The story of 活

live, alive

活 is composed of the BuShou of 水(water) and 舌. 舌 in there is actually the simplified combination of 氏(surname) and 口(mouth), 氏 depicts a bowing man, which has the meaning of lowering, our mouth will be bigger if we lower it(chin). Mouth widely and speak next to the ears of the other people, they must feel noisy. Annotation: The combination of 氏(surname) and 口(mouth) is an old HanZi, now it is no longer used, Shuowen Jiezi(說文解字) said this word means ‘stuffed mouth’, it is wrong.