Chinese Character Wiki
古

gǔ

old

Original meaning: 

firm, solid

Depicts a shield. Based on the original meaning "firm, solid", which is now written as 固. The current meaning "old" is a phonetic loan.

Components
◎ iconic component

◎  Iconic component

  

characterless component

Depicts a shield.

口 meaning component

口  Meaning component

kǒu

  

mouth

The 口 component is sometimes used to indicate an abstract meaning taken from a concrete object. Here, the concrete object "shield" evokes the abstract meaning "firm, solid".

Evolution

古 Oracle script (~1250-1000 BC)

Oracle script

(~1250-1000 BC)
古 Bronze script Early Western Zhou (~1000 BC)

Bronze script

Early Western Zhou (~1000 BC)
古 Seal script Shuowen (~100 AD)

Seal script

Shuowen (~100 AD)
古 Clerical script Eastern Han dynasty (25-220 AD)

Clerical script

Eastern Han dynasty (25-220 AD)
古 Regular script Modern

Regular script

Modern
Definitions

古  

gǔ

old, classic, ancient; ancient; old; paleo-

古  

Gǔ

surname Gu

Most common words with 古
Freq.
Word
Meaning

古

old

古怪

eccentric

古巴

Cuba

古老

ancient

古代

ancient times

Component uses

Meaning component in 1 character (0 verified)

枯

Sound component in 27 characters (7 verified)

故 苦 居 胡 固 姑 估 枯 咕 辜 沽 骷 轱 軲 鈷 钴 祜 鴣 鸪 蛄 诂 牯 嘏 怙 岵 罟 酤

Historical pronunciation

Old Chinese

Middle Chinese

Pinyin

Gloss

*kˤaʔ

kuX

gǔ

ancient


Statistics

HSK level 3

Appears in 37.3218% of movies

888th most common character in movies

509th most common character in books

Miscellaneous

Strokes

5

Unicode

U+53E4

Shuowen

“古，故也。从十口。識前言者也。，古文古。”


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