<blockquote>
<p>I don't care about pronunciation, what would it mean?</p>
</blockquote>
<p>This is not the right idea. Chinese characters represent words, and words have both sound and meaning. If you knew what the pronunciation is, you would be over halfway to finding out the word the character represented, and hence knowing its meaning.</p>
<hr />
<p>Existing studies offer little in the way of interpreting that character's meaning, but at least two academic publications offer the components as 「⿺眾辶」 or 「⿺衆辶」 (<a href="https://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.2988543" rel="nofollow noreferrer">Siu 2017 p.12</a>; <a href="https://ah.nccu.edu.tw/item?item_id=116573" rel="nofollow noreferrer">張靜二 1985 p. 253</a>), making up a character which looks like 「」. I’ll maintain that writing the character with 「血/(豕-一)」 is a transcription error, as there was no known widespread component 「血/(豕-一)」 used in other characters, and certainly not any which has a direct relation to the meaning or sound of the words used in the heart sutra.</p>
<p>If you really wanted to get to the bottom of this, rather than look at <a href="https://dia.dila.edu.tw/uv3/index.html?id=Tv08p0851#?c=0&amp;m=0&amp;s=0&amp;cv=861&amp;xywh=-2178%2C-167%2C6499%2C3333" rel="nofollow noreferrer">the printed transcription</a>, make a trip to the <a href="https://www.britishmuseum.org/collection/china/exploring-silk-roads" rel="nofollow noreferrer">British Museum's &quot;Exploring the Silk Roads&quot; exhibition</a> and take some high-resolution clear photos at their <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aurel_Stein" rel="nofollow noreferrer">Stein</a> collection. Here's some images of original excerpts as <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dunhuang_manuscripts" rel="nofollow noreferrer">excavated from Dūnhuáng</a>, all taken from <a href="https://archive.org/details/dunhuangbaozang/%E6%95%A6%E7%85%8C%E5%AE%9D%E8%97%8F019" rel="nofollow noreferrer">Volume 19 of 黃永武《敦煌寳藏》</a>. The yellow circle contains the character you're after (。。。取經早「?」，滿爾心願。。。), while the blue circles and indicated characters are some examples that you should expect similarities or differences to.</p>
<h2><a href="https://cbetaonline.dila.edu.tw/zh/T08n0256_001" rel="nofollow noreferrer">《唐梵飜對字音般若波羅蜜多心經》</a></h2>
<p><a href="https://archive.org/details/dunhuangbaozang/%E6%95%A6%E7%85%8C%E5%AE%9D%E8%97%8F019/page/687" rel="nofollow noreferrer">Stein no. 2464 (《敦煌寳藏》019, p.687-688)</a></p>
<p><a href="https://i.sstatic.net/BFzmG.jpg" rel="nofollow noreferrer"><img src="https://i.sstatic.net/BFzmG.jpg" alt="敦煌寳藏019, p688, 斯2464《唐梵飜對字音般若波羅蜜多心經》" /></a></p>
<blockquote>
<p>。。。師若受持，可保來往。「遂」乃口受與法師訖。。。</p>
</blockquote>
<p>If the unknown character contains the strokes of 「豕」, it should highly resemble 「遂」 from the same writer.</p>
<h2><a href="https://cbetaonline.dila.edu.tw/zh/ZW0031b" rel="nofollow noreferrer">《佛相好經》</a></h2>
<p><a href="https://archive.org/details/dunhuangbaozang/%E6%95%A6%E7%85%8C%E5%AE%9D%E8%97%8F019/page/633" rel="nofollow noreferrer">Stein no. 2461 (《敦煌寳藏》019, p.633-634)</a></p>
<p><a href="https://i.sstatic.net/KGoLG.png" rel="nofollow noreferrer"><img src="https://i.sstatic.net/KGoLG.png" alt="敦煌寳藏019, p633, 斯2461《佛相好經》" /></a></p>
<p><a href="https://i.sstatic.net/kYlzz.png" rel="nofollow noreferrer"><img src="https://i.sstatic.net/kYlzz.png" alt="敦煌寳藏019, p634, 斯2461《佛相好經》" /></a></p>
<p>This is unlikely to have the same penmanship as Stein no. 2464, but it should be written around the same era.</p>
<blockquote>
<p>。。。出五色光明，「還」入毛孔。。。</p>
<p>。。。其舌下十脈「衆」光流出。。。</p>
</blockquote>

