并 (bìng): and; furthermore; also

Meanings

1 and; furthermore; also
2 together with; simultaneously
3 to combine; to merge; to amalgamate
4 (not) at all; by no means

Characters

并

bìng

and; together; combine

Examples

事情并不简单。

Shìqing bìng bù jiǎndān.

The matter is not simple at all.

我并没有说过这样的话。

Wǒ bìng méiyǒu shuō guo zhèyàng de huà.

I never said anything like that at all.

他们并肩作战。

Tāmen bìngjiān zuòzhàn.

They fought shoulder to shoulder.

两家公司决定合并。

Liǎng jiā gōngsī juédìng hébìng.

The two companies decided to merge.

Tips

grammar

The high-frequency pattern is 并 + negative (并不, 并没有, 并非). It does not strengthen the negation by degree — it signals that the negation runs counter to expectation, like English 'actually not' or 'not at all (despite what you might think)'.

usage

As a conjunction ('and; moreover'), 并 is formal and leans written. In everyday speech use 而且 or 并且. As a verb ('combine; merge; annex'), 并 is bound — it appears inside compounds (合并, 兼并, 吞并) rather than as a free standalone verb.

register

Read as 并 (first tone) only in the rare proper-noun sense — the short name for Taiyuan 太原, capital of Shanxi, dating back to the ancient Bingzhou prefecture. Nearly all modern usage is 并 (fourth tone); the Bīng reading turns up mainly in historical or literary contexts.

Components

ideograph

丷 bā

two splayed strokes (split marker)

The top two splayed strokes — an abstract cap also seen on 关, 半, 兰. Historically 并 pictured two people standing side by side; the simplified form trims the figures down to these two parallel strokes capping the body below.

semantic

开 kāi

open (here: graphic body shape)

The bottom 4-stroke body — graphically identical to standalone 开 (open), but here functioning as the stylised lower halves of two parallel figures rather than carrying the 'open' meaning. Together with the 丷 top this gives the side-by-side silhouette behind 并's senses of 'parallel, combine, and (also)'. Indexed under Kangxi #51 干 by tradition, though no shield-element survives in the modern form.

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