■ radical
zhèn
the royal "we"
How it’s built
Originally depicted two hands (廾) holding an object (丨) to patch up a hole in a boat (舟), representing the meaning "seam; crack". Since cracks in bones were used for fortune-telling in ancient China, the meaning shifted later to "omen; sign" and "sovereign".
Through the ages
Appears in
Characters that use 朕 as a component, most common first.