Chinese Character Wiki
後

hòu

behind

Depicts someone's foot (夂) being held back by a rope (幺), preventing them from being able to walk （彳） forward.

Components
彳 meaning component

彳  Meaning component

chì

  

walk

彳 is a component form of 行.

幺 iconic component

幺  Iconic component

me, yāo

  

tiny

Depicts a rope.

夂 iconic component

夂  Iconic component

zhǐ

  

go

夂 is a component form of 止.

Evolution

後 Oracle script (~1250-1000 BC)

Oracle script

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

Bronze script

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

Seal script

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

Clerical script

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

Regular script

Modern
Definitions

后 (後) 

hòu

behind, rear, after; descendents; back; behind; rear; afterwards; after; later; post-

Most common words with 後
Freq.
Word
Meaning

后

back

然后

after

最后

final

之后

afterwards

以后

after

Historical pronunciation

Old Chinese

Middle Chinese

Pinyin

Gloss

*[ɢ]ˤ(r)oʔ

huwX

hòu

after

*[ɢ]ˤ(r)oʔ-s

huwH

hòu

put after ?


Statistics

Not found in HSK word list

Appears in 99.5996% of movies

75th most common character in movies

48th most common character in books

Miscellaneous

Strokes

9

Simplified

后

Unicode

U+5F8C

Shuowen

“後，遲也。从彳幺夊者，後也。，古文後从辵。”


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