Origin

This character combines wood (木) on the left, which indicates the character refers to something made of wood, with a sound component (闌) on the right that hints at how to pronounce it — roughly "ran." Together they create a character for wooden structures like handrails, railings, or the wooden frames that form columns in buildings. The wood radical makes sense because traditional railings and column dividers were naturally built from wood. Over time, the meaning expanded to include any kind of dividing space or blank area, perhaps because railings and columns divide rooms into sections.

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