母 starts exactly like 女, the kneeling woman, but the scribes added two small marks over her chest. Those two dots stand for breasts — the sign of a woman nursing a child. Two extra strokes were enough to turn "woman" into "mother", the one who feeds and raises the next generation.
A piece of culture
Mencius's mother moved three times The philosopher Mencius owed his education to his mother. Legend says she moved house three times while he was young — away from a cemetery, away from a noisy market, and finally next to a school — until her son began imitating scholars instead of mourners or merchants. The story, 孟母三迁 ("Mencius's mother, three moves"), is still told today to praise parents who sacrifice for their child's upbringing.