勋 (xūn) · meritorious service, merit, decoration

Meanings

1 meritorious service
2 merit
3 decoration
4 order (award)

Characters

勋

xūn

merit; decoration

Examples

HSK 7-9

他因战功卓著而获得了勋章。

Tā yīn zhàngōng zhuózhù ér huòdé le xūnzhāng.

He was awarded a medal for his outstanding military merit.

HSK 7-9

这位将军功勋卓著。

Zhè wèi jiāngjūn gōngxūn zhuózhù.

This general has outstanding merit and contributions.

Tips

history

勋 is a classical character associated with military and civil honors in imperial and modern Chinese contexts. It appears in compounds like 勋章 (medal/decoration), 功勋 (meritorious service), and 勋爵 (lord, nobility title borrowed into Chinese).

Components

radical

力 lì

strength; force

Right side 力 is the indexing radical, picturing a flexed muscle or plough. Meritorious service is force expended for the state - earned through effort - so the strength radical does direct semantic work. Files 勋 with 功 merit, 努 strive, 助 aid in the effort-and-achievement family.

phonetic

员 yuán

member; staff

Left side 员 supplies the sound - yuán shifted to xūn in 勋's reading, an unusual drift inherited from the older traditional form 勳 where the phonetic was 熏. The simplified version swapped in 员 as a graphically lighter stand-in. The 'staff member' meaning isn't loaded into 勋.