旬 (xún): a period of ten days

Meanings

1 a period of ten days
2 one-third of a month
3 a decade of age (in expressions like 六旬, sixty years old)

Characters

旬

xún

ten-day period; ten years (in age)

Examples

HSK 4

上旬天气较好，下旬会有降雨。

Shàngxún tiānqì jiào hǎo, xiàxún huì yǒu jiàngyǔ.

The weather will be fine in the first ten days, but there will be rain in the last ten days.

HSK 5

他已年届六旬，即将退休。

Tā yǐ nián jiè liù xún, jíjiāng tuìxiū.

He has reached his sixties and is about to retire.

Tips

usage

Traditional Chinese calendar divides each month into three periods of ten days: 上旬 (days 1-10), 中旬 (days 11-20), and 下旬 (days 21-end of month). Also used for decades of age: 七旬老人 = a septuagenarian.

Components

radical

日 rì

sun; day

日 (sun / day) sits inside the wrap as the indexing radical. The compound reads as days bundled together - a 旬 is a unit of ten days in the traditional calendar (上旬, 中旬, 下旬 divide a month). Also used for ten-year periods of a life (七旬老人).

semantic

勹 bāo

wrap; enclose

勹 (wrap) curls around the outside, framing the day inside. The image is a ten-day cycle gathered up like an embrace - one wrapping of the calendar wheel. The same enclosing shape appears in 包, 句, 匀 and 勿.