Easily Confused Chinese Characters

[taijidan]

Does anyone know any good list of Easily Confused Chinese Characters. (Simplified Chinese)

I saw wiktionary has a list, but it doesn't look that extensive:

http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Appendix:Easily_confused_Chinese_characters

I am sure I once came across a good list somewhere on the net, but can't remember where.

[ma3zi1]

well I would definitely add：

傅 傳

裏 裹

載 戴

[skylee]

戌 (xu4)

戍 (shu4)

戊 (wu4)

Here's how to remember them (I learnt it from my mom) - 橫戌點戍戊中空

PS - oh they are already on the list at #1

[aristotle1990]

I've pointed this out before, but I still confuse 宏 庞 宠

[liuzhou]

They all confuse me!

[Gharial]

Confusibles are surely a personal thing - I mean, a lot of the so-called confusibles mentioned in that Wiki article are only confused due to poor materials, and taking things to an extreme, one could agonize over the difference between items as simple as 土 versus 士 (see e.g. Hoenig's book). That being said, some of the examples in this thread might be a bit tricky!

[taijidan]

I found this : http://www.cantonese.sheik.co.uk/scripts/similarchars.htm

[T-revor]

http://www.zein.se/patrick/3000char.html

From the site:

"Curly brackets "{...}" are mostly used when giving references to characters that are similar to the listed ones either in shape. This is to help you avoid miswriting/misreading. The same marking is also used for references to characters with similar meaning but different pronunciation."

[skylee]

祇 (one dot on the left)　祗 (one dot on the left, one dot/horizontal at the bottom on the right)　衹 (two dots on the left)

Yesterday I had a discussion with a colleague about these three words and we got ourselves hopelessly confused (because of the overlapping meanings and pronunciations). Here is my attempt to make them clear(er) ...

祇 (one dot on the left, radical 示) -

pronunciation 1 - qi2; meaning 1 - an earthly god as in 神祇, 祇園 as in the one in Kyoto

pronunciation 2 - zhi1; meaning 2 - 正、恰、只 (only, but, as variant of 只)

祗 (one dot on the left, one dot/horizontal at the bottom on the right, radical 示) -

pronunciation 1 - zhi1; meaning 1 - respectfully

pronunciation 1 - zhi1; meaning 2 - 適﹑僅﹑只

衹 (two dots on the left, radical 衣) -

pronunciation 1 - qi2; meaning 1 - a monk's cassock (尼法衣)

pronunciation 2 - zhi1; meaning 2 - 但、正好; 同「祇」 (but, only)

And 祇 and 祗 are each other's variant. And 衹 is the same as (同) 祇 in meaning 2, making them all the same under some circumstances ...

Better?

PS - when I said one/two dot(s) on the left, actually I meant one/two dot(s) between the two parts ...

[Guest realmayo]

I felt a bit stupid today because I read 例外 as 到处 and, once my brain had got it wrong, it took a long time admit its mistake. I don't think I'd confuse either of these in isolation, at least not for more than a moment.

[aristotle1990]

Here's another pair: 辛 and 幸. What I hate about these little bastards is that they look alike and sound alike but have completely opposite meanings (compare 辛苦 and 幸事).

[renzhe]

I remember confusing 体 and 休, to the point of looking up 休色 in a dictionary and not noticing my mistake after re-reading it 10 times. Only happened once, though

[jbradfor]

I remember confusing 体 and 休

Evidence for the superiority of traditional characters?

[renzhe]

How do you write 木 and 本 in traditional, then?

[889]

Take a look at 常用汉字辨析 (1985). It's got a comprehensive section, some 100 pages long, titled “辨形”， broken into 3 chapters: “形似字”，“容易写错的字”，and “异体字”。

http://book.kongfz.com/10074/104994303/

[anonymoose]

I'm not sure what the deal is with 粘 and 黏.

According to my dictionaries, 粘 is zhān and 黏 is nián, but it seems that most people, in my experience, read both as nián. Is nián a legitimate reading of 粘? At least Sougou IME also gives 粘 as an option for nián.

[889]

Wenlin says:

"Sometimes 粘 is used as the simple form of 黏 nián 'sticky'; in fact, the 汉字正字手册 says that this is correct. But some dictionaries differentiate between 粘 and 黏, including 频率词典."

What's interesting as an aside is the apparent disagreement; I'd always thought there was an official, unified line on character simplification.

[jbradfor]

How do you write 木 and 本 in traditional, then?

Ummm, 木 and 豊?

[imron]

The Guifan dictionary that comes with Pleco has this to say:

黏 nián 形容能把一种东西粘（zhān）连在另一种东西上的性质。*1955年《第一批异体字整理表》将“黏”作为“粘”的异体字予以淘汰。1985年《普通话异读词审音表》审定“粘”读zhān，1988年《现代汉语通用字表》确认“黏”为规范字，表示以上意义；“粘”不再表示这个意义。

[Glenn]

What does that mean, exactly? That 黏 nián is like "viscous" and 粘 zhān is like "sticky"? These two never sat right with me either, since initially I thought they formed a trad-simp pair.