Amazing Chinese Characters (560) Spherical - 团（團）

The big seal script of character Spherical is

The inside 

is character Specialty, original meaning is a hand (bottom) holds a spindle for spinning). 
The outside is big box holding the spindle, which is spherical shape.
The small seal script of character Spherical is

Similar to shell bone script.
The clerical script of the character is

Some similarity to small seal script, the difference is that the lines in small seal script are rounded, but straight in clerical script.
The traditional song typeface of character Spherical is

Same as clerical script.
The simplified song typeface of character Spherical is

The inside is character 才 – Talent, very strange replacement for 專. It is not only no similarity on the appearance, but not in the meaning too, just reduced the number of strokes. It is bad simplification.
 The pinyin of the character is Tuan2.

Amazing Chinese Characters（559) Village - 屯

 The shell bone script of character village is

A seed is seedling, the top is the sprout, the bottom is the new root. The original meaning of the character is seedling. 

The bronze script of the character is

The sprout on the top with a black dot, which is an indicator to show the emphasizing area: the top of sprout (not the root, not the side sprout), the most exuberant one. 

The big seal script of the character is

Very similar to bronze script.

The small seal script of the character is

Similar to bronze and big seal scripts except the horizontal line on the top, which is from the dot of the bronze or big seal script because there is no dot in small seal script, all dots are lines, vertical or horizontal.

The clerical script of the character is

Similar to small seal script.

The pinyin of the character is Tun2.

The meaning of the character changed to village, maybe due to the fact that the seedling is only popular in village.

There is another character Village - 乡（鄉）,  which is much bigger area of countryside, may include many villages, also is the standard term for village used nationwide. The character 屯 is only used in some area of northern China, not used in southern China.

Amazing Chinese Characters (558) Specialty - 专（專）

 The bronze script of character Specialty is

The top is a spindle, the bottom is a hand. Ancient people make textile linen with spinning spindle, which is a specialty, a very skillful job.

The big seal script of character Specialty is

Similar to bronze script.

The small seal script of character Specialty is

Similar to big seal script except the bottom part with extra horizontal short line, but still means Hand.

The clerical script of character Specialty is

The top is similar to older scripts, the bottom is character Inch -  寸, original means Hand.

The traditional song typeface is

Same as the clerical script.

The simplified song typeface is

It is from cursive script, completely lost the original pictography of the character.

The Pinyin of the character is Zhuan1.

Amazing Chinese Characters (557) At that time or Pawn - 当（當）

 The big seal script of character At that time or Pawn is

The top is character Still - 尚（Post 556), the bottom is character Rice Field - 田（Post 3). The character has multiple meanings: 1, At that time; 2, Should, Serve as, etc; 3, Pawn, Equal, etc.

The second category means following the rules of person behavior; the third category means following the rules when trading or pawning rice field. How is first one related to the original meaning of character is unknown.

The small seal script of the character is

Similar to big seal script.

The clerical script of the character is

Similar to older scripts.

The traditional song typeface is

Same as clerical script.

The simplified song typeface is

Which is from cursive script, The cursive script of the character is

but simplified further, totally lost the the pictography.

The pinyin of the character is Dang1.

Why do it have unrelated meanings? I just guess that the character was added an extra meaning at very early time when there were not enough characters available to be used.

Amazing Chinese Characters (556) Still - 尚 (尙）

 The bronze script of character Still is

The top is character Eight - 八（Post 156), which means Divide, here it means details. The middle 门 alike means big house or building. The bottom is character Mouth - 口, which means "Door" here. Why is not Mouth? because we discussed character Direction - 向 (Post 415), which means a house with a door. The character Still here is formed with 八 (the top) and 向 (the bottom). Here 八 - Divide means making the hall wider and bigger. Therefore, this character means very big hall. 

I think that in the ancient time, 尚 is a big building or palace where King and top minsters discussed policies, and rules. They issued some new rules, which are ready to execute but not yet. 

The big seal script of character Still is

Similar to bronze script.

The small seal script of character Still is

The top changed from 八 to 小, I don't know why. It is baseless to me. The bottom is similar to older scripts.

The clerical script of character Still is

Similar to small seal script.

The Pinyin of character Still is Shang4.

The character now means Still, Yet, something should happen but not happened yet, highly possible will happen. I don't know why it changed to that meaning.

The simplified character is 尚, however, there is another one 尙 in traditional song typeface with same meaning. Simplification eliminated the 尙, which is good.

