灿 (càn): bright

Meanings

1 bright
2 brilliant
3 resplendent

Characters

灿

càn

bright, brilliant

Examples

HSK 2

她笑得很灿。

Tā xiào de hěn càn.

Her smile is dazzling.

HSK 7-9

阳光灿烂，正是出游的好天气。

Yángguāng cànlàn, zhèngshì chūyóu de hǎo tiānqì.

The sunshine is brilliant, perfect weather for an outing.

Tips

usage

灿 almost always appears in the compound 灿烂 (cànlàn, brilliant/splendid). On its own it's mostly used as a name character or in literary fragments. The traditional form 燦 has the 火 (fire) radical highlighting the 'glow' meaning.

Components

radical

火 huǒ

fire

Left fire radical - pictograph of rising flames. Anchors 灿 in the heat-and-light family with 烧 to burn, 烤 to roast, 烂 brilliant, 炼 to refine. Carries the meaning directly: to be 灿 is to blaze with light, like a flame catching brightly. Common in 灿烂 brilliant, dazzling.

phonetic

山 shān

mountain (here phonetic)

Right 山 - the simplified form's phonetic, replacing the heavier traditional 粲 (white rice) of 燦. Supplies the sound shān to càn via initial alternation. 山 itself pictures three peaks; here it carries no mountain meaning, just a compact three-stroke phonetic stand-in. The pre-1956 character kept the older 'white-rice glow' imagery.