In academia, the parts outside the definitions in phonetic-semantic reference books are ambiguously termed, referred to as “revealed characters”, “word entries”, “lexical entries”, or “character entries”. Based on the meticulously revised Japanese manuscript of “Xuan Ying’s Phonetic-Semantic Explanations”, this paper conducts a comprehensive study on the origins of these parts, their relationship with the explanations, and their functions. It is discovered that this content not only originates from the scriptures but also from related prefaces or accompanying annotations. Their primary function is to “locate” and “identify the explained words”. Hence, they are termed as “label entries”. The function of the labels in “Xuan Ying’s Phonetic-Semantic Explanations” is to indicate the position of the interpreted terms in the scripture, and they do not form a relationship of interpretation and being interpreted with the exegesis as a whole.

‘豪𢜶 Haosao’ is a dialect word widely used in Wu dialect areas. It means ‘to be quick or hurry’ and, by extension, ‘straightforward; comfortably’. The original word of that should be ‘𠢕趮 haozao’, which is a near-synonymy compound word. The commonly used Korean adverb of ‘어서 (eoseo)’ has the meaning of ‘to be quick or hurry up’ instead of ‘please’ as an interjection. ‘豪𢜶 (haosao)’ and ‘어서 (eoseo)’ correspond in terms of both sound and meaning. It is possible that the latter was borrowed from Wu dialect. During the Southern, Sui, and Tang Dynasties, the regions of Jiangsu and Zhejiang had frequent exchanges with Baekje and Silla. It is likely that ‘ 豪 𢜶 (haosao)’ was introduced to the Korean Peninsula during that period. Whether ‘어서’ has something to do with ‘豪𢜶’ or not is still worthy of further studies.