Word Family of Terms Originally Pronounced SUAR

Semantic Values of the Sound SUAR: Small/Thin/Slender + (Curving/Round) + Continuum




  The SUAR word family is a branch of the TUAR word family, emphasizing applications that have in particular to do with smallness, thinness or slenderness.

　Terms in this word family add the nuance of curvature or roundness to the SAR family theme of Small/Thin/Slender + Continuum. We find a puckering of the lips in 唆, a sodden, straw raincoat in 衰, squatting at length in 催, a lopping off of the nose resulting in permanent disfigurement in 罪, and small loops of metal linked in a chain in 鎖.

　Among the non-Everyday Use Characters, we find the following examples:

A dragging leg/foot (夊)
The shuttle of a loom (梭)
Align in a (semi-)circle in taking measurements (揣)
Cut finely and arrange in a circle (剉)
Squash in destroying (摧)
A rafter upon which a roof is wrapped (榱)
A round lump, boil or pimple (痤)
People seated in a circle on the ground (坐)

　Extensions of meaning or abstract applications of the senses noted above are found in the remaining characters in this group.




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