Friday 18 November 2016

Learn one Chinese Character a day - 盅

Today we continue to examine another Chinese character related to 皿 - 盅. It is composed of 中 and 皿. Both of them have been learnt. 盅 is then obviously some kind of 皿 (container). What's the meaning of 中 here then? Quite clueless. Let us see whether ts ancient scripts can provide us more ideas if any. (Image taken from http://vividict.com)
Learn one Chinese Character a day - 盅
Its Bronze Script (with  and  ) represents exactly the same concept as its current form 盅. It is then still impossible for us to reason its meaning properly. However if you have any good interpretation, please do share your thoughts.

So today we do the opposite way to see whether we can appreciate how 盅 was created with knowing its meaning: 

盅 means handleless cups (normally small in size and are used for serving Chinese tea or Chinese spirit), as shown below the small cup receiving tea:
盅 for tea
And 盅 in big size is usually used as slow cooker for soups, like:

盅 for soup
From the drawing of , it actually has handles. 中 which has meaning of middle, is believed to emphasise that 盅 refers to the middle part of  without handles. And 中 also works as the phonetic indicator that 盅 pronounces same as 中.

Now we have learnt the meaning of 盅, it is time to enjoy a Chinese calligraphy with 盅 inside:
蹈盅

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