昆

kūn
noun #12,083

Meanings

  1. 1 descendant; offspring
  2. 2 elder brother

Examples

HSK 5
Kūnmíng shì Yúnnán shěng de shěnghuì.
Kunming is the capital of Yunnan Province.
HSK 5
Kūnchóng zhǒnglèi fēicháng fēngfù.
There are very many species of insects.

Tips

usage
昆 is rarely used alone in modern Chinese. It mainly appears in compounds like 昆虫 (insect), 昆明 (Kunming), and 昆仑 (Kunlun Mountains).

Components

radical
日 rì
sun; day
Top sun radical - a pictograph of the sun, square in the small-seal style. In 昆 it carries the meaning of light and many - under one sun the whole crowd is gathered. Indexes 昆 in the same family as 晶 sparkling, 昌 prosperous, 昔 in the past.
semantic
比 bǐ
to compare; two people side by side
Bottom 比 - two people standing side by side, mirroring each other. Combined with the sun above, the picture is a crowd lined up under the same sky, which gave 昆 its core sense of 'multitude, together, elder of paired siblings.' Also yields 昆虫 the swarming family of insects.

Stroke Order

昆 kūn