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解冻 (jiě dòng) — to thaw / to melt (ice, frozen food); to unfreeze (financial assets, funds); to ease / to relax (political tensions, restrictions)

Definition

Literal ‘undo-freeze’: thaws ice/frozen things, unfreezes assets, or eases political/relations tensions — same verb across physical and figurative senses.

verb
to thaw / to melt (ice, frozen food)to unfreeze (financial assets, funds)to ease / to relax (political tensions, restrictions)

Examples

  • ，解冻。
    Chūn tiān lái le, hé lǐ de bīng yǐ jīng kāi shǐ jiě dòng le.
    Spring has come, the ice in the river has started to thaw.
  • 解冻，。
    Zhèng fǔ jué dìng jiě dòng zhè bǐ zī jīn, zhī chí zhōng xiǎo qǐ yè fā zhǎn.
    The government decided to unfreeze these funds to support small and medium-sized enterprises.
  • ，。
    Liǎng guó guān xì jiě le dòng, kāi shǐ zhèng cháng wǎng lái.
    Relations between the two countries have thawed, and normal exchanges have begun.

Origin

Compound word
构词法gòucífǎ
动宾dòngbīnVerb + object

An action followed by what it acts on, fused into one word.

解jiěloosen
冻dòngfrozen state

To 解 'loosen or melt' the 冻 'frozen state'.

Characters in this word

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

解 shows 刀 (knife) separating 角 (horn) from 牛 (cow), giving the picture of cutting up an ox.

Open 解 →

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

This origin belongs to the traditional form 凍; 冻 is its simplified writing.

Meaning part形符xíngfú
冫Written in full as仌bīng
Sound part声符shēngfú
東
東dōng凍dòng
Same sound today

The traditional form 凍 pairs 冫 (ice) with 東 for the sound; the simplified 冻 is a later shorthand.

Open 冻 →
Appears in
Finance & BankingWeather

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