Origin

The character 剖 combines a knife radical on the right, which indicates this is about cutting or dividing something, with a sound component on the left that hints at the pronunciation. The knife radical makes sense for the meaning of "divide" or "split apart" — you use a blade to cut things into pieces. The left component provides the phonetic clue for how to say the character, while the right component (the knife) carries the core meaning of division and separation.

AI-generated (claude-haiku-4-5), not yet reviewed. Formation type (automated guess): Phono-semantic (meaning + sound hint).