Amazing Chinese Characters (611) Unexpected - 兀

The shell bone script of character Unexpected is

 a person with a head top flat (not the head being cut off). A person without head is very strange, unexpected. Sometimes, people bend head very low, or hold something on shoulder, blocking the head, other people may not see the head from far or in the dark.

Let's compare it with shell bone script of character Person

The flat head may because the person is a kiln worker, kiln is not high, he has to bent low his head (see Post 612 for more information). Another possibility is that the flat is a board on head, we will see the situation in Post 612. 

The bronze script of character Unexpected is

A person with a rounded head. This one may not be character Unexpected, experts are confused. Because a person with a round head is normal.

The small seal script of character Unexpected is

A person with a flat head, the bottom is the body, even not very like.

The clerical script of character Unexpected is

The top is the flat head, the bottom is the body. 

The character original means "A flat top of head of a person", the flat top is bald (no hair). It means "Totally unexpected".

The Pinyin of the character is Wu4.

The character is not used often now. It is exist in a few compound characters.