Glyph origins and meaning of 敢
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「敢」 (Baxter-Sagart OC: /*[k]ˤamʔ/, to hunt and pursue > to eagerly advance and push forward > brave) was originally a picture of two hands 「廾」 fighting a wild pig 「豕」 with a hunting weapon that looked like 「干」 (/*[k]ˁar/) or 「單」 (/*Cə.tˤar/), which may have simultaneously hinted at the sound. One of the hands was sometimes removed to leave behind a single hand 「又」.

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Later on, the weapon was corrupted into a sound hint 「甘」 (/*[k]ˤ[a]m/).

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Another weapon was added back to the hand to form 「攴・攵」, then the pig 「豕」 and the sound hint 「甘」 were corrupted and merged together, forming the left hand side of 「敢」.



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》

中華語文知識庫


漢字源流