Amazing Chinese Characters (555) Browse - 览（覽）

 The big seal script of character Browse is

The top left is character Minister, actually a big eye. The top right is a person bent his back to watch downward (See character Facing, Post 422). The right bottom is character Utensil (Post 144) with a dot in it, which is something such as food.

The bottom part of the character is character Meet (Post 201), emphasizing the character meaning of Looking At. 

The small seal script of character Browse is 

Similar to the big seal script with the top right changed a lot

The clerical script of character Browse is

Similar to small seal script except the top right which is changed too much to be similar to that in small seal script.

The traditional song typeface of the character is

Almost same as the clerical script.

The simplified song typeface of the character is

All changed, no pictography exist anymore.

The Pinyin of the character is Lan3.

 

Amazing Chinese Characters (554) Everyone Agrees - 佥（僉）

  The big seal script of character Everyone Agrees is

The top triangle is mouth downward, under which are two people with mouth on top. The meaning of the character is that two or more people are discussing something, eventually they get consensus. The top mouth expresses the final consensus, which is not just everyone, but something everyone agrees.

The small seal script of character Everyone Agrees is

Similar to the big seal script.

The clerical script of character Everyone Agrees is

The two people in the bottom are changed a little bit, overall it is similar to older scripts.

The traditional song typeface of the character is

Similar to clerical script.

The simplified song typeface of the character is

The top is same as older scripts, but the bottom changed completely. How is it changed? I don't know, probably from its cursive script.

The pinyin of character 僉/佥 is Qian1.

The character has not been used as a single character in the text long time ago, but used as a part in many compound characters. The meanings except Consensus, are more, but overall is to make things smaller, neater, clearer, more order physically or mentally. 

Amazing Chinese Characters (553) Elder Brother - 兄

 The big seal script of character Elder Brother is

The top is character Mouth, under which is a person: One person speaks. In 3500+ years ancient time, among the brothers, only the elder brother was the first one who was acknowledged by community when he was 20 years old, he was granted an official name, he could vote, and took responsibility. Even he was not 20, he was the only one who could talk to visitors when parents were not at home.

The bronze script of character Elder Brother is

Similar to the shell bone script.

The small seal script of the character is

The bottom is changed to separated two legs.

The clerical script of character Elder Brother is

The bottom is character Child. The bottom of older scripts are character Person who normally is adult because in the ancient time, the adults could vote, take actions, have responsibility. The difference between elder brother and younger brother was great. As time passed, the difference is not so great in adults, only when they are children in a family.

The pinyin of the character is Xiong1.

Amazing Chinese Characters (552) - Tree - 树（樹）

 The big seal script of character Tree is

The left is character Drum even though not exactly same, the right part is a hand. The hand holds a big Drum vertically

The small seal script of character Tree is

The left is Wood Radical, here means tree. To set up a big drum against a big tree is the first thing for a big show or celebration ceremony. In 3500+ years ago, big gathering could only be held outside, no big building could hold many people. Probably, every time, the drum was set up against the big tree, gradually the drum and tree are tied together. Tree is always there, but drum is not. the character then is used to present the tree much more than the drum, eventually, it just means tree.

The clerical script of character Tree is

Similar to small seal script.

The song typeface of traditional character is

Same as clerical script.

The song typeface of simplified character is

The middle is changed to 又（character Again), not a drum any more. I don't know the reason for this change, it seems unreasonable simplification. 

The Pinyin of character Tree is Shu4.

Amazing Chinese Characters (551) Drum - 壴

 The shell bone script of character Drum is

or 

This is a side view of a drum, the drum faces are toward to side, not on the top. 

The top three are formed by character Ox (on the higher image), and the drum and support on the bottom. Many people believe that the character Ox indicates that the drum face is made from Ox skin. The lower image doesn't have full character Ox, only the top part of character Ox, people believe that it is a decoration of an ox head.

The bronze script of the character is

Similar to shell bone script.

The small seal script of the character is

Some similarity to old scripts.

The character as Drum discontinued to be used, probably sometime in Qin Dynasty or earlier because there is no clerical script of the character, which means that the character was not used in Han Dynasty (right after Qin Dynasty).

Another character Drum - 鼓 (Post 138) has replaced the one in this post. The simplified Chinese has removed it, only traditional Chinese still keeps it. But it exists in many compound characters, such as 鼓, the one replaced it.

Its Pinyin is Shu4.