五十秒 (wǔ shí miǎo) — fifty seconds

Definition

noun
fifty seconds

Examples

  • 五十秒。
    Bǐ sài hái shèng wǔ shí miǎo.
    The match has fifty seconds left.
  • 五十秒。
    Tā pǎo wán yì bǎi mǐ zhǐ yòng le wǔ shí miǎo.
    He finished the hundred-meter run in just fifty seconds.
  • 五十秒。
    Qǐng gěi wǒ wǔ shí miǎo shí jiān kǎo lǜ.
    Please give me fifty seconds to think about it.

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.

五十fifty
五wǔfive十shíten
偏正Modifier + head
秒miǎosecond

五十 (fifty) with 秒 (seconds) gives a span of fifty seconds.

Characters in this word

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 →

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

The early shape 十 was mostly a single vertical stroke, sometimes with a dot, and later gained a horizontal stroke to form a cross. For the number ten, it marked the next digit above one.

Open 十 →

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
禾禾hécereal; grain
Sound part声符shēngfú
少
少shǎo秒miǎo
The sound has drifted apartThe sound part was a clue two thousand years ago — it often still helps, but not always.

The form 秒 pairs 禾, a cereal or grain plant, with 少 giving the sound.

Open 秒 →

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