一千五 (yī qiān wǔ) — 1500 (one thousand five hundred, colloquial form of 一千五百)

Definition

Colloquial spoken shorthand for 1500, formed by dropping the 百. Use the full form 一千五百 in writing or when speaking formally.

numeral
1500 (one thousand five hundred, colloquial form of 一千五百)

Examples

  • 一千五。
    Zhè tái diàn nǎo huā le yī qiān wǔ kuài qián.
    This computer cost 1500 yuan.
  • 一千五。
    Wǒ men gōng sī yǒu yī qiān wǔ míng yuán gōng.
    Our company has 1500 employees.
  • 一千五。
    Tā měi gè yuè gōng zī shì yī qiān wǔ.
    His monthly salary is 1500.

Origin

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 →

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

An older form had a crossed mark between a top bar and a bottom bar. The modern 五 keeps those bars, while the original idea is uncertain.

Open 五 →

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