吏 (lì) · government official (historical), minor official

Meanings

1 government official (historical)
2 minor official
3 functionary

Characters

吏

lì

official, functionary

Examples

HSK 7-9

古代的地方官吏负责征收赋税。

Gǔdài de dìfāng guānlì fùzé zhēngshōu fùshuì.

Local officials in ancient times were responsible for collecting taxes.

HSK 7-9

他在县衙做了一名小吏。

Tā zài xiàn yá zuò le yī míng xiǎo lì.

He served as a minor official at the county magistrate's office.

Tips

history

In imperial China, 吏 (lì) referred to minor clerks and functionaries, distinct from 官 (guān), the appointed officials. 官吏 together means the officialdom as a whole.

memory

吏 looks like 史 (history/historian) with an extra stroke - officials were the ones who recorded and enacted history.

Components

radical

口 kǒu

mouth

Lower 口 - mouth radical, the indexing radical of 吏. In the original picture it represents the tablet or container of brush-records held below the hand, with the mouth-shape later reanalyzed as 'the official's mouth that proclaims orders.' The mid-level government clerk is the one who speaks the law to the people, hence the radical assignment.

semantic

丈 zhàng

elder; here a graphic residue (was hand-holding-brush)

Top three strokes look like 丈 today but originally pictured a hand gripping an implement - the same upper element shared by 史 (historian) and 事 (affair). The hand grasps a brush or tablet, the tool of the literate clerk who is the original 吏. Visual overlap below makes 吏 a fused compound rather than a clean stack.