一切經音義 11.93

11.93

猫兔（上莫包反江外吳音以為苗字今不取字統云狩名也顧野王云似虎而小人家畜養令捕鼠正體從𮙥音雉苗聲也經從犬省略也說文闕此字下土固反顧野王云兔毛可以為筆者說文狩名也象踞後點象其尾兔頭與象頭同故兔字從象省）。

Cats and rabbits: the upper character has the fanqie *mo* + *bao*. The Wu dialect south of the Yangtze River takes it as the character 苗, which is not adopted here. The *Zitong* states: 'The name of a beast.' Gu Yewang states: 'It resembles a tiger but is smaller; people domesticate and raise it to catch mice.' Its standard graph is written with 𮙥 (pronounced *zhi*) and 苗 as phonetic. The sūtra text writes it with the dog radical, which is an abbreviated form. The *Shuowen* lacks this character. The lower character has the fanqie *tu* + *gu*. Gu Yewang states: 'Rabbit fur can be used to make writing brushes.' The *Shuowen* states: 'The name of a beast. It depicts [the animal] crouching; the trailing dot depicts its tail. A rabbit’s head is the same as an elephant’s head, therefore the character 兔 has a reduced form of the elephant graph (象).'