大赦 (dà shè) — amnesty; general pardon

Definition

noun

amnestygeneral pardon

大赦，。
Zhèng fǔ xuān bù le dà shè, shì fàng le suǒ yǒu zhèng zhì fàn.
The government announced an amnesty, releasing all political prisoners.
大赦。
Zhè cì dà shè de fàn wéi bāo kuò qīng zuì hé bù fen zhòng zuì.
The scope of this amnesty includes minor crimes and some serious crimes.
大赦。
Xǔ duō guó jiā zài guó qìng rì huì shí xíng dà shè.
Many countries implement amnesty on National Day.

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dàgeneral

大 gives the sense of broad or general, while 赦 means pardon.

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.

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

攴攴pūhand holding a stick

Sound part声符shēngfú

亦

亦yì赦shè

The sound has drifted apartThe sound part was a clue two thousand years ago — it often still helps, but not always.

The older form of 赦 paired 亦 as a sound part with 攴, a hand holding a stick; later writing changed the sound part.

Appears in