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大屠杀 (dà tú shā) — massacre (large-scale killing of people)

Definition

noun
massacre (large-scale killing of people)
Measure word · 次

Examples

  • 大屠杀。
    Lì shǐ shàng fā shēng guò xǔ duō dà tú shā.
    Many massacres have occurred in history.
  • 大屠杀。
    Zhè cì dà tú shā zào chéng le wú shù wú gū píng mín sǐ wáng.
    This massacre caused the deaths of countless innocent civilians.
  • 大屠杀。
    Zhèng fǔ bì xū cǎi qǔ cuò shī fáng zhǐ lèi sì dà tú shā zài cì fā shēng.
    The government must take measures to prevent a similar massacre from happening again.

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.

大dàlarge
屠杀mass killing
屠túslaughter杀shākill
联合Coordinate

大 (large) with 屠 and 杀 (both kill) means a large-scale killing.

Characters in this word

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

The form 大 is a picture of a person standing and facing forward, not of someone stretching their arms.

Open 大 →

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
尸尸shībody
Sound part声符shēngfú
者
者zhě屠tú
The sound has drifted apartThe sound part was a clue two thousand years ago — it often still helps, but not always.

屠 combines 尸 (body) with 者, which gives the sound.

Open 屠 →

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

This origin belongs to the traditional form 殺; 杀 is its simplified writing.

The traditional form 殺 comes from an old drawing of a boar impaled in the head, with 人 and 又 added to show a person doing the killing; the simplified 杀 is a later abbreviation.

Open 杀 →
Appears in
Crime & Police

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