Chinese Character Wiki
抱

bào

embrace

Phonosemantic compound. 扌 represents the meaning and 包 represents the sound.

Components
扌 meaning component

扌  Meaning component

shou, shǒu

  

hand

扌 is a component form of 手.

包 sound,iconic component

包  Sound Iconic component

bāo

  

wrap

Depicts a person (勹) hugging a child (子).

Evolution

抱 Seal script Shuowen (~100 AD)

Seal script

Shuowen (~100 AD)
抱 Clerical script Eastern Han dynasty (25-220 AD)

Clerical script

Eastern Han dynasty (25-220 AD)
抱 Regular script Modern

Regular script

Modern
Definitions

抱  

bào

embrace, hold in arms, enfold; to hold; to carry (in one's arms); to hug; to embrace; to surround; to cherish

Most common words with 抱
Freq.
Word
Meaning

抱歉

to be sorry

抱

to hold

抱怨

to complain

拥抱

to embrace

怀抱

to hug

Historical pronunciation

Old Chinese

Middle Chinese

Pinyin

Gloss

*[m-p]ˤuʔ

bawX

bào

carry in the arms


Statistics

HSK level 4

Appears in 88.4350% of movies

289th most common character in movies

1122nd most common character in books

Miscellaneous

Strokes

8

Unicode

U+62B1

Shuowen

“捊，引取也。从手，孚聲。抱，捊或从包。”


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