餅? RTK #2802

Last edited by bodhisamaya (2008 November 03, 5:23 pm)

Oldest to newest, left to right.

The oldest of the above characters is the one on the far left.  The 幷 on the right side was then combined to become 并 and make the middle character.  After that the 食 was simplified in a number of other characters.  Eventually, this change made it back to form the kanji on the right.

Because the old, 9 stroke 食 in the left side doesn't appear in the 常用 kanji, all of the 常用 kanji have the 8 stroke version listed as the main entry and the 9 stoke version listed as an alternate version in modern kanji dictionaries; however, many, if not most, non-常用 kanji have the 9 stoke version listed as the main entry, and the 8 stroke version listed as an alternative.

In practice, both the version in the middle (15 stroke) and one on the right (14 stroke) are widely used.  It doesn't matter which as along as it's used consistently throughout the work.

Sometimes, you'll actually see the newer 食 used with the older 幷, but it's not terribly common.

Last edited by Nathanael (2008 November 03, 7:08 pm)

The first time I came across 灯, it was in a book published only about 40 years ago and it was written 燈.