TongTong
Sign in

一千 (yī qiān) — one thousand

Definition

numeral
one thousand

Examples

  • 一千。
    Zhè ge chéng shì yǒu yī qiān duō nián de lì shǐ.
    This city has over a thousand years of history.
  • 一千。
    Wǒ huā le yī qiān kuài qián mǎi zhè běn shū.
    I spent one thousand yuan to buy this book.
  • 一千。
    Wǒ men xué xiào yǒu yī qiān míng xué shēng.
    Our school has one thousand students.

Origin

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.

一yīone
千qiānthousand

一 means one and 千 means thousand, giving 1,000.

Characters in this word

An abstract idea shown by a mark or a diagram rather than by a picture of an object.

一 is drawn as one horizontal stroke, marking the number one.

Open 一 →

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
一一yīone, signifying a number
Sound part声符shēngfú
人
人rén千qiān
The sound has drifted apartThe sound part was a clue two thousand years ago — it often still helps, but not always.

千 pairs 人, whose sound was similar, with 一, a number stroke; the extra line was explained as extension, and a thousand is a number reached by extending counting.

Open 千 →
Appears in
Numbers & Counting5000 Most Frequent Chinese Words

Browse more HSK 7-9 words or search the full 43,000-word dictionary.