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波尔多 (Bō ěr duō) — Bordeaux (city and wine region in France)

Definition

noun
Bordeaux (city and wine region in France)

Examples

  • 波尔多。
    Wǒ míng nián xiǎng qù Bō ěr duō lǚ yóu.
    I want to travel to Bordeaux next year.
  • 波尔多。
    Bō ěr duō De pú tao jiǔ hěn yǒu míng.
    Bordeaux's wine is very famous.
  • 波尔多。
    Zhè píng Bō ěr duō hóng jiǔ shì wǒ péng you sòng de.
    This bottle of Bordeaux red wine was a gift from my friend.

Origin

Single-morpheme word
构词法gòucífǎ
音译yīnyìTransliteration

The characters spell the sound of a foreign word; their individual meanings play no part.

波bō
尔ěr
多duō

The characters here only transliterate the French place name Bordeaux; none carries an independent meaning.

Sound-only characters

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

Meaning part形符xíngfú
氵Written in full as水shuǐwater
Sound part声符shēngfú
皮
皮pí波bō
The sound has drifted apartThe sound part was a clue two thousand years ago — it often still helps, but not always.

The left side 氵 is water, and the right side 皮 gives the sound.

Open 波 →

A drawing of the thing itself, worn down over three thousand years into a few strokes.

假借jiǎjièLater borrowed for its sound alone — the picture has nothing to do with today’s meaning.

This origin belongs to the traditional form 爾; 尔 is its simplified writing.

The traditional form 爾, simplified as 尔, originally drew cloth on a loom with crossing threads. It was borrowed for its sound to write “you,” so the picture is unrelated to that meaning.

Open 尔 →

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

多 originally showed two pieces of meat placed together; the repeated meat shape gives the sense of many.

Open 多 →
Appears in
City & Urban

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