xiōng
elder brother
Pictograph of a mouth on top of a person, representing an older brother giving orders.
Evolution

Oracle script
(~1250-1000 BC)
Bronze script
Late Shang dynasty (~1100 BC)
Seal script
Shuowen (~100 AD)
Clerical script
Eastern Han dynasty (25-220 AD)Regular script
ModernDefinitions
Most common words with 兄
Freq. | Word | Meaning |
---|---|---|
brothers | ||
'old chap' (form of address between male friends) | ||
elder brother | ||
senior male fellow student or apprentice | ||
brother(s) and sister(s) |
Historical pronunciation
Old Chinese | Middle Chinese | Pinyin | Gloss |
*m̥raŋ | xjwaeng | xiōng | elder brother |
Statistics
HSK level 4
Appears in 56.6074% of movies
475th most common character in movies
1089th most common character in books
Miscellaneous
Strokes | 5 |
Unicode | U+5144 |
Shuowen | “兄,長也。从儿,从口。” |
Sources
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