About
The character 颃 is a phono-semantic compound with 亢 as its phonetic element and a head-related semantic component. In its traditional form 頏, the semantic component is 頁 (head/page), simplified to 页 in the current form. Originally, the character described a bird descending in flight. It later became primarily used in the compound 颉颃, which depicts birds fluttering up and down together and metaphorically means to be evenly matched or in rivalry.
Etymology Hide
