萬

Han character

萬 (radical 140, 艸+9, 12 strokes, cangjie input 廿田中月 (TWLB), four-corner 4442₇, composition ⿱艹禺)

Glyph origin

Historical forms of the character 萬
Shang	Western Zhou	Warring States	Shuowen Jiezi (compiled in Han)	Liushutong (compiled in Ming)
Oracle bone script	Bronze inscriptions	Chu Slip and silk script	Small seal script	Transcribed ancient scripts

This character has lost its original meaning of “scorpion”. The derivative 蠆 (OC *m̥ʰraːds) refers to the original word.

Etymology

Three roots can perhaps be distinguished:

1. “Scorpion”: See 蠆 (OC *m̥ʰraːds);
2. “Religious dance; sorcery”: Perhaps from Proto-Sino-Tibetan *s-man (“medicine”). Compare Tibetan སྨན (sman, “medicine; she-demons worshipped by common folk”), Burmese မန်း (man:, “utter mystic words to heal or ward off evil”);
3. “Myriad” (10000): Schuessler (2007) considers the etymology of this sense Sino-Tibetan, and compares it with Tibetan འབུམ ('bum, “hundred thousand; complete; entire; multifarious”). Similar words are found in branches of Altaic and Tocharian; here they are treated as very old loanwords from Chinese, per Pulleyblank (apud Clauson, 1972), Beckwith (2009), Adams (2013) and Tremblay (2005).

Pronunciation

Definitions

萬

1. ^† Original form of 蠆／虿 (chài, “scorpion”).
2. (historical) A ritual dance in ancient China.
3. myriad, ten thousand, 10000

   萬歲 / 万岁  ―  wànsuì  ―  ten thousand years; hooray; long live

4. (figuratively) a great number
5. innumerable; numerous
6. very; extremely; absolutely
7. A surname​.

Compounds

Descendants

• → Altaic:
  • → Chinese: 頭曼 (OC *doː moːn, “Touman, the first leader (chanyu) of the Xiongnu”)
  • Proto-Turkic: *Tümen (“ten thousand; an infinitely large number”)
    • Turkish: tümen (“ten thousand”)
  • Middle Mongolian: ᠲᠦᠮᠡᠨ (tümen, “ten thousand”)
    • → English: tumen (“an army unit of 10,000 soldiers, among the ancient Mongols”)
    • → Persian: تومان‎ (tumân)
      • → English: toman (“former currency of Iran”)
    • → Russian: Тюмень (Tjumenʹ, “Tyumen”)
      • → English: Tyumen (“city in Russia”)
    • Khalkha Mongolian: ᠲᠦᠮᠡ (tüme) / түм (tüm)
  • Tungusic:
    • Manchu: ᡨᡠᠮᡝᠨ (tumen, “ten thousand”)
      • → Chinese: 圖們／图们 (Túmén, “Tumen, city in China”), 圖們江／图们江 (Túmén Jiāng, “Tumen River, boundary river between China, North Korea and Russia”)
        • → Korean: 도문 (圖們, domun, “Tumen”)
        • → English: Tumen (“city in China”)
      • → Korean: 두만강 (豆滿江, duman-gang, “Tumen River”)
  • Korean: 즈믄 (jeumeun, “(obsolete) thousand”)
  • Japanese: 千 (ち) (chi, “thousand”)
• → Tocharian:
  • Tocharian A: tmāṃ (“ten thousand”)
  • Tocharian B: t_(u)māne (“ten thousand, a myriad”)
• → Japanese: 萬 (まん) (man), 萬 (ばん) (ban, “ten thousand”)
  • → English: banzai (“Japanese battle cry; cry of enthusiasm”)
• → Korean: 만 (萬, man, “ten thousand”)
• → Vietnamese: muôn (“ten thousand; all, many”)
• → Vietnamese: vạn (萬, "ten thousand; myriad")
• → Khmer: ម៉ឺន (məɨn), ហ្មឺន (məɨn, “ten thousand; official rank”)
• → Shan: မိုၼ်ႇ (mùen, “ten thousand”)
• → Lao: ໝື່ນ (mư̄n), ຫມື່ນ (mư̄n, “ten thousand; official rank”)
• → Thai: หมื่น (mʉ̀ʉn, “ten thousand; official rank”)

Kanji

(“Jinmeiyō” kanji used for names, kyūjitai kanji, shinjitai form 万)

1. ten thousand

Etymology 1

⟨yo₂ro₂du⟩ → */jərədu/ → /jorod͡zu/ → /jorozu/

From Old Japanese, first attested in the Kojiki (712 CE). See 万 for more senses.

Etymology 2

From Middle Chinese 萬 (MC mʉɐn^H). See 万 for more senses.

Etymology 3

Likely a shift from ban above. See 万 for more senses.

References

1. Source: EDICT and KANJIDIC files licensed by the Electronic Dictionaries Research Group.

Hanja

萬 • (man)

• Eumhun:
  • Sound (hangeul): 만
  • Name (hangeul): 만

Noun

萬 • (man) (hangeul 만)

1. Hanja form^? of 만 (“ten thousand”).

Han character

萬 (vạn, vàn, mại, muôn)

Noun

萬

1. Hán tự form of vạn, vàn, mại, muôn, “ten thousand”