Chinese Character Wiki
少

shǎo, shào

few

Depicts four dots, representing the meaning "few". Originally the same character as 小. The small dots possibly represent grains of sand (沙).

Evolution

少 Oracle script (~1250-1000 BC)

Oracle script

(~1250-1000 BC)
少 Bronze script Late Spring and Autumn (~500 BC)

Bronze script

Late Spring and Autumn (~500 BC)
少 Seal script Shuowen (~100 AD)

Seal script

Shuowen (~100 AD)
少 Clerical script Western Jin dynasty (266-316 AD)

Clerical script

Western Jin dynasty (266-316 AD)
少 Regular script Modern

Regular script

Modern
Definitions

少  

shǎo

few, less, inadequate; few; less; to lack; to be missing; to stop (doing sth); seldom

少  

shào

young

Most common words with 少
Freq.
Word
Meaning

多少

number

少

few

至少

at least

不少

many

减少

to lessen

Component uses

Meaning component in 5 characters (1 verified)

尠 劣 砂 眇 杪

Sound component in 13 characters (6 verified)

沙 妙 秒 吵 抄 炒 紗 纱 鈔 钞 砂 杪 耖

Iconic component in 2 characters (2 verified)

沙 釆

Historical pronunciation

Old Chinese

Middle Chinese

Pinyin

Gloss

*[s.t]ewʔ

syewX

shǎo

few

*[s-t]ewʔ-s

syewH

shào

young


Statistics

HSK level 1

Appears in 94.1695% of movies

277th most common character in movies

233rd most common character in books

Miscellaneous

Strokes

4

Unicode

U+5C11

Shuowen

“少，不多也。从小，丿聲。”


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