发 (fā): to send; to send out; to dispat…

Meanings

1 to send; to send out; to dispatch
2 to issue; to release
3 to show (a feeling); to give off
4 to develop; to flourish
5 to make a fortune; to get rich
6 classifier for gunshots (rounds)

Characters

发

fā

to send out; to issue; to develop

Examples

我给你发一条消息。

Wǒ gěi nǐ fā yī tiáo xiāoxi.

I'll send you a message.

他发了财。

Tā fā le cái.

He made a fortune.

老师发了三发子弹。

Lǎoshī fā le sān fā zǐdàn.

The instructor fired three rounds.

Tips

usage

fā 发 is one of the most productive verbs in Mandarin — pairs with almost anything to mean send/issue/develop/show: 发现 (discover), 发生 (happen), 发展 (develop), 发明 (invent), 发音 (pronunciation), 发烧 (run a fever).

mistakes

发 is a polyphone: fā for the verb "to send / develop / get rich" (traditional 發), but fà for the noun "hair" (traditional 髮). The 1956 reform merged two separate traditional characters into one simplified shape, so pinyin alone tells you which sense is meant.

Components

radical

又 yòu

right hand; again

Inner 又 is the hand radical and the entry's filing point — also one of the few intact pieces of the original 發. It pictures the hand drawing and releasing the bowstring; the whole character means send out, dispatch, emit, launch as a result.

ideograph

发 fā

send out; emit (upper fused body)

Stylised launching-the-arrow silhouette framing the right-hand 又; the strokes no longer decompose into standalone CJK pieces and function as a single fused residue. Historically the heavily simplified remnant of traditional 發's bow-and-arrow top plus the 癶 splayed-feet element, collapsed in the 1956 reform.