宣告
xuāngào · HSK 7
declare
📢 宣 announce + 告 tell = announce-and-tell, i.e. declare publicly
宣 means to proclaim or make widely known; 告 means to tell or notify. Stacked together they double down on the act of stating something officially: to declare or proclaim. The 口 (mouth) inside 告 marks it as spoken telling.
告 — ox 牛 (top) + mouth 口
Originally a pictograph showing an ox with something on its head, possibly a yoke or sacrificial marker, combined with 口 (mouth) to suggest announcing or reporting. The character came to mean 'to tell' or 'to announce,' as in making a formal declaration. Today it commonly appears in words like 告诉 (to tell) and 报告 (report).