bēi
adjective #12,825

Meanings

  1. 1 low
  2. 2 base
  3. 3 inferior
  4. 4 humble

Examples

Tā de xíngwéi fēicháng bēibǐ.
His behavior is extremely despicable.
Tā zǒngshì juéde zìbēi.
She always feels inferior.

Tips

usage
Rarely used alone; appears in compounds: 卑鄙 (despicable), 自卑 (inferiority complex), 卑微 (lowly), 谦卑 (humble/modest).

Components

radical
shí
ten (here a graphic remnant)
The bottom is the indexing radical but doesn't carry its 'ten' sense — it is the stylised handle of the ladle held by the hand above. Filing under is a Kangxi convenience; the real semantic load is the whole servant-holding-ladle image.
semantic
bái
white (here a graphic remnant)
The top looks like 'white' but is actually a stylised picture of a hand gripping a wine-server's ladle, with a short slash through it. Treat the shape as a memory hook — the original graph pictured a servant whose status was 'low', the modern meaning of .

Stroke Order

bēi