飞 | fēi

In Mandarin Chinese, 飞 (Pinyin: fēi 🔊) is a word of many meanings. As a verb, it means “to fly”, “to flutter”, or “to evaporate”. It also could be an adjective for “fast”, “unexpected”, “unfounded”, or an adverb “very” or “extremely”.

飞 is a simplified form of the traditional hanzi 飛. If you look carefully, you’ll see that the traditional character contains two 飞 bits, one on top of the other. Uncle Hanzi writes “a flying bird with long neck and big wings” without specifying explicitly whether he refers to 飛 or 飞. I see a long neck (and a long beak) and not-so-big wings in the simplified character.

Some compounds of 飞 include

• 飞 + 天 = 飞天 (fēitiān): to fly in the sky; to travel into space
• 飞 + 星 = 飞星 (fēixīng): meteor; shooting star
• 飞 + 鸟 = 飞鸟 (fēiniǎo): flying bird
• 飞 + 鱼 = 飞鱼 (fēiyú): flying fish
• 飞 + 鼠 = 飞鼠 (fēishǔ): flying squirrel; bat
• 飞 + 虫 = 飞虫 (fēichóng): flying insect

In Japanese, 飛 is an affix that confers the meaning of flight or speed. We’ve already seen 飛 in that famous haiku:

古池や 蛙飛こむ 水の音 芭蕉 Furu ike ya kawazu tobikomu mizu no oto The old pond; A frog jumps in, — The sound of the water. Bashō (Translated by R.H. Blyth)

Here, the frog 蛙 (kawazu) not just enters こむ (komu) the water: it leaps in 飛こむ (tobikomu).

More photos related to flight, calligraphy and sea glass @ Shutterstock.

明 | míng

In Mandarin Chinese, 明 (Pinyin: míng 🔊) is a word of many meanings. As an adjective, it stands for “bright”, “brilliant”, “light”, “clear”, “transparent”, “apparent”, “open”, “acute”, “sharp”, “keen”, “intelligent”, “perceptive” and, less obviously, “next” or “following”. As a noun, it can mean “vision”, “sight” or “light”, as well as “tomorrow”. As a verb, it can mean “to understand”, “to know”, “to make known” or “to show”. As you can clearly see, these many senses are related and linked to the concept of light. Also, 明 may refer to the Ming dynasty, 明朝 (1368—1644), also referred to as “Great Ming”, 大明 (Dàmíng).

Does the character 明 look familiar to you? Of course it does: it’s a combination of our old friends 日 “sun” and 月 “moon”. According to Wiktionary, 明 could be interpreted as “the sun just rising and the moon not yet set — dawn” or, alternatively, as “two bright celestial bodies — bright”. Lawrence J. Howell writes in his Etymological Dictionary of Han/Chinese Characters:

Originally, 月 moon + 向 (ventilation hole) → bright moonlight streaming through an open window, and manifesting the hidden → brightness; light. Extended meanings from the idea of the light of dawn (signaling the end of one day and the start of the next) include spend/pass (the night); be visible; the next/following (day/week/year); begin; end; and dawn. Disclose and confide are extended senses of “open” (open up to), as are clarity; evident and obvious. Be conversant with is via the idea of illumination, here with respect to a particular subject matter.

Elsewhere, Howell consistently refers to 明 as “manifest the hidden”.

Compounds of 明 include

• 明 + 明 = 明明 (míngmíng 🔊): obviously, plainly, clearly
• 明 + 白 = 明白 (míngbai, míngbái): clear, obvious, evident; open, explicit, frank; sensible, reasonable
• 明 + 人 = 明人 (míngrén): honest and upright person
• 明 + 天 = 明天 (míngtiān 🔊): tomorrow; near future
• 天 + 明 = 天明 (tiānmíng): to break (of dawn)
• 明 + 星 = 明星 (míngxīng 🔊): celebrity, star
• 明 + 日 = 明日 (míngrì): tomorrow; (literary, figurative) future
• 明 + 月 = 明月 (míngyuè): bright moon; next month
• 月 + 明 = 月明 (yuèmíng): moonlight

It’s haiku time!

