Etymograph

English

emoji

Emoji comes from Japanese 絵文字 ‘emoji: emoticons that originated in Japanese…’, from 文字 ‘a letter, a character’, and ultimately from Middle Chinese 文字.

  1. Middle Chinesec. 500–1000文字mjun dziH
  2. Japanesemodernsame formmoji‘a letter, a character’
  3. Japanese, derivedmodern絵文字emoji‘emoji: emoticons that originated in Japanese telephony’
  4. Englishearliest quotation 2002emoji

attested reconstructed ? uncertain or disputed

Lineage

  1. Middle Chinesec. 500–1000文字mjun dziH
  2. Japanesemodernsame formmoji‘a letter, a character’
  3. Japanese, derivedmodern絵文字emoji‘emoji: emoticons that originated in Japanese telephony’
  4. Englishearliest quotation 2002emoji

Earliest quotation: 2002, Language International: The Business Res, Amsterdam: John Benjamins Publishing Company: “In order to communicate quickly, many mobile phone users…”

Every English word from Middle Chinese 文字

Today it means

noun A digital graphic icon with a unique code point used to represent a concept, object, person, animal or place, originally used in Japanese text messaging but since adopted internationally in other contexts such as social media.

Language periods are conventional ranges, not dates for this word.

Etymograph / Middle Chinese 文字 / emoji

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