南 | nán

In Mandarin Chinese, 南 (Pinyin: nán 🔊) means “south” or “southern”. The compound words containing 南 include

• 南 + 北 = 南北 (nánběi): distance from north to south; latitude span
• 南 + 山 = 南山 (Nánshān): Nanshan, a common placename
• 江 + 南 = 江南 (Jiāngnán): literally, “south of the river”; in particular,
  1. Jiangnan (Keang-nan), a geographic area in China referring to lands immediately to the south of the lower reaches of the Yangtze River
  2. Gangnam, a district of Seoul, immortalised in the hit single Gangnam Style
• 天 + 南 + 星 = 天南星 (tiānnánxīng): rhizome of the Arisaema (an herb used in traditional Chinese medicine.)

According to Wiktionary,

This character has been explained as a pictogram of a hanging percussion instrument, originally identical to the left side of 殼. Under this hypothesis its borrowing for the word “south” is difficult to explain.

Sagart (1988) instead proposes that it is a pictogram of the front of a house. Archaeological evidence confirms that in antiquity, at least in some regions, houses were built to face south.

And we’ve also seen that “north” referred to the back (of the house or otherwise). Lawrence J. Howell writes in his Etymological Dictionary of Han/Chinese Characters:

The relevant oracle bone form of this character is a depiction of a hut or small storehouse. However, a seal inscription form is 屮 grass shoot + an element combining 冂 boundary/enclosure and an inverted 入 pierced by two horizontal lines, suggesting sprouts placed inside a hothouse for cultivation → south (← direction associated with warmth, which hothouses were positioned to face).

More photos related to south and sea glass @ Shutterstock.