CC BY-SA 4.0
2023-11-26T03:18:19.943Z
`there was no known widespread component 「血/(豕-一)」` I'm not sure if it's worth pointing out, but there's a way of writing 衆 that looks very similar to OP's picture. I've seen 衆 written that way occassionally in calligraphic works, so maybe that influenced the way the character was transcribed? See: https://dict.variants.moe.edu.tw/variants/rbt/word_attribute.rbt?quote_code=QTAyNzcy .
wang_xiao_ming
CC BY-SA 4.0
2023-11-26T03:27:08.890Z
@wang_xiao_ming yes, that's also how I got to 衆 in the first place - I didn't find it through the academic publications I listed in the answer. The  part contains the same number of strokes as 乑 and 众, so it's a short leap to get . However, I don't think OP knows how characters work, and I didn't want to try to explain that "because of 衆's bottom part being easily changed into , you can get the character in question, but don't look at [the zi.tools link](https://zi.tools/zi/%E2%BF%BA%E8%BE%B6%E2%BF%B1%F0%A6%93%90%E8%B1%95) because it points to an unrelated Vietnamese 同形異字".
dROOOze
CC BY-SA 4.0
2023-11-26T08:51:19.433Z
Thanks. This is a much more helpful than your previous comments.
Jayarava
CC BY-SA 4.0
2023-11-26T09:17:08.867Z
In Siu (2017), the note you refer to says  ［原字：「這」去「言」代「眾」. 

Though of course, 這 is not the term we see in Taishō Ed. So where does it come from?
Jayarava
CC BY-SA 4.0
2023-11-26T09:38:38.713Z
@Jayarava「這」去「言」代「眾」 means “take the character 這, remove (去掉) the component 言, and replace (代換) it with 眾”. It doesn’t mean that the character 這 was in the text. It’s the same kind of description as 這-言+(血/(豕-一)).
dROOOze
CC BY-SA 4.0
2023-11-25T10:27:38.563Z
2023-11-25T10:38:11.970Z
2023-11-25T10:38:11.970Z
dROOOze
<p>A few close ones:</p>
<p>汉语大字典第二版 p.4141, sound chang4, meaning 逸. Also in 中华字海 p. 651 but sound chong4.
<a href="https://i.sstatic.net/Xo0FV.png" rel="nofollow noreferrer"><img src="https://i.sstatic.net/Xo0FV.png" alt="汉语大字典" /></a></p>
<p><a href="https://dict.variants.moe.edu.tw/variants/rbt/word_attribute.rbt?quote_code=QTA0MTkxLTAwMg" rel="nofollow noreferrer">异体字字典</a> has the following variants for 還: <a href="https://i.sstatic.net/LrH6Y.png" rel="nofollow noreferrer"><img src="https://i.sstatic.net/LrH6Y.png" alt="还1" /></a>, <a href="https://i.sstatic.net/9CVZz.png" rel="nofollow noreferrer"><img src="https://i.sstatic.net/9CVZz.png" alt="还2" /></a>.</p>

CC BY-SA 4.0
2023-11-24T09:37:50.180Z
The radical yin 乑 is not the same as shi 豕
Jayarava
CC BY-SA 4.0
2023-11-21T14:05:56.533Z
2023-11-21T14:05:56.533Z
user2249675
<p>The context is excerpted from a version of《<a href="http://ccubk14.brinkster.net/greatbook/V08/0256_001.htm" rel="nofollow noreferrer">般若波羅蜜多心經</a>》(in the page 2), a buddhist scripture translated in Tang Dynasty.</p>
<p>The character in the picture is “还” written in ancient method. A similar character can be found in <a href="https://www.cihai.com.cn/yuci/detail?docLibId=1099&amp;docId=5683091&amp;q=%E8%BF%98&amp;type=2" rel="nofollow noreferrer">辞海</a> (in the part of 楷书, may require login to get onto the website)</p>

