康乃馨 (kāng nǎi xīn) — carnation | TongTong Chinese Dictionary

Definition

noun

carnation

Measure word · 朵

，康乃馨。
Mǔ qīn jié nà tiān, wǒ sòng le yí shù kāng nǎi xīn gěi mā ma.
On Mother's Day, I gave my mom a bouquet of carnations.
康乃馨，。
Huā diàn lǐ yǒu hěn duō yán sè de kāng nǎi xīn, hóng sè hé fěn sè zuì shòu huān yíng.
The flower shop has carnations in many colors, with red and pink being the most popular.
康乃馨，。
Tā xǐ huan bái sè de kāng nǎi xīn, jué de tā men hěn chún jié.
She likes white carnations and thinks they are very pure.

Single-morpheme word

构词法gòucífǎ

音译yīnyìTransliteration

The characters spell the sound of a foreign word; their individual meanings play no part.

馨xīn

The characters only spell the foreign name for carnation; they do not contribute their usual meanings here.

Sound-only characters

Two or more meaningful parts placed together so that their meanings combine into a new one.

康 pairs 庚 (threshing tools) with 米 (rice), showing rice being processed into chaff.

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

The origin of 乃 is uncertain: it may have drawn a sideways person, a rope, a thrown rope, or a pulling motion.

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

殸香馨

Meaning part形符xíngfú

Sound part声符shēngfú

殸

殸qìng馨xīn

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

馨 combines 香, for sweet fragrance, with 殸, which gives the character its sound.

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