Where does “等” come from?

等 (Japanese) comes from Japanese なんど, from Japanese 何と, from Japanese 何 — What?, Huh?; what; that thing.

等 (Japanese): et cetera; rank, class, order; et cetera, that...

Definitions

  1. et cetera; rank, class, order; et cetera, that...

Ancestry of “等”, step by step

等 traces back through two separate lines of ancestry.

via Japanese なんど

StepLanguageWordMeaning
1Japaneseなんど何度 the number of times, how often; 等 et cetera;...
2Japanese何とetc., and so forth, and such like
3Japanese何What?, Huh?; what; that thing

via Middle Chinese 等

StepLanguageWordMeaning
1Middle Chinese等—

Words derived from “等”

Every word from Japanese 何 →Every word from Japanese 何と →Every word from Japanese なんど →