CC BY-SA 4.0
2023-11-21T11:17:04.860Z
Also a modern passage about it also translated it as “还” https://www.sohu.com/a/394477695_562249
Tec99
CC BY-SA 4.0
2023-11-21T14:16:17.707Z
well, the quoted sohu link is in **simplified** chinese 
水巷孑蠻
CC BY-SA 4.0
2023-11-21T15:12:34.707Z
At least it shows that the original sentence is “由斯經歷，保爾行途。取經早還，滿爾心願。” (though typed in simplified Chinese), also there is another internet source indicates that is 还/還 : https://buddha.origthatone.com/%e7%8e%84%e5%a5%98%e5%a4%a7%e5%b8%ab%e7%8d%b2%e5%be%97%e3%80%8a%e5%bf%83%e7%b6%93%e3%80%8b%e7%9a%84%e4%b8%8d%e5%8f%af%e6%80%9d%e8%ad%b0%e5%9b%a0%e7%b7%a3/
Tec99
CC BY-SA 4.0
2023-11-21T15:23:48.017Z
well, **the original text should be in traditional chinese**, hand-written or printed. all equivalent in simplified chinese involved a conversion, by ocr, or someone typed it. what’s in doubt is, converting traditional to simplified, which induce errors 
水巷孑蠻
CC BY-SA 4.0
2023-11-21T15:30:24.107Z
So I found another traditional Chinese sources (the buddha one) to further prove my opinion.
Tec99
CC BY-SA 4.0
2023-11-21T15:36:13.817Z
Actually there are many diffrent "traditional Chinese", between which also need conversion. For instance, the one Taiwan use and the one Hong Kong use have several different "same character", and some ancient writing of characters are now abandoned and considered as “异体字”, which not included in any computer character system. So the only available "un-errored" way to figure out a “异体字” like that is searching in the dictionary, so I give a source in 辞海, and @user2249675 give a source from 教育部異體字字典
Tec99
CC BY-SA 4.0
2023-11-23T07:44:11.317Z
Thanks for this answer. I agree that some popular Chinese websites used 还, but without an explanation of why, I can't really use this. Similarly, in the same passage,  may reflect 阙, a variant of quē 闕 “lack, want”. But I need a bit more than this. 

A dictionary entry for 还 that doesn't mention the archaic character is not much use really.
Jayarava
CC BY-SA 4.0
2023-11-21T11:10:04.030Z
2023-11-21T11:10:04.030Z
Tec99
<p><a href="https://i.sstatic.net/0L5qQ.png" rel="nofollow noreferrer"><img src="https://i.sstatic.net/0L5qQ.png" alt="unknown character from Chinese Buddhist text" /></a></p>
<p>This archaic character is described in CBETA as [這-言+(血/(豕-一))]</p>
<p>It does not seem to be in Unicode yet. I don't care about pronunciation, what would it mean?</p>
<p>The context is 由斯經歷，保爾行途。取經早[這-言+(血/(豕-一))]，滿爾心願。我是觀音菩薩。(T 256; 8.851a26-28)</p>

CC BY-SA 4.0
2023-11-21T13:16:48.357Z
Looks like a variant on , chóng 快
Mou某
CC BY-SA 4.0
2023-11-22T04:27:21.523Z
Using Unicode IDS, this can be written as ⿺辶⿱豕 or as ⿺辶⿱血, and this _is_ currently in [zi.tools](https://zi.tools/zi/%E2%BF%BA%E8%BE%B6%E2%BF%B1%F0%A6%93%90%E8%B1%95).
Michaelyus
CC BY-SA 4.0
2023-11-23T08:04:23.500Z
I think this is the character: 
dROOOze
CC BY-SA 4.0
2023-11-24T09:36:03.877Z
No. The radical yin 乑 is not the same as shi 豕. But thanks for playing.
Jayarava
CC BY-SA 4.0
2023-11-24T17:45:50.413Z
Uhh, I’m not sure where you’re getting “yin” from, and whether you know how characters work in general. Firstly, 乑 is a variation on 众. Secondly, characters are made from components, not “radicals”, which are artificial dictionary organisation tools. Thirdly, there is no such component as “血/(豕-一)” which has a traceable glyph origin; this means that “血/(豕-一)” is **almost certainly derived from a transcription error**. Note that your idea of there being a 豕 in the character is wrong, as the collection of strokes making up the shape 豕 is fused to the collection of strokes making up the shape 血.
dROOOze
CC BY-SA 4.0
2023-11-25T07:52:33.407Z
@dROOOze Always good to get input from experts.
Jayarava
<traditional-characters><classical-chinese><literary-chinese>
Can anyone give me an idea of how to understand [這-言+(血/(豕-一))]?
# Can anyone give me an idea of how to understand [這-言+(血/(豕-一))]?

(Asked by: username_0 on 2023-11-21)

[![unknown character from Chinese Buddhist text](https://i.sstatic.net/0L5qQ.png)](https://i.sstatic.net/0L5qQ.png)

This archaic character is described in CBETA as [這-言+(血/(豕-一))]

It does not seem to be in Unicode yet. I don't care about pronunciation, what would it mean?

