削

A phono-semantic compound composed of:

刀 (knife) — semantic component, indicates the action of cutting or shaving, leading to the meaning “to pare down or remove;”

肖 — phonetic component supplying the sound (삭 / xuē or xiāo).

Semantic development:

- to cut or shave with a blade;

- to trim or pare down;

- to reduce or eliminate;

- to remove something entirely.

The meaning expanded from physical cutting to abstract reduction or removal.

In modern Korean, the character frequently appears in words related to editing, deletion, and reduction, such as 삭제 (deletion).

삭감 (削減) — reduction; cut (budget, amount)

삭제 (削除) — deletion; removal

삭발 (削髮) — shaving the head

削 emphasizes cutting away or reducing something.

Related characters:

切 — to cut

刪 — to delete

減 — to decrease

除 — to remove

The Sino-Korean reading 소 appears historically when referring to feudal land grants (寀地) but is rarely used today.