敗
- to be defeated, to lose, to fail;
- to collapse, to decay, to spoil;
Etymology
Originally a compound:
鼎 (sacrificial cauldron) – semantic element, representing a valuable vessel or object;
攴 (to strike, to beat) – semantic, indicating an act of force or breaking.
The original image conveyed breaking or overturning a cauldron, symbolizing ruin or defeat.
Later, 鼎 was simplified to 貝 (shell, money), creating the present form. Because 貝 commonly serves as a phonetic element, modern analysis often treats the character as a phono-semantic compound:
攴 – semantic (to strike, to break, destruction);
貝 – phonetic (pài) and symbolic of value or goods, easily tied to the notion of loss.
Semantic range:
- to lose, to be defeated in battle or contest;
- to fail, collapse, break down;
- to decay, rot, spoil (food, fabric, etc.);
- by extension: defeat, failure, ruin.
Usage in Korean
The modern sense focuses on “to be defeated, to fail,” though remnants of the older causative meaning appear in historical texts.
敗北 (패북) – defeat, to lose a battle
失敗 (실패) – failure
敗壞 (패괴) – corruption, moral ruin
敗亡 (패망) – collapse, downfall
潰敗 (궤패) – rout, crushing defeat
Additional notes
In Classical Chinese, 敗 was a polyphonic character:
p- (voiceless) reading: transitive, to defeat, to destroy.
b- (voiced) reading: intransitive, to be defeated, to collapse.
Over time, the transitive meaning largely disappeared, leaving the intransitive sense dominant. For example:
《左傳》: 公敗宋師於菅 (“The duke defeated the Song army at Guan”) – transitive usage.