The context is 由斯經歷，保爾行途。取經早[這-言+(血/(豕-一))]，滿爾心願。我是觀音菩薩。(T 256; 8.851a26-28)

**Tags:** traditional-characters, classical-chinese, literary-chinese

> **Comments:**
> **username_1**: Looks like a variant on , chóng 快  
> **username_2**: Using Unicode IDS, this can be written as ⿺辶⿱豕 or as ⿺辶⿱血, and this _is_ currently in [zi.tools](https://zi.tools/zi/%E2%BF%BA%E8%BE%B6%E2%BF%B1%F0%A6%93%90%E8%B1%95).  
> **username_3**: I think this is the character:   
> **username_0**: No. The radical yin 乑 is not the same as shi 豕. But thanks for playing.  
> **username_3**: Uhh, I’m not sure where you’re getting “yin” from, and whether you know how characters work in general. Firstly, 乑 is a variation on 众. Secondly, characters are made from components, not “radicals”, which are artificial dictionary organisation tools. Thirdly, there is no such component as “血/(豕-一)” which has a traceable glyph origin; this means that “血/(豕-一)” is **almost certainly derived from a transcription error**. Note that your idea of there being a 豕 in the character is wrong, as the collection of strokes making up the shape 豕 is fused to the collection of strokes making up the shape 血.  
> **username_0**: @username_3 Always good to get input from experts.  

---

## 3 answers

### Answer by username_3 on 2023-11-25. Score: 4

> I don't care about pronunciation, what would it mean?

This is not the right idea. Chinese characters represent words, and words have both sound and meaning. If you knew what the pronunciation is, you would be over halfway to finding out the word the character represented, and hence knowing its meaning.

---

Existing studies offer little in the way of interpreting that character's meaning, but at least two academic publications offer the components as 「⿺眾辶」 or 「⿺衆辶」 ([Siu 2017 p.12](https://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.2988543); [張靜二 1985 p. 253](https://ah.nccu.edu.tw/item?item_id=116573)), making up a character which looks like 「」. I’ll maintain that writing the character with 「血/(豕-一)」 is a transcription error, as there was no known widespread component 「血/(豕-一)」 used in other characters, and certainly not any which has a direct relation to the meaning or sound of the words used in the heart sutra.

If you really wanted to get to the bottom of this, rather than look at [the printed transcription](https://dia.dila.edu.tw/uv3/index.html?id=Tv08p0851#?c=0&m=0&s=0&cv=861&xywh=-2178%2C-167%2C6499%2C3333), make a trip to the [British Museum's "Exploring the Silk Roads" exhibition](https://www.britishmuseum.org/collection/china/exploring-silk-roads) and take some high-resolution clear photos at their [Stein](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aurel_Stein) collection. Here's some images of original excerpts as [excavated from Dūnhuáng](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dunhuang_manuscripts), all taken from [Volume 19 of 黃永武《敦煌寳藏》](https://archive.org/details/dunhuangbaozang/%E6%95%A6%E7%85%8C%E5%AE%9D%E8%97%8F019). The yellow circle contains the character you're after (。。。取經早「?」，滿爾心願。。。), while the blue circles and indicated characters are some examples that you should expect similarities or differences to.

## [《唐梵飜對字音般若波羅蜜多心經》](https://cbetaonline.dila.edu.tw/zh/T08n0256_001)

[Stein no. 2464 (《敦煌寳藏》019, p.687-688)](https://archive.org/details/dunhuangbaozang/%E6%95%A6%E7%85%8C%E5%AE%9D%E8%97%8F019/page/687)

[![敦煌寳藏019, p688, 斯2464《唐梵飜對字音般若波羅蜜多心經》](https://i.sstatic.net/BFzmG.jpg)](https://i.sstatic.net/BFzmG.jpg)

> 。。。師若受持，可保來往。「遂」乃口受與法師訖。。。

If the unknown character contains the strokes of 「豕」, it should highly resemble 「遂」 from the same writer.

## [《佛相好經》](https://cbetaonline.dila.edu.tw/zh/ZW0031b)

[Stein no. 2461 (《敦煌寳藏》019, p.633-634)](https://archive.org/details/dunhuangbaozang/%E6%95%A6%E7%85%8C%E5%AE%9D%E8%97%8F019/page/633)

[![敦煌寳藏019, p633, 斯2461《佛相好經》](https://i.sstatic.net/KGoLG.png)](https://i.sstatic.net/KGoLG.png)

[![敦煌寳藏019, p634, 斯2461《佛相好經》](https://i.sstatic.net/kYlzz.png)](https://i.sstatic.net/kYlzz.png)

This is unlikely to have the same penmanship as Stein no. 2464, but it should be written around the same era.

