Learn Chinese Characters 151 出

by Caren Zuo

出 （chū）




Its regular script (the last one) gives us little leads on its original meaning. Actualy it is a up-down construction. Take the oracle script (the first one), The part on the above is something like a toe of a foot, while the part below draws a threshold. The character originally means that one's feet is stepping out of the freshhold, namly one is leaving his house. Now the character has changed into double "山" stand in a column.


Its orignally meaning "to leave". Later it was extended to mean "to produce", "to send", "to appear".


The part below is also a radical but seldom used. It means the threshold.





Useful Phrases:
出去 （chū qù） be out
出发 （chū fā ） set off
出国 （chū guó  ）leave one's country
出口 （chū kǒu  ） export