Han character 苢

苢 is a variant form of 苡 in an old plant name.

In 芣苢, 苢 names plantain (車前). The Shijing, a classical Chinese poetry collection, has a song about gathering, picking, and bundling it.

The Shuowen Jiezi, an early Chinese character dictionary, calls the plant 馬舄 and links its fruit with fertility; it also records 苡 as written 苢. The Shijing text uses 芣苢, with 苡 noted as a variant reading. The plant names differ by compound: 芣苢 names plantain, while 薏苡 names Job's tears.

Why does 苢 look different across devices?

The font supplies the character's visible form.

苢 is a Han text character, so its shape comes from the font used to display it. A font without this glyph may show an empty box or a fallback mark; the character itself remains 苢.