CJK character 宊

It can represent 突 (“emerge suddenly”) or 家 (“home”).

The earliest named record of the word is in 方言, a Western Han work about regional speech attributed to Yang Xiong. It records a Jiang-Xiang expression for suddenly meeting or appearing; that attests the word, not this exact written shape.

The character dictionaries 龍龕手鑑 (997) and 廣韻 (1008) gloss 宊 as 出貌, “the appearance of coming out,” and connect it to 突. Another branch of the historical dictionary tradition links it with 家, the word for home. In form, 宊 combines the roof component 宀 with 犬; 突 has 穴 (“cave”) above 犬.

When should I use 宊 instead of 突 or 家?

Use 宊 when preserving a source spelling or deliberately using the variant.

A Chinese character-variant dictionary records both links and gives 宊 the Mandarin reading associated with 突 in one entry and with 家 in another. The glyph alone does not tell a reader which word you intend.

In ordinary modern writing, use 突 for sudden emergence or breaking through, and 家 for home, household, or family. Keeping 宊 can preserve an old source's spelling, but a message without context may leave the reader unsure.