歷

The core sense is traversal—passing through a sequence whether spatial, temporal, or conceptual.

• Spatial Traversal: To cross or travel across various points or regions; implies a journey of multiple stages rather than direct movement.
• Temporal Passage and Endurance: To live through, undergo, or endure a period of time. As a noun/attribute, it refers to the past or history (often as the process of time passing).
• Sequential Examination: To enumerate or examine items one by one.
• Experiential State: When used as an attribute for a person, denotes being seasoned or weathered.

• Transitive Verb: Typically takes a path, a duration of time, or a series of events/hardships as its object.
• Attribute: Functions as "experienced" or "seasoned."
• Noun: Refers to the calendar or annals (less common in early texts).

• Calendar Overlap: Often interchangeable with 曆 (calendar/almanac), sharing the conceptual link of an "ordered record of time passed."
• Sense of "Taking Place": Unlike a sudden event, when this glyph denotes something taking place, it suggests a process unfolding over its full course.

• Variants: Simplified variant 历 (U+5386); semantic variants U+66C6 and U+6B74.

When encountering the gloss "to take place" or "to happen," be cautious not to translate it as a discrete event; look instead for an unfolding process.