难nán
Character evolution
难
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Simplified · Today
繁体
Traditional Chinese
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Shuowen
难 (nán) is made up of the radical 隹 (zhuī, a short-tailed bird) on the left and the phonetic component 堇 (qín) on the right, originally depicting a bird caught in a trap. In oracle bone inscriptions the character shows a bird (隹) and a trap-like element (堇), symbolizing something hard to obtain or accomplish and giving the original meaning 'difficult'. The simplified form replaces the bird radical with 又 (hand), preserving the phonetic and the sense of difficulty.
Pinyin
nán· HSK 1