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As a phono-semantic compound, 燔 consists of 火 'fire' (semantic) and 番 (phonetic), the latter depicting meat on a spit, together conveying the roasting of meat. The earliest recorded meaning is to roast meat over a fire, especially in ancient sacrificial offerings where the smoke would rise to the spirits. Later, it came to mean to burn or set fire to objects in general, though its primary association with ritual combustion persists in historical literature.
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