夙

夙 (Kangxi radical 36, 夕+3, 6 strokes, cangjie input 竹弓一弓戈 (HNMNI), four-corner 7721₀, composition ⿵几歹)

• 㑉, 洬, 珟, 㓘

• Kangxi Dictionary: page 246, character 7
• Dai Kanwa Jiten: character 5755
• Dae Jaweon: page 489, character 5
• Hanyu Da Zidian (first edition): volume 2, page 861, character 7
• Unihan data for U+5919

The oracle bone script consisted of 月 (“moon”) and 丮, and resembled a man holding the moon, probably representing the worship of the moon. Alternatively, it might represent a person working under the moon in the early morning when the moon has not set.

In some forms of its bronze inscription, 月 corrupted into 夕.

丮 later got reduced into 凡.

Schuessler (2007) compares this with Proto-Lolo-Burmese *C-sok ~ *V-sok (“morning; morrow”), which STEDT derives from Proto-Tibeto-Burman *s(j)u-ŋ/k (“to wake up; morning; clear-headed; to sober up”). Burmese သောကြာ (sau:kra, “Venus”) is unrelated as it ultimately derives from Sanskrit शुक्र (śukra).

Schuessler (2007) also considers this to be related to Proto-Tibeto-Burman *m-sow (“to arise; to awake; to awaken”), as the morning is the time to arise. Other possible Chinese comparanda of this Tibeto-Burman word are 搜 (OC *sru, “to move”) (as in 搜搜), 速 (OC *sloːɡ, “speedy”), 聳 (OC *sloŋʔ, “to urge on”) (STEDT).

夙

1. early morning
2. early
3. old; past
4. since old days

(Hyōgai kanji)

1. early morning
2. early
3. since long ago

• Go-on: すく (suku)
• Kan-on: しゅく (shuku)
• Kun: つとに (tsutoni, 夙に)、はやい (hayai, 夙い)、まだき (madaki, 夙)

Derivation unclear. A surface analysis suggests that this may have been a noun with a sense similar to "early time".

Only appears as part of other words first attested in Old Japanese and Early Middle Japanese. Not listed on its own in monolingual Japanese dictionaries.^[1][2][3]

Attested as part of the adverbial phrase 夙に (tsuto ni) in the Man'yōshū poetry anthology of 759.^[1]

• IPA^(key): [t͡sɨto̞]

夙(つと) • (tsuto) ^{←つと (tuto)?}

1. [from 759] (possibly) early time, especially early in the morning

• 夙に (tsuto ni, “from before, from earlier; early in the morning”)
• つとめて (tsutomete, “the morning; the dawn; (especially) the morning after some other event”)

夙 • (suk) (hangeul 숙, revised suk, McCune–Reischauer suk)

1. This term needs a translation to English. Please help out and add a translation, then remove the text {{rfdef}}.

夙: Hán Nôm readings: túc

1. This term needs a translation to English. Please help out and add a translation, then remove the text {{rfdef}}.