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The character 樯 (traditional form 檣) is a specific nautical term for the mast of a boat or ship. It is formed as a phono-semantic compound, pairing the semantic radical 木 ('wood') on the left, which points to the material of traditional masts, with the phonetic 啬 (traditional 嗇) on the right to suggest pronunciation. In classical Chinese poetry and maritime literature, 樯 frequently appears as a synecdoche, the imagery of the wooden mast standing for the entire sailing vessel.
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