The Chinese characters 冰 meaning is ice.
The Chinese character for ice 冰, the radical 冫 depicts water dripping and freezing into an icicle. It was added to 水 (water) to freeze and crystallize it into “frozen water” or ice. Our illustration applies 冰 figuratively, contrasting icy with fiery passion.

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The Chinese characters 永 meaning is everlasting; perpetual; forever.
One generation comes and another goes, but water flows on incessantly in a continuous cycle. From this unceasing flow of water came the ideogram for “everlasting”: 永. A variation of water (水), with foams and ripples added. 永 will long be remembered as the “everlasting” Chinese character [...]

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The Chinese characters 水 meaning is water.
Water (水), a natural source of power, is represented by a pictograph of surging waters with a central mainstream and four whirls. A variant form, using only three drops (氵), operates as radical to induce a flood of “watery” Chinese characters. To this day, the proverbial saying is afloat: [...]

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The Chinese characters 卖 meaning is sell.
賣 is derived by loading 買 (the business of netting in cowries) with 士 (out, a contraction of 出). Hence 賣 means to sell, i.e., to put out or push goods and netting in cowrie-money (貝). Our picture exposes the fishy business of pushing and netting.

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The Chinese characters 买 meaning is buy.
This ideogram is made up of a net and 貝 (money cowrie). 買 means to buy, i.e., net the goods, paying the price in cowries. This is often done with bargain offers. The simplified form: 买 offered in place of the regular form: 買 may not seem quite a [...]

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The Chinese characters 贵 meaning is expensive; honorable.
A basket or container filled with precious cowries: 贝 (once used as money) means expensive. By extension, it also means high-class or honorable. In this connection, humble self (贱) ranks honorable readers (贵) for their appreciation and interest in the bilingual page.

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The Chinese characters 贱 meaning is cheap; mean; worthless.
Two spears: 戈 shattering and destroying the value of shells: 貝, once used as money, conveys the idea of cheap, worthless, mean or humble. Man applied this word to anything of little value, uttering the proverbial saying: “Cheap things are of little value; valuable things are not [...]

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The Chinese characters 贝 meaning is shells; valuables.
This Chinese character is a pictograph of the precious cowrie shell. Used in early feudal times as money, it came to mean also “valuables”. The regular form 貝 shows a live shell with feelers; but today, like the money it once represented, the shell reveals its hollowness in [...]

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The Chinese characters 姓 meaning is surname.
The Chinese character 姓, comprising 女 (woman) and 生 (born), literally means: “born of woman”. It suggests that in some remote, forgotten era man, born of woman, got his name from the mother. Hence: 姓: “surname”. We introduce here Mama Li’s (李) family from the remote past, but we’ve [...]

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The Chinese characters 生 meaning is produce; bear; grow.
The earth (土), producing a plant, lays the groundwork for growth. Hence the modified form: 生, meaning to produce, bear or grow. Man, born imperfect, grows in different ways and directions. Pictured here are examples from three generations.

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