this post was submitted on 16 Oct 2023
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[–] Jonathan12345@lemmygrad.ml 10 points 1 year ago (2 children)

that's not wood, though, it's 小 with a 一 through it.

[–] PointAndClique@hexbear.net 7 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (3 children)

Yes, I also came by to say this (and reply to acabjones below re. Pleco). Pleco has the bottom component as 朩 deng3, reference in image below:

Edit: that being said, I really admire OP for their curiousity and intuition to break down the characters manually, even if they don't arrive at the correct result every time. It will put them in a fantastic place for the rest of their Chinese learning.

[–] Jonathan12345@lemmygrad.ml 5 points 1 year ago

neat, I've never seen that before.

[–] urshanabi@lemmygrad.ml 3 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Wait is this a paid dictionary on Pleco? I don't think I have the character breakdown like that.

[–] PointAndClique@hexbear.net 4 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

I haven't paid for any add ons, so this should be one of the free ones? I added the following:

[–] urshanabi@lemmygrad.ml 3 points 1 year ago

Huh, yeah I guess I deleted some of them when I was messing around with the settings...

[–] unperson@hexbear.net 2 points 1 year ago

I like this dictionary for character breakdowns: https://www.dong-chinese.com/wiki/

According to this it's ⿱艹余, where 余 is a pictogram of a small shelter, an old rendering of 舍 (example 宿舍, dormitory)

[–] Bartsbigbugbag@lemmy.ml 5 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Thanks, I was learning from a native speaker, so they may have just misremembered. I appreciate that!

[–] Jonathan12345@lemmygrad.ml 6 points 1 year ago

No problem!

[–] acabjones@lemmygrad.ml 8 points 1 year ago

Highly recommend the android app Pleco for character decomposition, and many other things. Extremely useful and fascinating.

[–] The_Walkening@hexbear.net 7 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Chinese guy 1000 years ago: yeah... Uhh lemme get a cup of them leafy plant guys

[–] PointAndClique@hexbear.net 3 points 1 year ago

China does have its own mythology around how tea as a beverage was discovered

[–] Ronin_5@lemmygrad.ml 6 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

And the character for “good” is a young woman.

女+子=好

[–] urshanabi@lemmygrad.ml 5 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I might be wrong but the 子 radical and 好 was told to me to be good by my Mandarin teacher because it's like, harmony. Like woman and person or woman and child or something. It's like good is when there's a balance and not one extreme or the other.

[–] Flyberius@hexbear.net 5 points 1 year ago (1 children)

The app hello Chinese said it's because having a wife and a child is good, lol

I guess the original meaning is lost in 5000 years of history.

[–] Shinhoshi@lemmygrad.ml 3 points 1 year ago

Yeah, it does seem to be lost. Wiktionary has a couple theories. Here’s the first one:

The widely accepted meaning of this character is that the characters for “female” (女) and “child” (子) were put together to form a compound because it was good for a woman to have a child.

[–] ihaveibs@lemmygrad.ml 5 points 1 year ago

Tea is one of my favorite characters, there is something so aesthetically pleasing about it. Please keep posting these!

[–] conc@lemmy.ml 4 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I've been learning, recently learned tea. This is so cool, thank you!

[–] Bartsbigbugbag@lemmy.ml 4 points 1 year ago

No worries! Make sure you look at the correction someone made below, it is not supposed to be wood.