木をつみて 夜の明やすき 小窓かな 子規 ki o tsumite yo no akeyasuki komado kana the tree cut, dawn breaks early at my little window Shiki (Translated by Janine Beichman)

窓明て 蝶を見送る 野原哉 一茶 mado akete chō wo mi-okuru no hara kana opening the window I see the butterfly off... into the field Issa (Translated by David G. Lanoue)

More photos related to bright stuff, hanzi and calligraphy @ Shutterstock.

意 | yì

In Mandarin Chinese, 意 (Pinyin: yì 🔊) is a word with many meanings, one of which, by the way, is “meaning”. It also can mean “thought”, “idea”, “opinion”, “mind”, “heart”, “soul”, “conscience”, “intention”, “wish”, “desire”... Also, 意 is short for 意大利 (Yìdàlì 🔊), “Italy”.

At the base of 意 — or shall I say, at its heart? — is our old friend 心, “heart-mind”. But what’s on top? According to Wiktionary,

Modern form is a compound of 音 and 心 (“heart”). However, the top component is etymologically unrelated to 音.

Lawrence J. Howell writes in his Etymological Dictionary of Han/Chinese Characters:

As per 音 (contained) + 心 heart/emotions → keep contained in the heart (compare 念) → (deep) thought; mind; signification.

But I can’t find the meaning “contained” for 音. Instead, it has many other meanings, all ultimately related to sound, and it is pronounced yīn (🔊). So I think I can safely say that 意 is a phono-semantic compound of phonetic 音 and semantic 心.

Many compounds of 意 include

• 意 + 中 + 人 = 意中人 (yìzhōngrén): the person one has in mind, the object of one’s affections, one’s beloved
• 意 + 思 = 意思 (yìsi 🔊, yìsī): meaning, significance; interest, fun; hint, trace; opinion, view; token of appreciation; friendship, camaraderie
• 好 + 意思 = 好意思 (hǎoyìsi, hǎoyìsī): to feel no shame; to have the nerve; to dare
• 好 + 意 = 好意 (hǎoyì 🔊): good intention; kindness
• 美 + 意 = 美意 (měiyì): good intention; kindness
• 中 + 意 = 中意 (zhòngyì 🔊): to be to one’s liking; to catch the fancy of
• 生 + 意 = 生意: 1. (shēngyi): business, trade; 2. (shēngyì): vitality
• 大 + 意 = 大意 (dàyì 🔊): (n.) general idea, main points; (adj.) careless, negligent
• 天 + 意 = 天意 (tiānyì): will of heaven, God’s will, providence; will of the emperor
• 公 + 意 = 公意 (gōngyì): will of the public
• 心 + 意 = 心意 (xīnyì): feelings; intention, purpose, intent, inclination, disposition; friendly regard, affection
• 一 + 心 + 一 + 意 = 一心一意 (yīxīnyīyì): heart and soul; wholeheartedly
• 三 + 心 + 二 + 意 = 三心二意 (sānxīn'èryì): shilly-shally; half-hearted

More photos related to thought, hanzi and calligraphy @ Shutterstock.

安 | ān

In Mandarin Chinese, 安 (Pinyin: ān 🔊) has many meanings but most of them are related to the concepts of peace and security. It could be an adjective meaning “calm”, “peaceful”, “tranquil”, “quiet”, “comfortable”, “safe”, “secure”, or a verb for “to calm”, “to be content with”, “to place”, “to find a place for”, “to fit”, “to set up”, “to bring”, “to cherish”, “to harbour”. In physics, 安 is short for 安培 (ānpéi), “ampere”.

Lawrence J. Howell writes in his Etymological Dictionary of Han/Chinese Characters:

宀 roof/building + 女 woman → woman resting/at ease indoors → be at ease/peace → cheap; inexpensive (← cheap enough to be purchased with ease).

The meaning “cheap”, however, is specific for Japanese, where the word 女 (あん; an) has an additional sense in chemistry for “ammonium”. Also, according to Ponte Ryūrui,

The modern form of the hiragana character あ comes from the cursive form of the kanji 安.

Back to Chinese — many compounds of 安 include

• 安 + 心 = 安心 (ānxīn 🔊): (to be) relieved or at ease
• 安 + 好 = 安好 (ānhǎo): safe and sound
• 公 + 安 = 公安 (gōng'ān): public security (officer); police (officer)
• 天 + 安 + 门 = 天安门 (Tiān'ānmén): Tiananmen, “Gate of Heavenly Peace”.

More photos related to calmness, calligraphy and sea glass @ Shutterstock.

