搜集
soū jí · HSK 7
to gather
🗂️ 搜 search + 集 gather = search around and gather it all into one pile
搜 means to search or seek out; 集 means to assemble or bring together (it shows a bird 隹 on a tree 木, the old sense of birds flocking). Together: actively hunt things down and pull them into a collection.
搜 — hand radical 扌 + 叟 sǒu (old man)
A semantic-phonetic compound. The hand radical 扌 gives the meaning, indicating an action done with the hand, while 叟 supplies the sound. Originally meaning to grope or feel for something by hand, it extended to the modern sense of searching or seeking.
集 — bird 隹 on top of tree 木
集 is an ideograph showing a bird (隹) perched on a tree (木). The original form depicted three birds gathering on a tree, later simplified to one. From 'birds flocking together' it extended to mean 'gather, collect, assemble,' and by extension 'collection' or 'volume' of writings.