Chinese Character Wiki
能

néng

to be able

Original meaning: 

bear

Pictograph of a bear. Based on the original meaning "bear". The meaning of this character has shifted over time to mean "strong" and "ability, power". Original form of 熊.

Components
◎ iconic component

◎  Iconic component

  

characterless component

Depicts the body of the bear.

◎ iconic component

◎  Iconic component

  

characterless component

Depicts the head of the bear.

◎ iconic component

◎  Iconic component

  

characterless component

Depicts the four legs and tail of the bear.

Evolution

能 Bronze script Early Western Zhou (~1000 BC)

Bronze script

Early Western Zhou (~1000 BC)
能 Seal script Shuowen (~100 AD)

Seal script

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

Clerical script

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

Regular script

Modern
Definitions

能  

néng

to be able; can, permitted to; ability; can; to be able to; might possibly; (physics) energy

能  

Néng

surname Neng

Most common words with 能
Freq.
Word
Meaning

能

can

可能

possible

不能

cannot

能力

capability

能够

can

Component uses

Sound component in 1 character (1 verified)

態

Iconic component in 2 characters (2 verified)

罷 熊

Historical pronunciation

Old Chinese

Middle Chinese

Pinyin

Gloss

*nˤə

noj

néng

a kind of bear

*nˤə(ŋ)

nong

néng

a kind of bear

*nˤə(ʔ) (~ *nˤəŋ)

nong

néng

able; ability


Statistics

HSK level 1

Appears in 100.0000% of movies

29th most common character in movies

35th most common character in books

Miscellaneous

Strokes

10

Unicode

U+80FD

Shuowen

“能，熊屬，足似鹿。从肉，聲。能獸堅中，故稱賢能，而彊壯稱能傑也。”


This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.
Creative Commons License