工 | gōng

In Mandarin Chinese, 工 (Pinyin: gōng 🔊) has a variety of meanings related to work. Apart from “work” itself, it could stand for “worker”, “working class”, “working day”, “industry”, “skill” or “project”.

According to Wiktionary, 工 is a pictogram of “a bladed tool”. What tool? Many historical forms of this character remind me of a spade or a shovel. Or maybe of an axe head — cf. 王 (which is like 工 with an extra stroke) and discussion therein. On the other hand, Lawrence J. Howell writes in his Etymological Dictionary of Han/Chinese Characters that 工 is

A depiction of a long hollow tube used as a tool both to pierce and to connect → work; construct (← work/construct using connecting pipes/tubes) → artisan; specialist; skillful.

Many compounds of 工 include

• 工 + 人 = 工人 (gōngrén 🔊): worker, labourer
• 人 + 工 = 人工 (réngōng 🔊): man-made, artificial
• 木 + 工 = 木工 (mùgōng): woodwork, carpentry; woodworker, carpenter
• 小 + 工 = 小工 (xiǎogōng): unskilled worker
• 大 + 工 = 大工 (dàgōng): (literary) skilled worker; carpenter
• 天 + 工 = 天工 (tiāngōng): (literary) work of nature

More photos related to beads, hanzi and calligraphy @ Shutterstock.

门 | mén

In Mandarin Chinese, 门 (Pinyin: mén 🔊) is a word of many meanings, all of which are ultimately derived from “gate”:

1. gate; door; entrance; opening
2. valve; switch
3. knack, way of doing something
4. school of thought
5. class, category
6. measure word used for academic subjects, courses and branches of technology

门 is a simplified form of the traditional character 門. Lawrence J. Howell in his Etymological Dictionary of Han/Chinese Characters describes 門 as a

depiction of a curving, double-doored gate, the doors adhering tightly in concealing what lies behind it.

It won’t surprise you then to know that a half of this character, 戶, means a single door.

I find the traditional character more pleasing aesthetically and easier to remember; the simplified one 门 is easier to write but it makes me think rather of a fridge door or power switch ⏻ than of the “real” gate.

The many compounds of 门 include

• 门 + 口 = 门口 (ménkǒu): entrance
• 门 + 人 = 门人 (ménrén): door guard
• 出 + 门 = 出门 (chūmén): to go out; to leave home for a far place; to get married (of a woman)
• 龙 + 门 = 龙门 (lóngmén): gateway to success; fame; glory
• 山 + 门 = 山门 (shānmén): monastery gate
• 水 + 门 = 水门 (shuǐmén): floodgate, sluice, water valve
• 玉 + 门 = 玉门 (yùmén): “jade gate” (literary, figuratively) palace; (euphemism) vulva

as well as Chinese toponyms such as

• 金 + 门 = 金门 (Jīnmén): Kinmen (Quemoy)
• 下 + 门 = 下门 (Xiàmén): Xiamen (Amoy)
• 天 + 安 + 门 = 天安门 (Tiān'ānmén): Tiananmen, “Gate of Heavenly Peace”.

And not just Chinese: for example, 水门, apart from “floodgate”, is also a literal translation of Watergate. As the back-formed suffix -gate is used in English to form the names of scandals (such as Climategate, Irangate, Nipplegate etc.), so does 门 in Chinese.

In Japanese, 門 is pronounced mon or kado. We already read a haiku by Buson featuring gates; here are some more:

埋火や 夜ふけて門を たたく音 許六 Umorebi ya yo fukete mon wo tataku oto A banked fire; It is deep night; Knocking at the gate. Kyoroku

門口に 來て凍るなり 三井の鐘 一茶 Kadoguchi ni kite kōrunari Mii no kane Reaching the gate, The bell of Mii temple Freezes. Issa (All haiku translated by R.H. Blyth)

More photos of gates, doors and sea glass @ Shutterstock.

下 | xià

In Mandarin Chinese, 下 (Pinyin: xià 🔊) has many meanings but all of them have something to do with direction “down”. Predictably enough, it looks very much like the character 上 flipped upside down.

