■ radical

yuán

employee

How it’s built

Depicts the round opening (口) of a cooking pot (鼎). Based on the original meaning "round", now written as 圓. The current meaning is a phonetic loan.

iconic

mouth — Depicts the round opening of a cooking pot.

iconic

ancient cooking pot — 貝 is used here as an abbreviation of 鼎, a cooking pot.

Through the ages

Oracle bone script

Bronze script

Seal script

Appears in

Characters that use 員 as a component, most common first.