寄付
きふ · kifu · JLPT N3 · noun
donation
🪙🎁 寄付 = send over (寄) + hand to (付): money handed to a cause
寄 means to send or bring close, as in 寄る (drop by). 付 means to attach or hand over. Together they mean bringing something over and handing it to someone else: a donation. Sound hook: kifu, keep few, give the rest away.
寄 — roof 宀 + strange 奇 (phonetic)
A semantic-phonetic compound: the roof radical 宀 suggests a dwelling or shelter, while 奇 (qí) supplies the sound, shifted to jì. The original sense was to lodge or stay temporarily under someone's roof, which extended to entrusting, depositing, and eventually sending or mailing things to another's care.
付 — person radical 亻 + hand 寸
付 originally pictured a hand (寸) reaching out to hand something to a person (亻), depicting the act of giving or delivering. The core sense 'to hand over, deliver, pay' has remained stable since ancient bronze inscriptions. It also serves as a phonetic component in characters like 附, 符, and 府.