Wu Collection, Lower Volume
Radical: Grain (hé)
Kangxi Strokes: 7
Page 849, Entry 02
Pronounced tu (falling tone). According to the Shuowen Jiezi (Explanation of Graphs and Analysis of Characters), it refers to someone with no hair. The character shape is formed by the person radical, with the top resembling the shape of a grain ear, which also provides the phonetic value. Wang Yu suggests that when Cangjie created characters, he saw a bald person lying in the grain seedlings and thus invented this character, though it is uncertain if this is accurate. Xu Kai explains that it describes a bald person whose hair is not long or thin, resembling the appearance of grain seedlings.
Guliang Zhuan (Guliang Commentary): In the first year of Duke Cheng, Ji Sunxingfu, who was bald, visited the State of Qi, and the State of Qi dispatched a bald person to act as his carriage driver.
Records of the Grand Historian (Shiji): He served an old bald man together with Zhang Ru.
It also refers to anything that has been stripped bare.
Book of the Later Han (Houhanshu): Su Wu used a bare staff to demonstrate his loyalty.
Book of the Later Han (Houhanshu): In the biography of Kong Rong, it mentions going out in secret wearing a bald (tu) scarf. The commentary notes this means wearing no head covering.
Du Fu Poetry: The pines and cypresses in the valley are bare.
Also a surname. The descendants of Zhurong had eight surnames, and Tu was one of them, as recorded in the Discourses of the States (Guoyu).
Also a compound surname. Wugu of the Tufa clan was a ruler of the Southern Liang state.
Also equivalent to the character tu. It appears in the name of the bird tuqiu.