Mei (美, beauty) is written as in oracle bone inscriptions, which resembles a man with two long decorative feathers on head. In small seal script, another form appears as , which consists of a “羊” (sheep) on a “大” (big). The two forms appear similar in strokes, however, with distinctly different stress. The former seems to indicate the impression of being decorated, while the latter emphasizes our impression on fat sheep. Finally the same meaning is indicated, that is, "beauty". The word in regular script was an evolvement from that in small seal script.
