About two thousand years ago, the Chinese philosopher Lao Zi remarked: “Dao gives rise to one; one gives rise to two; two gives rise to three , and three gives rise to myriad things.” In other words, the entirety of the universe is composed of just a few simple elements. Chinese characters are this way as […]
The earliest Chinese writing system that has been preserved to the present day is the oracle bone inscriptions, which dates back 3,000 years to China’s Shang Dynasty (1600-1046 BC). The ancient Chinese people believed that both nature and human affairs were governed by a kind of mystical force. As a result, divination was commonly used […]
Are you studying Chinese? There are many rules for Chinese learners to memorize the Chinese characters. In Chinese, two “人” (ren, “people”) characters written together gives us the character “从” (cong), which depicts one person walking behind another and means “to follow”. When three “人” characters are written together, we get the character “众”(zhong, “many […]
According to the legend, when Cangjie created Chinese characters, he noticed not only everything in the universe, but also the human race itself. Chinese characters, therefore, reflect not only the Chinese people’s understanding of the world but also their understanding of the human body. Many Chinese characters are related to the human body. Study Chinese: “比” […]
There were countless boats, each of which had a dragon head and a dragon tail carved its hull (borrowing the implication of “wrath” from the figure of the dragon); 20 strong men were seated on both sides of the boat, each holding big wooden oars (borrowing the implication of “bold and intrepid” from the strength […]
There are a lot of folktales about the Lantern Festival, and the most believable one is that it originated from the custom of illuminating silkworm by peasants in the past. Illuminating silkworm fields meant that on the night of the festival, peasants, hoping for a bumper harvest, would insert a long bamboo pipe with a […]
饺子 (jiǎo zi) On the Eve of the Spring Festival, Chinese people eat an important kind of food—dumplings “饺子”. Initially, they were called “交子” rather than “饺子”. In ancient times, the character “交” was like a person’s two shanks, one crossed over the other. Later, the character was used to refer to any two things […]
Yue Fei’s Mother Tattooed Characters on the Skin of Yue Fei Yue Fei was a patriotic military commander of the Southern Song Dynasty and a national hero in resisting the invading Jin people. As a young man, he was diligent and adept in martial arts. His mother was afraid that after her death some unworthy […]
北(běi) The original form of the character “北” resembles two people with their backs to each other. The original meaning of it was “back” (背bèi). In the past, losing a battle was known as “败北(bài běi) ”. This is because, when soldiers fled after suffering a defeat, they had their backs to the enemy. When […]
The scientist Lu Ji came from Huating of Wu County in the State of Wu from the Three Kingdoms Period, the location of which is Songjiang in Shanghai at present. At the age of 6, he accompanied his father Lu Kang to Jiujiang to pay a visit to Yuan Shu, who then received them with […]