Lawrence J. Howell writes in his Etymological Dictionary of Han/Chinese Characters:

The relevant oracle bone form of this character is a depiction of one line below another, suggesting the idea of under (contrast 上) → low; lower; below; down; subordinate; descend. Extended meanings from “down” or “below” include come/go down; fall; drop; hang (down/from); hand down; younger; have diarrhea; abort (a fetus); step/move back; withdraw; leave the capital; retire and surrender. By further extension are carry, remove and clear a table (← take down from a table); grate (← grated shavings that fall below); give and do someone the favor of (← hand ← hand down); obtain (← be handed/given); and latter half (← bottom/lower of two halves).

There are a great number of compounds of 下, for instance

• 下 + 午 = 下午 (xiàwǔ 🔊): afternoon
• 上 + 下 = 上下 (shàngxià): up and down, high and low, etc. but also in a sense “about” or “more or less”
• 上 + 上 + 下 + 下 = 上上下下 (shàngshàngxiàxià): everybody; all; the whole
• 天 + 下 = 天下 (tiānxià): everything under the sky; a lofty name of China (but of course!); an ancient Chinese concept of tianxia

I think the physics community should adopt the symbols 上 and 下 for up and down quarks instead of rather boring “u” and “d”.

More photos related to down, downward and sea glass @ Shutterstock.

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.

夏 | xià

In Mandarin Chinese, 夏 (Pinyin: xià 🔊) means “summer”. There are other, mostly obsolete, meanings of this word. Just to be sure that they are really talking about summertime, the Chinese use compounds with 季 “season”, 夏季 (xiàjì), or 天 “day”, 夏天 (xiàtiān). Some other compound words of 夏 include

• 夏 + 仲 = 仲夏 (zhòngxià): midsummer
• 夏 + 历 / 曆 = 夏历 / 夏曆 (xiàlì): Chinese calendar
• 金 + 春 + 沙 = 金夏沙 (Jīnxiàshā): purely phonetic rendering of Kinshasa (the capital of the Democratic Republic of the Congo)

With ten strokes, 夏 is the most complex hanzi of the four seasons. According to Wiktionary, it all started with

an ideogrammic compound: 日 (“sun”) + 頁 (“head; man”) — man under the scorching sun; summer.

A number of modifications ensued until the character reached its current shape.

More photos related to summer and sea glass @ Shutterstock.

王 | wáng

In Mandarin Chinese, 王 (Pinyin: wáng 🔊) means “king”. Wang (or Wong) is a popular family name shared by, among others, the film director Kar-wai Wong (王家卫; Wáng Jiāwèi) and the world-famous concert pianist Yuja Wang (王羽佳; Wáng Yǔjiā).

Ponte Ryūrui describes two theories of this character’s origin. One is that 王 is a pictogram of an axe head, where the bottom stroke corresponds to the axe blade. Many historical forms of this character indeed show the bottom stroke thicker and/or having a fancier shape.

The association of the axe with the ruler comes from a ceremonial axe that was kept near the throne, and was used for performing rituals in ancient China.

Another theory is more symbolic:

The three vertical lines depict three powers: Heaven, Earth and Man (天地人), which are then connected by a vertical line symbolising the ruler bracing those powers and taking control over them.

Again, many historical forms of 王 show a man-like figure, 大 or 天 above a horizontal stroke (earth?).

More photos related to kings and sea glass @ Shutterstock.

山 | shān

In Mandarin Chinese, 山 (Pinyin: shān 🔊) means “mountain”.

Why 山? Easy: think of three mountain peaks. Historical forms of this character look even more like children’s drawings of mountains.

Combining 火 (fire) with 山, we get a word for volcano: 火山 (huǒshān). Now recall the word for sky, 天 (tiān). If we stick it in front of 山, we get 天山 (Tiānshān), “Mountain of Heaven”, the name of a great mountain range in Central Asia. That’s how I remember the pronunciation of 山. For Russian speakers, or indeed anybody who is familiar with Cyrillic alphabet, there is an additional mnemonic: 山 looks very much like Ш, the first letter in the Шань.

More photos of mountains and sea glass @ Shutterstock.

天 | tiān

In Mandarin Chinese, 天 (Pinyin: tiān 🔊) means “sky”, “heavens”, “heaven” or “day”.

OK, the sky is big, right? Much bigger than a man with outstretched arms 大 can ever show, no matter how hard he tries. That’s why there is a line over his head. A whole new level. Some historical forms of this character show a stickman with a large head, or a line instead of a head.

More photos of sky and sea glass @ Shutterstock.