权
quán · HSK 6
power
👑 quán sounds like queen — she holds the power and authority
木 (wood) + 又 (hand): a hand gripping a wooden staff of office. The English echo queen locks in the meaning — royal right and authority.
权 — wood 木 + 雚 (heron, phonetic)
Originally a phono-semantic compound: 木 (tree/wood) gives the meaning, while 雚 supplies the sound 'quan'. The early sense referred to a specific tree, then shifted to mean a weight used on a steelyard balance. From 'weight' it extended metaphorically to 'authority' and 'power', the dominant modern meaning.