歐

Phono-semantic compound:

欠 (yawn, breath, voice) – semantic, related to actions of the mouth and chest (breathing, vomiting, exhaling, striking sounds).

區 (to divide, area “gu”) – phonetic element.

Originally carried the sense of “strike, beat.” Later borrowed as a phonetic element in transliteration, where it came to mean “Europe.” In some contexts, shares meaning with 嘔, “to vomit.”

Semantic range:

- to strike, beat, hit;

- to retch, vomit (esp. in compound 嘔歐);

- Europe (as a transliteration in Sino-Korean, Sino-Japanese, Sino-Chinese usage).

구라파 (歐羅巴) – transliteration of “Europe” (older form in Korean).

서구권 (西歐圈) – Western Europe (lit. “Western Europe sphere”).

동구권 (東歐圈) – Eastern Europe.

구주 (歐洲) – Europe (modern standard form).

구타 (歐打) – to beat, to strike.

The Sino-Korean reading “구” comes from the phonetic element 區, diverging from the original “우.” Hence the somewhat misleading Korean transliteration 구라파 for “Europe.”

In compounds like 구타 (歐打), the older meaning “to beat” remains visible.