About
The character 苜, meaning clover or medick, is structured with the grass radical 艹 positioned above the component 目, which primarily indicates phonetic value but also alludes to the plant's characteristic round leaflets that visually resemble eyes. Its etymology points to an initial use for describing plants with such eye-like features, and over time its meaning became specifically tied to the alfalfa plant through the compound 苜蓿, a term borrowed into Chinese from an Old Iranian source. This semantic shift from a general botanical descriptor to a more precise reference occurred while the character's compositional form remained unchanged.