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郇 is a phono-semantic compound made up of the right-side radical 阝, an abbreviation of 邑 (yì, "city" or "state"), which supplies the meaning, and the left-side component 旬 (xún), which gives the sound. The character originally named the ancient State of Xun, a minor vassal state of the Zhou Dynasty, thus its meaning was anchored in political geography. After the state dissolved, 郇 shifted to a surname for the descendants of that territory and fell out of use as an active place name. The presence of the city radical reflects its primary function as a toponym in early Chinese records.
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