duān

old variant of 端[duan1]

start; origin

standing upright (立) + sound (耑) = a proper, upright start

立 anchors the meaning: something upright, properly established, at its starting point. 耑 mainly contributes the sound duān and does not add semantic weight here.

+
Standing uprightSemantic
An older character with its own historyPhonetic

事情的起还不清楚。

shì qíng de qǐ duān hái bù qīng chǔ。

The start of the matter is still not clear.

这场争论的发很难找到。

zhè chǎng zhēng lùn de fā duān hěn nán zhǎo dào。

The origin of this debate is very hard to find.

Words with 端

连锅端

lián guō duān

to take even the cooking pots (idiom)

远端

yuǎn duān

the far end (of an object)

远端工作

yuǎn duān gōng zuò

to telecommute; to work remotely

远端胞浆

yuǎn duān bāo jiāng

distal cytoplasm

远端转移

yuǎn duān zhuǎn yí

metastasis

衅端

xìn duān

pretext for a dispute

钩端螺旋体病

gōu duān luó xuán tǐ bìng

leptospirosis

开端

kāi duān

start

云端

yún duān

high in the clouds

顶端

dǐng duān

summit; peak

首鼠两端

shǒu shǔ liǎng duān

(idiom) to hesitate

高端

gāo duān

high-end

More characters with 立