涅

Left three-drop water radical - side-form of 水. Indexes 涅 in the wet-mineral family. The original meaning of 涅 was 'black mud at the bottom of a pond' - sediment used to dye cloth black or to tattoo skin. The water radical anchors that swampy origin. Same family: 染 (dye), 浸 (steep), 泥 (mud).

Right 圼 supplies the sound - niè unchanged. 圼 rarely stands alone - it stacks 日 (sun) over 土 (earth), used mainly as a phonetic here and in 捏 (pinch), 蹑 (tread lightly). Beyond the literal black-mud meaning, 涅 is famous through 涅槃 (niè pán), the transliteration of Sanskrit 'nirvāṇa' - the Buddhist state of extinction-and-release.