noun #4,237

Meanings

  1. 1 uncle (father's elder brother)
  2. 2 earl; count
  3. 3 senior; elder

Examples

Dàbó duì wǒ hěn hǎo.
My father's elder brother is very good to me.
Tā shì yī wèi bójué.
He is an earl.

Tips

usage
specifically refers to one's father's elder brother (大伯). The father's younger brother is . This distinction matters in Chinese kinship terms.
register
There is a colloquial reading bǎi, found in the spoken kinship word 大伯子 (a woman's husband's elder brother). Note the contrast: 大伯 (with bó) is the father's elder brother, while 大伯子 (with bǎi) is the brother-in-law. Everywhere else the character is read bó.

Components

radical
rén
person (left-side radical)
Left person radical, two strokes, the compressed standing-side form of . Anchors in the family-and-rank vocabulary: most radical chars name a kind of person, such as (you), (he), (servant), (companion). Tells the reader is a person, specifically a senior family member or noble title.
phonetic
bái
white; clear (phonetic)
Right phonetic supplies the sound (bái drifted to bó, a regular shortening). It pictures a thumbnail or grain of rice, then came to mean pale or plain. It adds a faint flavour: a white-haired one is what traditionally meant, the eldest paternal uncle, white-haired with age. Family: , , , , .

Stroke Order