鼠 | shǔ

In Mandarin Chinese, 鼠 (Pinyin: shǔ 🔊) is a word for “mouse”, “rat” or other similar rodent.

The Rat is the first of the twelve-year cycle of animals which appear in the Chinese zodiac and is associated with the earthly branch 子.

An ancient folk story tells that Cat and Rat were the worst swimmers in the animal kingdom. Although they were poor swimmers, they were both quite intelligent. To get to the meeting called by the Jade Emperor, they had to cross a river to reach the meeting place. The Jade Emperor had also decreed that the years on the calendar would be named for each animal in the order they arrived to the meeting. Cat and Rat decided that the best and fastest way to cross the river was to hop on the back of Ox. Ox, being naïve and good-natured, agreed to carry them both across. Midway across the river, Rat pushed Cat into the water. Then as Ox neared the other side of the river, Rat jumped ahead and reached the shore first, claiming first place in the competition and the zodiac.

More photos related to mice, zodiac and sea glass @ Shutterstock.

子 | zǐ

In Mandarin Chinese, 子 (Pinyin: zǐ 🔊) has many meanings. As a noun, it can signify “a child”, “an offspring”, “a son”, “a person”, “a seed” or “an egg”, while as an adjective, it means “young” or “small”.

子 is also the first of twelve earthly branches. It corresponds to the Year of the Rat (鼠) of the Chinese zodiac; the eleventh month; the hour of the Rat (11 pm to 1 am, “the time when Rats are most active in seeking food”); and the direction 0° (i.e. north). Its associated “fixed element” is Water, 水.

Curiously, a combination of 男 “man” with 子, 男子 (nánzǐ), still means “a man”, not “a boy” as one would expect; similarly, 女 + 子 = 女子 (nǚzǐ) means “a woman”, not “a girl”. (This is not the case in Japanese where 男子 and 女子 mean exactly that: “a boy” and “a girl”, respectively.) However, an anagram of 女子, 子女 (zǐnǚ), means “children”, i.e. “sons and daughters”.

Many historical forms of 子 show a baby with a large head and spread arms (the legs are presumably swaddled). To remember the pronunciation of this word, I think of it as a variant of Latin letter Ƶ (pronounced American way, /ziː/ 🔊).

More photos related to children, zodiac and sea glass @ Shutterstock.