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The character 鲒 is a phono-semantic compound: the semantic radical 鱼 (broadly covering fish, aquatic animals, and seafood) is paired with the phonetic 吉, which signals the pronunciation. Its traditional form 鮚 uses the unsimplified 魚 radical. The character does not denote a true fish, but rather a bivalve mollusk, clams or oysters, a meaning that echoes the older taxonomic habit of placing shelled marine organisms under the fish radical.
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