Chinese Characters 1 by Adelina

Chinese Characters 1 hàn

zì

汉 字 by

Adelina Ke

Email : adelina@discover-mandarin.com

Pictographic characters and associative characters are two of character forms. From Pictographic characters and associative characters , especially the ancient ones, one can easily know the meaning.

Ready? Let’s see some examples.

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yī

一

(one)

èr

二

(two)

sān

三

(three)

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rén

人

(people, person)

This character looks like a person standing there. So it means “people, person” in Chinese.

Next, we’ll learn two characters associative with “人”

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dà

大

(big, large)

This character looks like a person standing there and stretch out his arms. Chinese people knows when human beings stretch out their arms, they can be powerful, that is “ big, large”.

Now we put these two characters together, to make a new word.

dà rén

大 人 (adult) Email : adelina@discover-mandarin.com

tiān

天

yī

(sky; day)

tiān

一天

When one stretches himself, he can be big and powerful, but Chinese people also know there is “sky” above us.

sān tiān (one day)

三天

(three days)

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rì

日

Originally, the character of sun is written or drawn as the picture on the right, symbolized (sun , date) the sun.

zǎo

早

(early)

This character contains two parts: the upper part is “日” the sun, and the lower part stands for tree.

When the sun just goes above trees, that means sun just arises, and the time is “early”

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yuè

月

Originally, the character of moon is written or drawn as the picture on the right, symbolized (moon,month) the moon. Since ancient Chinese invented Chinese lunar calendar according to the changes of moon, it is also known as “ month”.

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sān yuè yī

rì

三月 一 日 èr yuè èr

1st, March

rì

二月 二 日

2nd, February

【Exercise】 Read out the following phrases, and translate into English 一月三日 三月二日 一月二日 二月一日 二月三日

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míng

明

We put “日”the sun and “月” the moon together, we get a new character, which has the following two meaning: 1. In ancient time, Chinese people thought both the sun and the moon shone light, so when they are together, there will be a lot of light, so the first meaning of 明 is “ bright”.

2. After the sun goes down and the moon also goes down, it is a brand new day. So 明天 means tomorrow.

míng tiān

明 天

(tomorrow)

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【Exercise】 Read out the following phrases, and translate into English 明天三月二日。 明天二月一日。 明天一月一日。

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Thank you!

Email : adelina@discover-mandarin.com