簡化

We have seen some inconsistencies in the simplification process in previous posts. Today we are going to look at characters whose parts were simplified to 又. 又(you4) is a character that already exists in the traditional script. In addition to this, 又 is already used as a character component, e.g., 友. Here is an incomplete list of such simplifications. 堇 was simplified to 又. 雚 was simplified to 又.

So that last post irked me a little bit. 風. Let’s take a look at it. 風 is comprised of 凡(fán, all) and 虫(chóng, insect). It seems to be slightly disputed on its etymology, but both make sense. One way views 凡 as the phonetic component and 虫 is its semantic component; think bugs flying in the wind 😉 . Another is just that, 凡 as a sail with 虫 flying in the wind.

Here is a character that I initially had trouble remembering, but after learning its etymology I have never forgotten it. This beautiful character is a 會意. For fun let’s look at 小篆 version. (These are real versions of the characters scanned from the 說文解字 if I’m not mistaken, except for 宀 because I couldn’t be arsed to crop it out of a normal character)