『설문해자』 女부에 나타난 고대 중국 여성의 미인상(美人相) 고찰 (A Study on the Ancient Chinese Perception of “a Beautiful Woman” Based on the Analysis of Chinese Compound Characters under the Radical 女 in Shuowen Jiezi(說文解字))

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초록

The present paper aims to illuminate the Ancient Chinese perception of “a beautiful woman” based on the analysis of the Chinese compound characters under the radical 女(woman) in Shuowen Jiezi(說文解字). The characters describing female external beauty used in the Radical 女(woman) are categorized by meaning into three groups: “beautiful(general term),” “feature,” and “attitude,” and the characters for “beautiful(general term),” and “feature” are analyzed for what they signify.
The focus in the semantic analysis of each character is on two points: First, the meanings of characters describing external female beauty in the 女(woman) section are re-categorized to figure out how the female body are symbolized from the perspective of female “beauty” in terms of the meaning.
Second, the etymological meanings of each character are analyzed the meanings of phonetic signs.
The findings of the analysis are: The characters used in Shuowen Jiezi are frequently found in various ancient literatures, signifying the characters for “beauty” and “feature” are reflective of ancient Chinese intellectuals' view of “a beautiful woman.” Analysis on the meaning of characters in the 女(woman) Section shows that the emblems for female beauty, on the aspect of the body, include eyes, face, body type, neck and skin, while subtle eye shapes, round and deep eyes, small face, slim fragile weak and upright posture, straight neck and clear skin are the measures of beautiful female feature.
There are a total of 17 characters describing “feature,” of which 12 represent the “body type” - an absolute majority of the total. In the glossary of Shuowen Jiezi, definitions of these 12 characters include characters describing the body type, such as 長(slender), 弱(weak), 小(small), 細(fragile), and 直(upright). Seeing characters for “slender” and “weak or fragile” are among the most frequently used ones, we can assume that these constitute favored female body types in the Pre-Qin Period of China.
These semantic attributes are also found in the analysis on the meanings of phonetic signs in each character. Of the total 33 words analysed for this study, all but 好(good) are formed in the phono-semantic compound character(形聲) principle. There are 23 characters, or 71.8%, that represent the etymological meanings in phonetic signs. The distribution of characters by the etymological meanings contained in the phonetic signs of each character shows concentration on characters for “slender and long”(tall) and “weak(small).” The analysis of the present paper indicates that, though Xu Shen(許愼) does not articulate that phonetic signs have both phonetic and semantic representations in his character analysis, his explanation of various characters formed in the phono-semantic compound character(形聲) principle takes consideration of the etymological meanings of characters.

영어초록

The present paper aims to illuminate the Ancient Chinese perception of “a beautiful woman” based on the analysis of the Chinese compound characters under the radical 女(woman) in Shuowen Jiezi(說文解字). The characters describing female external beauty used in the Radical 女(woman) are categorized by meaning into three groups: “beautiful(general term),” “feature,” and “attitude,” and the characters for “beautiful(general term),” and “feature” are analyzed for what they signify.
The focus in the semantic analysis of each character is on two points: First, the meanings of characters describing external female beauty in the 女(woman) section are re-categorized to figure out how the female body are symbolized from the perspective of female “beauty” in terms of the meaning.
Second, the etymological meanings of each character are analyzed the meanings of phonetic signs.
The findings of the analysis are: The characters used in Shuowen Jiezi are frequently found in various ancient literatures, signifying the characters for “beauty” and “feature” are reflective of ancient Chinese intellectuals' view of “a beautiful woman.” Analysis on the meaning of characters in the 女(woman) Section shows that the emblems for female beauty, on the aspect of the body, include eyes, face, body type, neck and skin, while subtle eye shapes, round and deep eyes, small face, slim fragile weak and upright posture, straight neck and clear skin are the measures of beautiful female feature.
There are a total of 17 characters describing “feature,” of which 12 represent the “body type” - an absolute majority of the total. In the glossary of Shuowen Jiezi, definitions of these 12 characters include characters describing the body type, such as 長(slender), 弱(weak), 小(small), 細(fragile), and 直(upright). Seeing characters for “slender” and “weak or fragile” are among the most frequently used ones, we can assume that these constitute favored female body types in the Pre-Qin Period of China.
These semantic attributes are also found in the analysis on the meanings of phonetic signs in each character. Of the total 33 words analysed for this study, all but 好(good) are formed in the phono-semantic compound character(形聲) principle. There are 23 characters, or 71.8%, that represent the etymological meanings in phonetic signs. The distribution of characters by the etymological meanings contained in the phonetic signs of each character shows concentration on characters for “slender and long”(tall) and “weak(small).” The analysis of the present paper indicates that, though Xu Shen(許愼) does not articulate that phonetic signs have both phonetic and semantic representations in his character analysis, his explanation of various characters formed in the phono-semantic compound character(形聲) principle takes consideration of the etymological meanings of characters.

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