鄉

鄉 (Kangxi radical 163, 邑+9, 12 strokes, cangjie input 女竹戈戈中 (VHIIL), four-corner 2772₇, composition ⿰乡郎)

• 膷, 鱜, 㗽, 蠁, 嚮, 饗, 響, 薌, 曏, 䦳

• Kangxi Dictionary: not present, would follow page 1275, character 2
• Dai Kanwa Jiten: character 39498
• Dae Jaweon: page 1775, character 1
• Hanyu Da Zidian (first edition): volume 6, page 3786, character 4
• Unihan data for U+9109

Ideogrammic compound (會意 / 会意): 𠨍 (“two people facing each other”) + 皀 (“a round-mouthed food vessel”) – to feast; the original script of 饗 (OC *qʰaŋʔ). The sense "village" was a result of phonetic borrowing or semantic shifting.

In early writing, the character was virtually indistinguishable from 卿 (OC *kʰraŋ). Semantically, 卿 (OC *kʰraŋ, “elder; leader”) and 鄉 (OC *qʰaŋ, “community; district; village”), likely cognates too, were both represented by the event depicted in the ideogram – 饗 (OC *qʰaŋʔ, “ritual feasting”), which was central to the community life (Yang, 1965).

The right half is unrelated to 郎, as 良 in 鄉 was derived from 皀 during the formation of the clerical script.

鄉

1. township
2. countryside; country; rural area

   鄉村／乡村  ―  xiāngcūn  ―  village

   城鄉／城乡  ―  chéngxiāng  ―  urban and rural areas

3. one's native place

   回鄉／回乡  ―  huíxiāng  ―  to return to one's native place

4. place
5. state; situation

   夢鄉／梦乡  ―  mèngxiāng  ―  dreamland

6. a surname

鄉

1. alternative form of 嚮 / 向

鄉

1. alternative form of 饗 / 飨 (xiǎng)

(Hyōgai kanji)

1. (nonstandard) alternative form of 郷

• On (unclassified): きょう (kyō)、ごう (gō)
• Kun: さと (sato)、ふるさと (furusato)、さきに (sakini)

鄉 • (hyang) (hangeul 향, revised hyang, McCune–Reischauer hyang, Yale hyang)

1. alternative form of 鄕

鄉: Hán Nôm readings: hương

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