> 。。。出五色光明，「還」入毛孔。。。
>
> 。。。其舌下十脈「衆」光流出。。。

> **Comments:**
> **username_4**: `there was no known widespread component 「血/(豕-一)」` I'm not sure if it's worth pointing out, but there's a way of writing 衆 that looks very similar to OP's picture. I've seen 衆 written that way occassionally in calligraphic works, so maybe that influenced the way the character was transcribed? See: https://dict.variants.moe.edu.tw/variants/rbt/word_attribute.rbt?quote_code=QTAyNzcy .  
> **username_3**: @username_4 yes, that's also how I got to 衆 in the first place - I didn't find it through the academic publications I listed in the answer. The  part contains the same number of strokes as 乑 and 众, so it's a short leap to get . However, I don't think OP knows how characters work, and I didn't want to try to explain that "because of 衆's bottom part being easily changed into , you can get the character in question, but don't look at [the zi.tools link](https://zi.tools/zi/%E2%BF%BA%E8%BE%B6%E2%BF%B1%F0%A6%93%90%E8%B1%95) because it points to an unrelated Vietnamese 同形異字".  
> **username_0**: Thanks. This is a much more helpful than your previous comments.  
> **username_0**: In Siu (2017), the note you refer to says  ［原字：「這」去「言」代「眾」.   Though of course, 這 is not the term we see in Taishō Ed. So where does it come from?  
> **username_3**: @username_0「這」去「言」代「眾」 means “take the character 這, remove (去掉) the component 言, and replace (代換) it with 眾”. It doesn’t mean that the character 這 was in the text. It’s the same kind of description as 這-言+(血/(豕-一)).  

---

### Answer by username_5 on 2023-11-21. Score: 3

A few close ones:

汉语大字典第二版 p.4141, sound chang4, meaning 逸. Also in 中华字海 p. 651 but sound chong4.
[![汉语大字典](https://i.sstatic.net/Xo0FV.png)](https://i.sstatic.net/Xo0FV.png)

[异体字字典](https://dict.variants.moe.edu.tw/variants/rbt/word_attribute.rbt?quote_code=QTA0MTkxLTAwMg) has the following variants for 還: [![还1](https://i.sstatic.net/LrH6Y.png)](https://i.sstatic.net/LrH6Y.png), [![还2](https://i.sstatic.net/9CVZz.png)](https://i.sstatic.net/9CVZz.png).

> **Comments:**
> **username_0**: The radical yin 乑 is not the same as shi 豕  

---

### Answer by username_6 on 2023-11-21. Score: 2

The context is excerpted from a version of《[般若波羅蜜多心經](http://ccubk14.brinkster.net/greatbook/V08/0256_001.htm)》(in the page 2), a buddhist scripture translated in Tang Dynasty.

The character in the picture is “还” written in ancient method. A similar character can be found in [辞海](https://www.cihai.com.cn/yuci/detail?docLibId=1099&docId=5683091&q=%E8%BF%98&type=2) (in the part of 楷书, may require login to get onto the website)

> **Comments:**
> **username_6**: Also a modern passage about it also translated it as “还” https://www.sohu.com/a/394477695_562249  
> **username_7**: well, the quoted sohu link is in **simplified** chinese   
> **username_6**: At least it shows that the original sentence is “由斯經歷，保爾行途。取經早還，滿爾心願。” (though typed in simplified Chinese), also there is another internet source indicates that is 还/還 : https://buddha.origthatone.com/%e7%8e%84%e5%a5%98%e5%a4%a7%e5%b8%ab%e7%8d%b2%e5%be%97%e3%80%8a%e5%bf%83%e7%b6%93%e3%80%8b%e7%9a%84%e4%b8%8d%e5%8f%af%e6%80%9d%e8%ad%b0%e5%9b%a0%e7%b7%a3/  
> **username_7**: well, **the original text should be in traditional chinese**, hand-written or printed. all equivalent in simplified chinese involved a conversion, by ocr, or someone typed it. what’s in doubt is, converting traditional to simplified, which induce errors   
> **username_6**: So I found another traditional Chinese sources (the buddha one) to further prove my opinion.  
> **username_6**: Actually there are many diffrent "traditional Chinese", between which also need conversion. For instance, the one Taiwan use and the one Hong Kong use have several different "same character", and some ancient writing of characters are now abandoned and considered as “异体字”, which not included in any computer character system. So the only available "un-errored" way to figure out a “异体字” like that is searching in the dictionary, so I give a source in 辞海, and @username_5 give a source from 教育部異體字字典  
> **username_0**: Thanks for this answer. I agree that some popular Chinese websites used 还, but without an explanation of why, I can't really use this. Similarly, in the same passage,  may reflect 阙, a variant of quē 闕 “lack, want”. But I need a bit more than this.   A dictionary entry for 还 that doesn't mention the archaic character is not much use really.  

---

