Chinese Character Wiki
半

bàn

half

Depicts separating a cow (牛) into two halves (八).

Components
八 iconic component

八  Iconic component

bā

  

eight

Depicts splitting into two halves.

牛 iconic component

牛  Iconic component

niú

  

cow

Evolution

半 Bronze script Qin dynasty (221-206 BC)

Bronze script

Qin dynasty (221-206 BC)
半 Seal script Shuowen (~100 AD)

Seal script

Shuowen (~100 AD)
半 Clerical script Western Han dynasty (202 BC-9 AD)

Clerical script

Western Han dynasty (202 BC-9 AD)
半 Regular script Modern

Regular script

Modern
Definitions

半  

bàn

half; semi-; incomplete; (after a number) and a half

Most common words with 半
Freq.
Word
Meaning

半

half

一半

half

半年

half a year

半夜

midnight

半场

half-court

Component uses

Meaning component in 1 character (0 verified)

畔

Sound component in 11 characters (3 verified)

判 伴 胖 叛 畔 衅 絆 绊 拌 袢 泮

Historical pronunciation

Old Chinese

Middle Chinese

Pinyin

Gloss

*pˤan-s

panH

bàn

half


Statistics

HSK level 1

Appears in 69.5339% of movies

609th most common character in movies

513th most common character in books

Miscellaneous

Strokes

5

Unicode

U+534A

Shuowen

“半，物中分也。从八，从牛。牛為物大，可以分也。”


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