Today we move on our learning journey to 方. This is a very simple Chinese character that provides little clue of what it is. Let us examine its ancient scripts to get more clues:
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| evolution history of 方 |
From its Oracle script 
, we can tell that it can be divided into parts of 
and 
. It is believed that represents man, and represents an ancient Chinese shackles used to exile criminals, as shown below:
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| 方 |
方 originally means exile criminals into desolated border of a country.
From its original meaning, 方 is extended with following meanings:
1. border or side: for example: 四方形
2. Chinese ancestors believes that Heaven is round, while earth is a square at its border, 方 thus contains meaning of square: for example: 方方正正
3. a place at border means it is far away from central of the country, 方 has the meaning of local, for example 方言
4. 方 thus also has the meaning of a place or a county, for example 地方
5. exile to borders means travel to that direction: for example 方向
That is pretty much all for 方, time to enjoy a Chinese calligraphy with 方 inside:
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| 大风起兮云飞扬, 威加海内兮归故乡, 安得猛士兮守四方. |
