时代
shídài · HSK 3
epoch
⏳ 时 (time) + 代 (generation) = era, the times one lives in
时 means time or hour; 代 means generation or to substitute. Together they name an age or epoch — the era a generation belongs to. Common in 时代精神 (zeitgeist) and 新时代 (new era).
时 — sun 日 + temple/measure 寺
Originally a phono-semantic compound: 日 (sun) gives the meaning of time or season, while 寺 (shí) supplies the sound. Early forms used 之 as the phonetic before 寺 replaced it. The core sense 'season, time, hour' has stayed stable since ancient Chinese.
代 — person radical 亻 + 弋 (stake/dart, phonetic)
代 is a semantic-phonetic compound: 亻 (person) gives the meaning and 弋 supplies the sound. The original sense was one person taking the place of another, which broadened to 'substitute,' 'replace,' and then 'generation' or 'era' — successive groups of people replacing the previous.