Glyph origin and meaning of 臤

Question

This character 臤 is an obsolete word, so I can't seem to figure out what this character is supposed to mean. To me it seems like an extension of the original 臣 with hand 又 added on to emphasize on the administer/watch on subject meaning of 臣. But some sources I've checked say that 臤 is supposed to mean firm or solid, like the origin of 堅, though I cannot see how is is originally meant for that; while others say it's the origin of 賢, i.e. someone wise to watch over money? Which character did 臤 originally mean?

Answer 1

臤 (qiān; to gouge the eyes) (Zhengzhang OC: /*kʰaːn/, /*kʰriːn/, or /*kʰins/) depicts a hand (又) gouging out an eye turned sideways (臣), indicating the original meaning "to gouge the eyes".

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As for the connection between it's other meanings "hard, firm, solid" (when pronounced qiān) and "wise, virtuous" (when pronounced xián), I am certainly unsure how those came to be associated with this component, but my guess is that 臤 is likely used as a variant of 堅 (when pronounced qiān) and 賢 (when pronounced xián). Otherwise though, the meanings "firm, solid; wise" are probably phonetic loan meanings since I can't really think of a connection between "to gouge the eyes" and "firm, solid; wise".

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Sources used:

• Wiktionary
• zi.tools
• 季旭昇 《說文新證》p.223-224
• 小學堂
• 漢語多功能字庫

Answer 2

臤 does exist in oracle bone script, so it is not a derivative of another character in that sense and is an "original" chinese character.

However is it not very common in the earliest oracle bone incriptions, with only around six known occurances. Its seems clear it was just beginning to form. One translated oracle bone sentence with it has an oracle bone form of

and is considered an early version of

meaning drag/lead forward (掔 today). So this can be considered as one of the earliest definitions of this character.

Also use of similar glyphs identified as prototype 臤 had use through warring states period as a version of modern day 堅. I am guessing that is where your hard and firm are coming from. So this is also one of its earliest meanings.

When it comes to language, especially super early languages, things are not always lineal A to B and B to C. It can be B is an alternate of C but then someone uses it for A cause they sound similar and then someone else uses it for D cause it looks similar and then someone else uses it for C only again and then no one uses til five hundred years later someone discovers a new animal and decides to use that character to name it. You get the idea, language is messy, and we probably can't say exactly what the first meaning was, especially so long ago with so few oracle bones defined. But with my hobbyist level knowledge I think these two meanings can be identified.

Hope it helps ( ´ ▽ ` )ﾉ

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References:

甲骨字形庫、金文字形庫、the oracle bone inscriptions from huayuanzhuang east (A. Schwartz, pg. 102)

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EDIT: as pointed out these images from the textbook are very pixelated, here are drawing renditions of them that are less pixelated (I could not find better images of the exact ones in the textbook free online) Leaving the original pixelated ones for the accuracy to source.