布

布 (radical 50, 巾+2, 5 strokes, cangjie input 大中月 (KLB), four-corner 4022₇, composition ⿸𠂇巾)

• KangXi: page 328, character 6
• Dai Kanwa Jiten: character 8778
• Dae Jaweon: page 633, character 2
• Hanyu Da Zidian: volume 1, page 728, character 5
• Unihan data for U+5E03

Historical forms of the character 布
Western Zhou	Warring States	Shuowen Jiezi (compiled in Han)	Liushutong (compiled in Ming)
Bronze inscriptions	Chu Slip and silk script	Small seal script	Transcribed ancient scripts

Phono-semantic compound (形聲, OC *paːs) : phonetic 父 (OC *paʔ, *baʔ) + semantic 巾.

"to spread out" (tr.)

Likely from Proto-Sino-Tibetan. Schuessler (2007) considers this sense to be cognate with:

• 博 (OC pâk), 博 (OC phâʔ), 敷 (OC pha), & 甫 (OC paʔ); as well as
• outside Sinitic, with Proto-Kuki-Chin *phaʔ, whence Mizo phah (“spread (as cloth, etc), to place flat on the ground”), Lai phaʔ (“spread out cloth”), Tedim Chin phaʔ³ (“spread a flat object”), Thado Chin phàa, phàt (“spread out cloth”) 

"cloth"

"Cloth" is often thought to be the same etymon as "to spread (out)" (tr.). Alternatively, Schuessler thinks this sense's Austroasiatic origin more likely. Indeed, a late Han (漢) dynasty's word for "cotton", 幏布 *ka^(H)-puo^H (Shuowen, Hou Hanshu), was borrowed from the Austroasiatic-speaking Man-Yi peoples, and a Sanskrit loan (c. 430 CE) into Northwestern dialect is 古貝 *ko^X-pei^H. Compare Proto-Austroasiatic *k-rn-pas and Proto-Mon-Khmer *kpaas (“cotton”), whence Khmer ក្របាស (krɑbaah), Bahnar kơpaih, Proto-Vietic *k-paːs (→ Vietnamese vải & Muong pái).

Additionally, Schuessler suggests that the Austroasiatic word was the source of Sanskrit कर्पास (karpāsa) & Ancient Greek κάρπασος (kárpasos). Still, earlier Johnson & Decker (1980) stated that "the problem of etymological origin of karpāsa has not been resolved".

布

1. cloth; textiles (Classifier: 匹; 塊／块)

   棉布  ―  miánbù  ―  cotton cloth

2. to announce; to proclaim

   宣布  ―  xuānbù  ―  to declare, to proclaim, to announce

3. to spread

   遍布  ―  biànbù  ―  to be found everywhere, to be spread all over

• → Lao: ຜ້າ (phā, “cloth”)
• → Thai: ผ้า (pâa, “cloth”)

(grade 5 “Kyōiku” kanji)

• Go-on: ふ (fu, Jōyō)
• Kan-on: ほ (ho)
• Kun: ぬの (nuno, 布, Jōyō); しく (shiku, 布く)

布 (hiragana ぬの, rōmaji nuno)

1. cloth

布 • (po) (hangeul 포)

1. This term needs a translation to English. Please help out and add a translation, then remove the text {{rfdef}}.

布: Hán Việt readings: bố (博(bác)故(cố)切(thiết))[1][2][3]
布: Nôm readings: bố[1][2], vú[1][3], bó[1], bồ[1], vó[1], múa[2], búa[3], vố[3], bô[4]

1. Nôm form of vú (“breast”).