480531170

657
L3
価
KA, atai
price, value, worth
8 strokes
KACHIvalue
KAKAKUprice
BUKKAprice of goods
Seal ; late graph (Shuowen); traditional .
The graph has 41 ‘person’ and (NJK, itself
comprising ‘stopper, cover’, and 10 ‘shell
currency, valuables’, meaning ‘store goods,
trade’) as semantic and phonetic meaning ‘business
of buying and selling’, to give ‘someone
who buys and sells, merchant’. By extension,
the graph acquired related or extended other
meanings such as ‘price, worth’. KJ1970:116;
YK1976:80; OT1968:58,911,957; SS1984:72. As
a mnemonic we suggest taking the right-hand
part of the modern graph as 169 ‘west’, with
41 ‘person’.
Mnemonic: PERSON FROM WEST HAS VALUE
658
L3
河
KA, kawa
river
8 strokes
KAKŌrivermouth
fugu*globefish
KABAhippopotamus
OBI ; seal . OBI forms vary. Tōdō takes
the one given here as comprising left-hand
element representing flowing water, and righthand
as symbol signifying ‘curved, bent’, giving
‘river’; he includes in his word-family ‘bent
(at ninety degrees)’ along with (modern
meaning: ‘what?’ 86, q.v.), the original meaning
of which was ‘carry on the back’. Other OBI
forms for are virtually indistinguishable from
some of those listed by Mizukami for . Ma,
alternatively, takes the phonetic in to be 丂
(CO, ‘floating aquatic waterweed’ 130). Gu, for
his part, takes the original meaning of as ‘the
Yellow River’, then by extension the generalized
sense ‘river’. The basis for this proposal is probably
that the Shang dynasty culture evolved
in the Yellow River valley. Schuessler lists both
‘river’ and ‘Yellow River’ as meanings for
in OBI texts. By the seal stage, the structure
of had stabilized in line with the first OBI
form above as 42 ‘water’, and 655 (‘can,
should’) as phonetic with associated sense
‘bend’. KJ1970:123; YK1976:81; GY2008:709;
AS2007:274; OT1968:564; MS1995:v2:740-
41,v1:52-3,204-06; AS2007:274-5; MR2007:435.
As a mnemonic we suggest taking the elements
as ‘water’ and ‘can’.
Mnemonic: WATER CAN FORM RIVER
659
L3
過
KA, sugiru/gosu,
-sugi, ayamachi
pass, exceed, error
12 strokes
TSŪKApassage
KAKOKEIpast tense
iisugiexaggeration
Seal . Has 85 ‘walk, go’, and (originally,
either ‘distorted mouth shape’ [Katō] or
‘smooth-moving body joints’ [Mizukami]) as
phonetic with associated sense ‘many, much’, to
give ‘go a long way/too far’ (Mizukami takes as
‘much latitude/margin’, to give ‘walk to a destination
along an easy road’). OBI forms are listed
by Mizukami, all of slightly different structure.
KJ1970:312; YK1976:83; MS1995:v2:1298-1300;
OT1968:1005. Suggest taking right-hand element
as a ‘topless’ tower (see 132, ‘tall’).
Mnemonic: GOING TO PASS BY TOPLESS
TOWER IS EXCEEDINGLY ERRONEOUS
214 The 185 Fifth Grade Characters