The government cares for the old, widowed, orphaned, and childless.
Tips
culture
Used in 鳏夫 (widower) and 鳏寡孤独 — a classical four-part phrase for society's most vulnerable: widowers, widows, orphans, and the elderly with no children.
Left 鱼 (fish), the indexing radical. The character originally named a large fish; the 'widower' meaning was borrowed by sound, but the fish radical remained.
Right side is 眔 (an eye with falling tears), supplying the sound that drifted to guān. The weeping-eye image resonates poignantly with the lonely widower sense the character later took on.
