Taxonomy of meanings for 段:　　

Additional information about 段

說文解字: 【段】，椎物也。从殳、耑省聲。 【徒玩切】

Criteria
• HAMMER
  

  1. Duàn 鍛 refers to the forging, and also to some kind of implement used in forging metal; probably mentioned already in SHIJING. According to some opinions, it can also refer to an anvil or to a whetstone. It should be noted that evidence for both duàn 鍛 and duàn 段 is rather slight, and it is quite difficult to establish to what kind of implement these words actually refers. From the fact that the implement could be used to forge metal we can deduce that its head was made of some kind of hard material; perhaps stone in archaic times. Duàn 段 is another way of writing duàn 鍛; according to the KAOGONGJI chapter of the ZHOULI, it was used in forging metal.

  2. Chuí 椎 refers to the mallet which was used to beat something. According to WANG (1993: 230) it was originally the wooden stick with one very thick end; but it seems that at least in the Han period the word can refer to the mallet with metal head which was also used as a weapon at the time.

  3. Chuí 錘 refers to the sledge-hammer, perhaps mostly with a metal (iron) head. The word originally referred to the weight, and only later the term began to be used for a hammer (the oldest evidence I have found is from the Eastern Han). It can also refer to the same kind of weapon like chuí 椎.

  4. Chuí 鎚 refers to the hammer, mostly with an iron head, and it seems to be the term prededing chuí 錘.

  5. Chuí 槌 refers to the beating by the use of a mallet-like object, and also to the mallet (perhaps made of wood??); it mainly refers to the mallet to beat drums.

  6. Chuí 棰 refers to the mallet or to the stick. See also BELL.

  7. Yōu 耰 refers to a wooden mallet used to break pieces of earth. This implement is relatively often referred to in the texts of the Chunqiu and Warring States period. It is not known from archaeological finds (for being made of wood), but there are pictorial presentations in hand.

  NB: It is difficult to distinguish between chuí 椎, chuí 鎚, and chuí 錘. To the hammers with iron heads known from the Warring States and Han period can be attributed any or all of these terms; but more probably the former two, since the last one seems to be later.

• FORGE
  

  1. The standard word for forging something by the use of a hammer is duàn 段／鍛.

  NB: For liàn 煉 "melt, smelt" see MELT.