yǎn
noun

Meanings

  1. 1 (used in place names) Yan, as in 兖州 Yanzhou
  2. 2 (classical) one of the Nine Provinces of ancient China

Examples

Yǎn zhōu shì Shāndōng de yīgè gǔ dìmíng.
Yanzhou is an old administrative region in Shandong.

Tips

history
has almost no standalone use today. It survives chiefly in , a district of Jining in Shandong, and as the name of one of the legendary Nine Provinces (九州) listed in the ancient geography.
register
Classical / proper-noun only — you meet in old geography and place names, not in everyday speech.

Components

ideograph
liù
graphic top portion (no number meaning here)
The top is written like but carries no 'six' meaning — it is a stylized cap shape. Indexed under Kangxi radical (legs) by tradition; the radical is the bottom element, not visibly meaningful in the modern form.
phonetic
yǔn
to permit; sincere
The lower is the sound element. The reading drifted from yǔn to yǎn, a common kind of phonetic-series shift; contributes no meaning here.

Filed under radical (ér) by convention. is not a separate component in , so no strokes are highlighted.

Stroke Order

yǎn