters
- 几 table 3 characters
- 凵 receptacle 4 characters
- 刀 knife 70 characters
- 力 power 34 characters
- 勹 wrap 12 characters
- 匕 spoon 4 characters
- 匚 box 9 characters
- 匸 hiding enclosure 4 characters
- 十 ten 13 characters
- 卜 divination 4 characters
- 卩 seal 12 characters
- 厂 cliff 15 characters
- 厶 private 2 characters
- 又 again 11 characters
- 口 mouth 226 characters
- 囗 enclosure 30 characters
- 土 earth 141 characters
- 士 scholar 9 characters
- 夂 go 2 characters
- 夊 go slowly 6 characters
- 夕 evening 9 characters
- 大 big 33 characters
- 女 woman 194 characters
- 子 child 22 characters
- 宀 roof 69 characters
- 寸 inch 13 characters
- 小 small 6 characters
- 尢 lame 6 characters
- 尸 corpse 28 characters
- 屮 sprout 2 characters
- 山 mountain 65 characters
- 巛 river 6 characters
- 工 work 6 characters
- 己 oneself 7 characters
- 巾 turban 45 characters
- 干 dry 6 characters
- 幺 short thread 4 characters
- 广 dotted cliff 58 characters
- 廴 long stride 3 characters
- 廾 arch 7 characters
- 弋 shoot 3 characters
- 弓 bow 27 characters
- 彐 snout 6 characters
- 彡 bristle 9 characters
- 彳 step 36 characters
- 心 heart 252 characters
- 戈 halberd 26 characters
- 戶 door 10 characters
- 手 hand 257 characters
- 支 branch 2 characters
- 攴 rap, tap 44 characters
- 文 script 4 characters
- 斗 dipper 9 characters
- 斤 axe 12 characters
- 方 square 20 characters
- 无 not 2 characters
- 日 sun 98 characters
- 曰 say 16 characters
- 月 moon 16 characters
- 木 tree 422 characters
- 欠 lack 43 characters
- 止 stop 9 characters
- 歹 death 22 characters
- 殳 weapon 12 characters
- 毋 do not 6 characters
- 比 compare 3 characters
- 毛 fur 12 characters
- 氏 clan 4 characters
- 气 steam 3 characters
- 水 water 476 characters
- 火 fire 117 characters
- 爪 claw 4 characters
- 父 father 1 character
- 爻 trigrams 3 characters
- 爿 split wood 4 characters
- 片 slice 7 characters
- 牙 fang 1 character
- 牛 cow 33 characters
- 犬 dog 70 characters
- 玄 profound 5 characters
- 玉 jade 124 characters
- 瓜 melon 5 characters
- 瓦 tile 23 characters
- 甘 sweet 3 characters
- 生 life 4 characters
- 用 use 4 characters
- 田 field 41 characters
- 疋 bolt of cloth 5 characters
- 疒 sickness 74 characters
- 癶 footsteps 4 characters
- 白 white 13 characters
- 皮 skin 5 characters
- 皿 dish 25 characters
- 目 eye 89 characters
- 矛 spear 4 characters
- 矢 arrow 8 characters
- 石 stone 61 characters
- 示 spirit 67 characters
- 禸 track 4 characters
- 禾 grain 72 characters
- 穴 cave 40 characters
- 立 stand 12 characters
- 竹 bamboo 136 characters
- 米 rice 30 characters
- 糸 silk 235 characters
- 缶 jar 11 characters
- 网 net 29 characters
- 羊 sheep 26 characters
- 羽 feather 33 characters
- 老 old 5 characters
- 而 and 4 characters
- 耒 plough 7 characters
- 耳 ear 27 characters
- 聿 brush 5 characters
- 肉 meat 136 characters
- 臣 minister 6 characters
- 自 self 4 characters
- 至 arrive 5 characters
- 臼 mortar 12 characters
- 舌 tongue 3 characters
- 舛 oppose 4 characters
- 舟 boat 12 characters
- 艮 stopping 3 characters
- 色 color 3 characters
- 艸 grass 399 characters
- 虍 tiger 21 characters
- 虫 insect 158 characters
- 血 blood 6 characters
- 行 walk enclosure 13 characters
- 衣 clothes 106 characters
- 襾 cover 7 characters
- 見 see 25 characters
- 角 horn 25 characters
- 言 speech 231 characters
- 谷 valley 7 characters
- 豆 bean 8 characters
- 豕 pig 21 characters
- 豸 badger 20 characters
- 貝 shell 70 characters
- 赤 red 9 characters
- 走 run 31 characters
- 足 foot 78 characters
- 身 body 3 characters
- 車 cart 77 characters
- 辛 bitter 8 characters
- 辰 morning 3 characters
- 辵 walk 104 characters
- 邑 city 125 characters
- 酉 wine 56 characters
- 釆 distinguish 3 characters
- 里 village 5 characters
- 金 gold 225 characters
- 長 long 2 characters
- 門 gate 58 characters
- 阜 mound 75 characters
- 隶 slave 1 character
- 隹 short-tailed bird 32 characters
- 雨 rain 36 characters
- 靑 blue 4 characters
- 非 wrong 3 characters
- 面 face 3 characters
- 革 leather 38 characters
- 韋 tanned leather 15 characters
- 韭 leek 3 characters
- 音 sound 5 characters
- 頁 leaf 58 characters
- 風 wind 11 characters
- 飛 fly 1 character
- 食 eat 53 characters
- 首 head 2 characters
- 香 fragrant 3 characters
- 馬 horse 97 characters
- 骨 bone 18 characters
- 高 tall 1 character
- 髟 hair 25 characters
- 鬥 fight 5 characters
- 鬯 sacrificial wine 2 characters
- 鬲 cauldron 5 characters
- 鬼 ghost 12 characters
- 魚 fish 65 characters
- 鳥 bird 93 characters
- 鹵 salt 5 characters
- 鹿 deer 20 characters
- 麥 wheat 7 characters
- 麻 hemp 3 characters
- 黃 yellow 1 character
- 黍 millet 3 characters
- 黑 black 22 characters
- 黹 embroidery 4 characters
- 黽 frog 6 characters
- 鼎 tripod 4 characters
- 鼓 drum 6 characters
- 鼠 rat 10 characters
- 鼻 nose 4 characters
- 齊 even 6 characters
- 齒 tooth 24 characters
- 龍 dragon 4 characters
- 龜 turtle 1 character
- 龠 flute 3 characters
What this run of images shows, no text says as quickly: the oldest characters are drawings. 魚 is a fish standing on its tail, fins and all; 門 is a double-leaf gate; 火 is a flame. There are only a handful of them — the vast majority of Chinese characters are compounds, one part for the meaning and one for the sound — but they are the parts everything else is built from, and finding them again lights up the rest. What stiffened the drawing into strokes was the hand of the clerks: they wrote fast, with a brush, on bamboo slips. After them, a character no longer looks like the thing it stands for.
Under each form, two short lines of Chinese: the period of the document, then the collection the form is recorded in. They are left as palaeographers write them — 商 for the Shang, 西周早期 for the early Western Zhou, 戰國.楚 for the state of Chu under the Warring States — because that is the exact string you need to find the piece again in the catalogues. The plain date, at the head of each script, says the same thing for readers of English.
Forms, sources and dates: the 字形演變 database of 小學堂, Academia Sinica (Taiwan), public domain (CC0).