历lì

历

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Simplified · Today

繁体

Traditional Chinese

The traditional form 歷 (lì) tells a story of walking through time — the foot radical 止 combined with a phonetic element suggesting a path or trail, literally meaning to pass by or experience. In traditional script, this character served as both "to undergo" and the root of 曆 (calendar, the recording of passed time), a meaning now collapsed into the simplified 历. The visual complexity of 歷, with its dense strokes crossing like footprints in a field, was streamlined in simplified Chinese to a single horizontal stroke and radical, losing the original pictographic sense of movement entirely.

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Shuowen

历 (lì). The oracle bone form depicts a foot (止) stepping over standing grain (禾), representing the act of passing through or traversing land. This concrete image of walking across fields was extended metaphorically to mean passing through time—to experience, to undergo—hence its modern meanings of "calendar, history, and to undergo." The character preserves this notion of movement through space and time, written with the foot radical suggesting motion and the later 力 (strength) component suggesting the passage of seasons.

Pinyin

lì· HSK 2

历lì

Character evolution

Shuowen

Pinyin