About
The character "姝" is a phono-semantic compound composed of the semantic radical 女, meaning "woman", and the phonetic component 朱, which provides its pronunciation. Etymologically, it appeared in early Chinese texts with the specific sense of "beautiful woman". Over time, its meaning shifted from a noun denoting a person to an adjective describing the quality of "beautiful" or "fair", primarily in the context of feminine beauty, while its nominal usage became less prevalent.
Etymology Hide
