字字 (zì zì) — character by character; word for word; every ch…

Definition

字字 means 'every character' or 'character by character' — used as an adverbial phrase (often reduplicated with 都) to emphasize that each character or word is handled individually, e.g. 字字斟酌, 字字翻译.

bound form

character by characterword for wordevery character

Examples

字字。
Tā zì zì dì fān yì le zhè piān gǔ wén.
He translated this classical Chinese text character by character.
，字字。
Tā dú shū fēi cháng zǐ xì, zì zì dōu rèn zhēn zhēn zhuó.
She reads very carefully, pondering every character.
字字，。
Lǎo shī yāo qiú wǒ men zì zì xiě xià lái, bù néng chū cuò.
The teacher asked us to write it down character by character, without errors.

Origin

Reduplicated word

构词法gòucífǎ

重叠chóngdiéReduplication

A syllable said twice — for affection, for softness, or simply because that is how the word is said.

字zìcharacter

字 is repeated to mean every character or character by character.

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.

宀子字

Meaning part形符xíngfú

宀宀miánroof

Sound part声符shēngfú

子

子zǐ字zì

Same sound today

字 pairs 宀 (roof) with 子 (child); 子 gives the sound, while 宀 relates to the meaning.

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