仰面 (yǎng miàn) — to face upward; to look up; to lie on one's bac…

Definition

A formal/literary verb meaning 'face upward / look up / lie on one's back' — mostly seen in writing, not everyday speech.

verb

to face upwardto look upto lie on one's back (face up)

，仰面。
Tā tǎng zài cǎo dì shàng, yǎng miàn kàn zhe lán tiān.
He lay on the grass, looking up at the blue sky.
，。
Tā yǎng le yí xià miàn, yòu jì xù kàn shū.
She looked up for a moment, then continued reading.
，仰面。
Tā bù xiǎo xīn huá dǎo le, yǎng miàn shuāi zài dì shàng.
He accidentally slipped and fell flat on his back.

Compound word

构词法gòucífǎ

动宾dòngbīnVerb + object

An action followed by what it acts on, fused into one word.

仰yǎngturn upward

仰 means to turn upward, and 面 is the face, so the face is turned upward.

Characters in this word

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

亻卬仰

Meaning part形符xíngfú

亻Written in full as人rénperson

Sound part声符shēngfú

卬

卬áng仰yǎng

Same sound today

In 仰, the left part 亻 represents a person, and the right part 卬 gives the sound.

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

面 originally drew a man’s face, with one eye exaggerated; the horizontal stroke was added later.