床头 (chuáng tóu) — head of a bed, bedside

Definition

noun

head of a bedbedside

床头。
Wǒ bǎ shǒu jī fàng zài chuáng tóu.
I put my phone on the bedside.
床头。
chuáng tóu Yǒu yì zhǎn tái dēng.
There is a lamp at the bedside.
床头。
Tā měi tiān shuì qián dōu huì zài chuáng tóu kàn shū.
He reads at the bedside every night before sleep.

Compound word

构词法gòucífǎ

偏正piānzhèngModifier + head

The first part narrows down the second: it says what kind of thing the head is.

头tóuhead/end

床 is the bed and 头 is its end, so the word gives the head or bedside.

Characters in this word

Two or more meaningful parts placed together so that their meanings combine into a new one.

广木床

The 床 shape combines 广, a house, and 木, tree, to show a wooden bed inside a house.

Most characters — around four in five — are built this way: one part hints at the meaning, the other at the pronunciation.

This origin belongs to the traditional form 頭; 头 is its simplified writing.

豆頁頭

Meaning part形符xíngfú

頁頁yèhead

Sound part声符shēngfú

豆

Close in sound todayThe sound part was a clue two thousand years ago — it often still helps, but not always.

The traditional form 頭 shows 頁, meaning head, beside 豆 as a sound component; the simplified 头 is a later shorthand.

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