者

There are several theories about its origin:

Traditionally it is explained as a pictograph of stacked wood being burned, and regarded as the original form of 煮 (to boil, cook).

Another view interprets it as representing sugarcane: the upper part 耂 depicts sugarcane stalks, and the lower part 日 is derived from mouth (口 → 曰 → 日).

Originally it carried the meaning “to cook, to boil.” The sense of “person, one who …” is a later loan usage.

Common compounds / usage:

독자 (讀者) – reader (“the one who reads”)

기자 (記者) – journalist (“the one who records”)

학자 (學者) – scholar (“the one who studies”)

자 (者) as suffix, person, agent marker (similar to “-er” in English)

The gloss “놈” (“fellow, person”) comes from the fact that in older Korean usage 놈 was not derogatory, but a neutral word for “person.”

In Classical Chinese and Korean usage, 者 functions as a suffix or bound noun:

South Jeolla dialect example: 南原有梁生者 – “In Namwon, there was a person named Yang-saeng.”

It can also mean “the one who …, that which …”:

出乎爾者反乎爾 – “What comes from you returns to you.”

此者不當爲者也 – “This is something that ought not to be done.”

It may also appear after a noun to emphasize the subject.

Note: The “자” in 男子 (man) and 女子 (woman) is not this 者, but 子 (child, son). Historically, 男子 and 女子 literally meant “male child” and “female child.”

In Korean hanja and occasionally in Japanese and Vietnamese, an additional 丶 stroke is written at the bottom right corner of 耂 above 日, which is the historical form found in the Kangxi dictionary. In other regions, the additional 丶 stroke has been omitted.

In Unicode, the dotted and undotted forms are unified under the same code point. By contrast, some characters such as 緒 (U+7DD2, no dot) and 緖 (U+7DD6, with dot) retain separate code points.

U+FAB2: Alternative form used in North Korea without additional 丶 stroke below 耂.

U+FA5B: Japanese kyūjitai with additional 丶 stroke below 耂.

U+2F97A: Variant traditional form used in Taiwan with additional 丶 stroke below 耂.