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血汗 (xuè hàn) — blood and sweat; hard toil, strenuous effort

Definition

A fixed pair meaning 'blood and sweat' — emphasizes painful, exhausting effort put into earning or achieving something. Functions as an attributive modifier, as in 血汗钱 / 血汗劳动.

noun
blood and sweathard toilstrenuous effort

Examples

  • 血汗。
    Zhè xiē cái fù dōu shì tā yòng xuè hàn huàn lái de.
    This wealth was all earned by his blood and sweat.
  • 血汗。
    Wǒ men yīng gāi zūn zhòng gōng rén de xuè hàn láo dòng.
    We should respect the hard labor of workers.
  • 血汗。
    Tā fù chū le hěn duō xuè hàn cái chéng gōng.
    He paid a lot of blood and sweat to succeed.

Origin

Compound word
构词法gòucífǎ
联合liánhéCoordinate

Two parts of equal weight, alike or opposite in meaning, standing side by side.

血xuèblood
汗hànsweat

血 (blood) and 汗 (sweat) stand together for the effort and hardship of labor.

Characters in this word

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

  • 一一yīdrop of blood
  • 皿皿mǐncontainer

The shape shows 一, a drop of blood, inside 皿, a container, for blood held in a sacrificial vessel.

Open 血 →

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
水水shuǐ
Sound part声符shēngfú
干
干gān汗hàn
Close in sound todayThe sound part was a clue two thousand years ago — it often still helps, but not always.

汗 has 水, the water form, beside 干; 水 relates to liquid sweat, while 干 gives the sound.

Open 汗 →
Appears in
Abstract Concepts

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