Learn one Chinese Character a day - 像

We have just learnt 象. Today we move on to one Chinese character which is composed of 象 and 人: 像. Based on our understanding of 象, the possible combination is as below:

a. a person (人) with an elephant (象) (doing something?);
b. the (abstract) things or characteristics (象) of a human being (人);

Chinese ancestors does no special activities with 象 in ancient China as Chinese did not know how to train elephant to work together.

Option b is a more reasonable combination: what human being looks like!

So 像 means appearance of a person. for example: 人像.

Similar but different from 象, 像 is used to represent the appearance of someone or something by the action or art of imitating, including the way of reflection or refraction of lights on mirrors and etc. For example 录像机, and 图像.

Below is the evolution history of 像: (image taken from http://www.vividict.com)

evolution history of 像

We can see that Seal Script  is composed of exactly the same components as what we write today:  （a person）and  (elephant).

That is all for today, time to enjoy a Chinese calligraphy with 像 inside:

古圣贤像传略