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六千 (liù qiān) — six thousand

Definition

numeral
six thousand

Examples

  • 六千。
    Zhè bù shǒu jī de jià gé dà gài liù qiān yuán.
    The price of this phone is about six thousand yuan.
  • 六千。
    Zhè suǒ xué xiào yǒu liù qiān míng xué shēng.
    This school has six thousand students.
  • 六千。
    Gōng sī jīn nián zhāo pìn le liù qiān míng yuán gōng.
    The company hired six thousand employees this year.

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.

六liùsix
千qiānthousand

六 (six) and 千 (thousand) combine to mean 6,000.

Characters in this word

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

The shape of 六 may come from a simple drawing of a shed, or from an ancient counting mark.

Open 六 →

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 & Counting

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