Formerly drawn as 㗊 but simplified: MANY, MANY ORIFICES, feeding many mouths, the PUBLIC paddies worked by a tribal community of females, or the public orifices of females worked by a tribal community of males (see 公). Perhaps TEN with ORIFICE to indicate that on a scale of one to ten, the orifice that rates a ten.
Meaning a FILLED ORIFICE, exactly as these elements depict: ask a coloproctologist, where can you find an always-filled orifice? to verify where, while not recommended other than in the doctor's office, immediately after defecating insert a digit or two, or three, into your anus as far as possible (without experiencing pain) and then sniff under your fingernails to verify whether that location remains a「filled orifice.」Note: if at home or the office, best practice is to perform this procedure in private, but there are some exceptions to the general rule.
PLUGGED, or BLOCKED ORIFICE of one variety or another, also TWISTING ORIFICE similar to a scorpion burrow, or a SCREWING ORIFICE of some sort (see 㚻,㚼,儡,町 as examples). Scholars explain that 'four fields' are depicted here with small, earthen dike-like walls surrounding each field to hold in standing water for most of the growing season, but why four? unfortunately, most students and scholars forget that this glyph was formerly drawn round…nevertheless, when and where on Earth have there ever been circular-shaped rice paddies?
Today meaning WET MUDDY SPOT, a place with WET SOIL, or WET NIGHT SOIL as slurry. Also refers to a RICE PADDY for those reasons, and not due to its shape (different glyphs refer to a dry field for growing other crops). Rice can only be grown over heavy, clay-rich soil that minimizes seepage into the water table, often with more than two metres of heavy, continuous clay.
The shapes of the initial rice paddies historically were not at all square, nor round. Paddies were long and thin, generally crescent-shaped and built upon terraced slopes (see 掵, 秈 and 籼), nor are paddies today partitioned into quarter sections…why would they be? see the related glyph 稻 for the original kanji meaning 'rice growing in paddies.' Nonetheless, what else is crescent-shaped and filled with fecal slurry? a buttocks crack (⻖ and 阜) perhaps?
Formerly rice paddies「twisted, turned」around the sides of slopes and hills, lining hillsides in horizontal terraces, hence the FILLED ORIFICE, lined with clay-soil walls that creates standing water filled with muck and fecal slurry as fertilizer is the key point, and these shapes twisting around a hillside resulted in a WET AREA FOR PLANTING. Actually, rice seedlings were IMPLANTED into mud by a series of methodical「bending over with plugging」actions into a「hole」formed using the fingers and hand, by committees of women and not by men.
Note that these small, earthen, dike-like walls surrounding each field to hold in standing water for most of the growing season all have a hole, an orifice, built into the dike wall to allow both filling or drainage of the field at the proper time (see 畎), so the meaning of PLUGGED ORIFICE, WET ORIFICE is integral to the cause, formation, and successful use of any rice paddy—not its shape—early rice paddies were not square and were not constructed on flat ground. Rice paddies were fertilized with WET NIGHT SOIL collected from humans and other animals, formed into a slurry and then flung about the paddy.
Needless to point out perhaps is that this glyph contains four orifices that are adjacent, and the glyph commonly used today to mean「four」(四) is comprised of「copulation within orifice.」…all just coincidence, to be sure they say. From time immemorial before the beginning, humans have collected feces and used it as fertilizer. Still today, researchers are working on finding solutions for problems facing humanity. It is not only feces that are an excellent fertilizer. Urine works, too! "Innovative system turns human waste into sustainable fertilizer: Stanford researchers have developed a prototype that harnesses urine to generate valuable fertilizer, offering solutions for sanitation and energy in resource-limited regions."
[ https://news.stanford.edu/stories/2025/08/prototype-urine-human-waste-fertilizer-sustainable-energy-research/ 2025-08-21 ]

External source definitions …excluding politically incorrect concepts and other meanings deemed offensive today; may include extended definitions, euphemisms, and mnemonics)
Chinese: field; farm
Japanese EDRDG: rice field, rice paddy
Unihan extended: field, arable land, cultivated

Used within names (nanori)
いなか　･　おか　･　たん　･　で　･　とう　･　や