Mnemonic or Glyph Origin for 御
「御」 originally meant to operate or manage/control, then extended to mean the adjective imperial.


  The meaning to drive a carriage is specifically held by the character 「馭」; when 「御」 is used for this meaning, it is a rebus of 「馭」.




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「御」 (to operate/manage) originally depicted a kneeling person 「卩」 using (operating) a pestle 「午」.


  Pestle is now written as the derivative character 「杵」.


Later on, two verb-like markers were added:


「彳」 (half of the character 「行」, picture of a road intersection > roads, travelling)

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「止」 (picture of a foot > walking). This leads on to the modern form 「御」.

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References:


季旭昇《說文新證》
小學堂
國學大師


郭沫若《甲骨文合集》
中國社會科學院考古研究所《殷周金文集成》