xià
verb HSK 1 #83

Meanings

  1. 1 down
  2. 2 below
  3. 3 under
  4. 4 next
  5. 5 to go down

Examples

Qǐng zuò xià.
Please sit down.
Xià gè yuè wǒ qù Zhōngguó.
I'm going to China next month.
Cóng shān shàng zǒu xiàlái.
Walk down from the mountain.

Tips

grammar
as a directional complement means downward or completion: (sit down), (put down), (write down).
usage
meaning 'next' pairs with time words: (next month), 下次 (next time), 下周 (next week).

Components

radical
one; horizontal line; reference
Top horizontal — the reference line, the 'ground' against which the lower mark is positioned. This is the indexing radical. The same line-as-reference logic appears in (mark above the line), (negation below the line), and the pair forms the most basic spatial-indicator system in Chinese.
ideograph
mark below; downward indicator
Below the reference line — a vertical with a small tick, an abstract downward-pointing mark (the shape happens to coincide with the divination character , but here it has no oracle meaning). The whole character is a pure ideograph: 'something positioned below', the mirror of .

Stroke Order

xià