Character-loaning and pictophoneticization are major phases in the history of the Chinese language, through which the Chinese characters obtain the sound-indicating feature. Pictophoneticization occurs after the character loaning phase. Xu Shen’s viewpoint on character-loaning differs from our present theory. The ancients do not avoid meaning link when they loan a character to express an abstract word. Therefore’in archaic Chinese original character and its bred one are usually interchangeable when expressing the same word. In pictophonetic characters there’s one element indicating both sound and meaning. Characters sharing the same sound-element often connect closely in meaning or motivation. It is of great importance to realize this fact of pictophonetic-characters.
