弗林特 (fú lín tè) — Flint (city in Michigan, USA)

Definition

noun

Flint (city in Michigan, USA)

弗林特。
fú lín tè Shì měi guó de yí gè chéng shì.
Flint is a city in the United States.
弗林特。
Wǒ hái méi qù guò fú lín tè.
I haven't been to Flint yet.
弗林特。
fú lín tè De shuǐ yǒu wèn tí.
There's a problem with the water in Flint.

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.

'弗林特 carry no meaning of their own here; the word spells Flint.

Sound-only characters

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

The old form of 弗 pictures a rope wrapped around two pieces of wood to keep them straight.

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

木木林

林 is made of two 木 (tree) placed side by side, showing many trees together, hence a forest.

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

牛寺特

Meaning part形符xíngfú

Sound part声符shēngfú

寺

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

The shape combines 牛 (ox) with 寺, which gives the pronunciation; it originally meant a large bull.

Appears in