Chinese Character Wiki
皋

gāo

the high land along a river

The advancement of white vapor or mist, exemplified as that from a vast swampland, and also used for unrelated meanings by sound loan. Scholars think this differentiated from 睪, as 「皋」「㚖」「睪」 were almost indistinguishable before the Western Han dynasty (206 BCE - 9 CE.)

Components
白 meaning component

白  Meaning component

bái

  

white

Ostensibly signifying the meaning of "white" vapor, but probably a remnant of the 目 in 睪/𥇡/𬐇.

夲 sound,meaning component

夲  Sound Meaning component

tāo

  

advance quickly

Traditionally noted in different sources as providing both meaning and sound, but actually differentiated from 㚔 in stages similar to 𠦍, as seen in variants like 皐.

Evolution

皋 Seal script Shuowen (~100 AD)

Seal script

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

Clerical script

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

Regular script

Modern
Definitions

皋  

gāo

the high land along a river; bank; marsh

皋 (皐) 

gāo

high riverbank; variant of 皋[gāo]

Most common words with 皋
Freq.
Word
Meaning

皋

bank

如皋

Rugao county level city in Nantong 南通[Nán​tōng], Jiangsu

如皋市

Rugao county level city in Nantong 南通[Nán​tōng], Jiangsu

皋兰县

Gaolan county in Lanzhou 蘭州|兰州[Lán​zhōu], Gansu

皋兰

Gaolan county in Lanzhou 蘭州|兰州[Lán​zhōu], Gansu

Component uses

Sound component in 3 characters (0 verified)

翱 嗥 槔

Historical pronunciation

Old Chinese

Middle Chinese

Pinyin

Gloss

*[k]ˤu

kaw

gāo

announce


Statistics

Not found in HSK word list

3983rd most common character in books

Miscellaneous

Strokes

10

Unicode

U+768B

Shuowen

“皋，气皋白之進也。从夲，从白。《禮》祝曰皋，登謌曰奏，故皋奏皆从夲。《周禮》曰：‘詔來鼓皋舞。’皋，告之也。”


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