西雅图 (Xī yǎ tú) — Seattle | TongTong Chinese Dictionary

Definition

noun

Seattle

西雅图。
Wǒ míng nián xiǎng qù Xī yǎ tú lǚ yóu.
I want to travel to Seattle next year.
西雅图。
Xī yǎ tú Shì yí gè měi lì de gǎng kǒu chéng shì.
Seattle is a beautiful port city.
西雅图。
Wǒ de péng you zhù zài Xī yǎ tú yǐ jīng sān nián le.
My friend has lived in Seattle for three years.

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.

西雅图 spells Seattle with 西雅图; the written syllables carry no meaning of their own here.

Sound-only characters

No reliable origin is recorded for this character.

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

隹牙雅

Meaning part形符xíngfú

隹隹zhuīa short-tailed bird

Sound part声符shēngfú

牙

Same sound today

雅 pairs 隹, a short-tailed bird, with 牙 as its sound part; the bird was a rook/crow, and the sense was extended to refined.

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

This origin belongs to the traditional form 圖; 图 is its simplified writing.

囗啚圖

The traditional form 圖 pairs 囗, a walled city, with 啚, an early form meaning remote areas or territory. The simplified 图 is a later abbreviation.

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