Y: 001

口日(/曰)目白自


口
—— mouth —— Looks like a widely open mouth ——

日(/曰)(*口一)
—— 1) sun; day —— Each time the sun rises a new day begins. —— It is a picture of the sun. Normally we draw the sun with a circle(ㅇ) surrounded by many strokes. But there are no “round” shaped Kanji so we take mouth*1 instead. And adding so many strokes is also very annoying so let’s abbreviate them to only one stroke (one*2) in the middle representing all. ——
2) say —— What is coming out of the mouth*1 is what we say (symbolized by one*2) ——

目
—— eye —— Rotate this character by 90 degree, then it will look like an eye ——
目_目

丶(in白without日)
—— dot; drop —— The dot's ink is dropped, so it looks like a comma. ——

白(*丶(in白without日)日)
—— white —— If you watch into the sun*2 for too long you’ll see several small white dots*1. ——

自(*丶(in白without日)目)
—— self; nose —— In Asia, one refers to oneself by pointing to their nose —— Rotate this character by 90 degree to the right: (*1) shows the nose, it's right to the *eye* (*2) ——

? (in友without又) left hand —— 又 is the right hand (or fist). Together they are 友 (you3 friend) —— Friends give each other the hands. ——

言 say; words —— sethg: "This is simple a pictogram of a mouth SAYing something. The lines are soundwaves. No need to complicate it."

讠words; say —— It's the simplified form of 言 derived from Cursive Script ——

門 door; gate —— Just looks like a door/gate

no.20 门 door; gate —— it's the simplified form of 門

Yuanzi Listing

Please read my post about 'Hanzi, Fenzi and Yuanzi'.

There are thousands of Hanzi, but only a limited number of Yuanzi.
In this post (and the following; beginning witch "Y:...") I would like to collect all Yuanzi I have encountered on sein.se (in the same character sequence) and give some mnemonics to remember them.

Note1: Some Yuanzi can also function as a Hanzi, some not.
The one which cannot are followed by (in...without...). In (in...without...) is a sample Hanzi which contains this Yuanzi.

Note2: Yuanzi in (*...) are Yuanzi of Yuanzi, so they are pseudo-Yuanzi, because Yuanzi are the smallest meaningful components and therefore - to be correctly - not allowed to be split, but this "incorrect" splitting makes them easier to remember^^...

Note3: Translations in "..." are pseudo-traslations. For example 且 actually means 'further; moreover', but my pseudo-translation for it is "building" - It looks like a building so why not remember it as "building"? I guess it's easier to remember mnemonic rhymes with "building" in it than witch 'further; moreover'...

Click on the Yuanzi below:

口日(/曰)目白自

done:
口日(/曰)目白自
to do:
罒(in署without者)覀(in要without女)
八丷(in单without田十)人(/入)亻(in他without也)貝贝頁页
耳
而

H:这{U+20087}說讠门

Here are some characters and their mnemo which you won't find on Reviewing the Kanji:

*Note: I am not able to write all characters on blogger.com . The one I am not able to write are shown as {...} (and numberd). {...} is always linked so you can see the character on another web site when you click on it.

no.11 这 this (zhe4) —— Imagine a literate in a sushi bar. The sushi dishes are passing by/moving and the literate wants to find his favorite dish. Then he found his favorite one and crosses his arms around it saying "This is mine!". (3rd and 4th stroke show his crossed arms; 1st stroke is his head; the 2nd stroke is his shoulders) ——

{U+20087} left hand —— 又 is the right hand (or fist). Together they are 友 (you3 friend) —— Friends give each other the hands. ——

no.19 說 speak; say (shuo1) —— to exchange words words/sayings is to speak/say.

讠words; say —— It's the simplified form of 言 derived from Cursive Script ——

no.20 门 door (men2) —— it's the simplified form of 門

to do: 文辶

My Method

0) Before reading about my method, please read the introduction first (Begin with the oldest post).

1) I will give you mnemonic advices for the 3000 most common characters used in Modern Chinese.
These characters are all listed on zein.se (in the same sequence I will explain them).

2) But there is a problem:
For example the most common character is 的, and 的 consists of the components 白 and 勺, but these two components are more seldom characters than the character 的.

So visit yellowbridge and find out the components of each character.
Alternatively you can also use zhongwen.com.

Before explaining the character I will explain its components.
So I will explain 丶 first, then 日, then 白, then 勹, then 勺, and in the end 的.

3) Why is it so good to know the meaning of components?
Read Mnemonic...

4) Where are the explanations?
To read my explanations please visit Reviewing the Kanji.
This website is made for Kanji-learner (people who learn the japanese variants of Hanzi, more: here)
BUT it's also possible to write explanations for Hanzi!

5) How do I find the explanations for one cerain Hanzi?
When you are logged in at Reviewing the Kanji search for the character you want to know in the 'Study' section ('browse').
The you will certainly find many explanations by many users.

My user name onReviewing the Kanji is 'sinologe' .

6) My former user name on Reviewing the Kanji was pjdekl...

7) There are also characters which are not on Reviewing the Kanji. In this case I will post the mnemo explanation on my blog here...

8) Simplified characters are not shown on Reviewing the Kanji.
Take the traditional variant instead!
For learners of simplified characters I will explain this simplified character on this blog (see (7) ),
but only once. For example: I won't explain 们, but 們, 門 and 门 (because 们 already contains 门, so it's sufficient to explain only 們...)

Yuanzi - Fenzi, Meaning - Sound

Please read my last post about “Hanzi, Yuanzi and Fenzi”.

1) Sound Loan

Often (but not always!) Fenzi imply the pronunciation of a Hanzi.

For example, the following Hanzi all contain the Fenzi 喿(sao4 - chirping of birds).
Note that these Hanzi’s prounounciation are very similar to “sao4” (proununciation of喿):

噪 (chirp; zao4) = 口(mouth) + 喿(sao4 - chirping of birds)
澡 (bath; zao3) = 氵(water [variant of 水]) + 喿(sao4 - chirping of birds)
燥 (dry; zao4) = 火(fire) + 喿(sao4 - chirping of birds)
躁 (impatient; zao4) = 足(foot) + 喿(sao4 - chirping of birds)
操 (grasp; operate; cao1) = 扌(hand [variant of手]) + 喿(sao4 - chirping of birds)

2) Meaning Loan

The Yuanzi which is outside of the Fenzi often (but not always!) imply the meaning of the Hanzi.

噪 (chirp; zao4) = chirping with the “mouth” (口) (or neb…)
澡 (bath; zao3) = bathing in water (氵)
燥 (dry; zao4) = to dry something at a fire (火) place
躁 (impatient; zao4) = tapping the feet (足) while being impatient
操 (grasp; operate; cao1) = to crasp or operate with hands (扌)

3) Conclusion

Over 90 per cent of Hanzi are build up by a sound loan (1 Fenzi) and a meaning loan (1 Yuanzi)
So it’s really useful to learn the meaning of Yuanzi and the pronunciation of Fenzi!

4) Link

Read about "Phono-semantic compound characters" in the Wikipedia article about "Chinese character classification".