zǎn
noun

Meanings

  1. 1 a surname
  2. 2 (archaic) I; me (in old drama dialect)

Examples

Cūnlǐ zhù zhe yí wèi xìng Zǎn de lǎoxiānsheng.
There is an old gentleman surnamed Zan living in the village.

Tips

history
is essentially a surname today; it has no general-word use in modern Chinese. In Yuan and Ming drama it was also written for meaning 'I / me'. Built on the 'sun' radical, you meet it as a family name or in old play scripts.
register
Onomastic and archaic only. Outside the surname, survives only in old vernacular drama.

Components

radical
sun; day
The 'sun' element at the bottom is the indexing radical of , placing it in sun/day radical lookups even though the meaning is unrelated.
phonetic
chù
place; (here) graphic top
The upper part is a stylized element that supplies the rough sound of ; it does not carry meaning here.

Stroke Order

zǎn