髮

Specifically refers to human head hair. Frequently appears in contexts of aging and grief (e.g., white hair) or ritual and social status regarding the cutting or binding of hair.

Maintains a sharp distinction from 毛 (body hair, animal fur, or feathers). The use of 髮 to describe animals is rare and typically intentional, such as in cases of anthropomorphism.

Simplified variant: U+53D1. Functionally and orthographically interchangeable with 發; the more general 發 is frequently used to denote head hair, omitting the semantic radical (髟) for brevity.

Due to phonetic identity, this glyph is frequently substituted in manuscripts for 發 in its verbal senses ("to send," "to emit," "to shoot," or "to begin"). If a literal translation of "hair" produces a nonsense sentence, test these verbal meanings.