癸

Translingual

Stroke order

Etymology

癸	癸	癸	癸
Oracle bone script	Bronze inscriptions	Large seal script	Small seal script

Pictogram (象形) - Multiple uncertain interpretations.

Possibly, this was a pictograph of a four handled plow, meant to be operated by 4 people at a time. This character shows how essential and commonplace, collective farming was roughly 3000 years ago, and for the entirety of the area's history.

The derivative 揆 is semantically related to the original word.

Han character

癸 (radical 105 癶+4, 9 strokes, cangjie input 弓人一大 (NOMK), four-corner 1243₀, composition ⿱癶天)

1. the tenth of the ten heavenly stems

Derived characters

• 葵

References

• KangXi: page 783, character 32
• Dai Kanwa Jiten: character 22660
• Dae Jaweon: page 1193, character 9
• Hanyu Da Zidian: volume 4, page 2760, character 4
• Unihan data for U+7678

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Chinese

		-
simp. and trad.		癸

Pronunciation

• Mandarin

  (Pinyin): guǐ (gui³)

  (Zhuyin): ㄍㄨㄟˇ

• Cantonese (Jyutping): gwai³
• Min Nan (POJ): kuí

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• Mandarin
  • (Standard Chinese, Beijing)⁺
    • Pinyin: guǐ
    • Zhuyin: ㄍㄨㄟˇ
    • Wade-Giles: kuei³
    • Gwoyeu Romatzyh: goei
    • IPA ^(key): /ku̯eɪ̯²¹⁴/
• Cantonese
  • (Standard Cantonese, Guangzhou)⁺
    • Jyutping: gwai³
    • Yale: gwai
    • Cantonese Pinyin: gwai³
    • IPA ^(key): /kʷɐi̯³³/
• Min Nan
  • (Hokkien)
    • Pe̍h-ōe-jī: kuí
    • Tâi-lô: kuí
    • IPA (Taipei): /kui⁴¹/
    • IPA (Zhangzhou): /kui⁵³/

Middle Chinese pronunciation (癸, reconstructed)
Character (癸), Pronunciation 1/1
Initial: 見 (28) Final: 脂 Division: III			Openness: Closed Tone: Rising (X)			Fanqie: 居誄切
Zhengzhang Shangfang	Bernard Karlgren	Li Rong	Pan Wuyun	Edwin Pulleyblank	Wang Li	Shao Rongfen
/kiuɪX/	/kwiX/	/kuiX/	/kʷiX/	/kwiX/	/kwiX/	/kjuɪX/

Old Chinese pronunciation (癸, reconstructed)
Baxter-Sagart system 1.1 (2014)
Character								Modern Beijing (Pinyin)								Middle Chinese								Old Chinese								English
癸								guǐ								‹ kjwijX ›								/*kʷijʔ/								10th heavenly stem
Notes for Old Chinese notations in the Baxter-Sagart system: Parentheses "()" indicate uncertain presence; Square brackets "[]" indicate uncertain identity, e.g. *[t] as coda may in fact be *-t or *-p; Angle brackets "<>" indicate infix; Hyphen "-" indicates morpheme boundary; Period "." indicates syllable boundary.
Zhengzhang system (2003)
Character					No.					Phonetic component					Rime group					Rime subdivision					Corresponding MC rime					Old Chinese					Notes
癸					4644					癸					脂					1					癸					/*kʷilʔ/					戴侗雲戣初文；甲文象二工（金文或變二木）相交以度圜，本規初文

References

• (Min Nan) Taiwan Min Nan Common Words Dictionary (臺灣閩南語常用詞辭典)

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Japanese

Kanji

癸

(uncommon “Hyōgai” kanji)

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Readings

• On: き (ki)
• Kun: みずのと (mizunoto)

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Korean

Hanja

癸 (gye) (hangeul 계, revised gye, McCune-Reischauer kye, Yale kyey)

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Vietnamese

Han character

癸 (quý, quấy, quậy)

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