猫 (máo): to stoop; to bend over (bound,…

Meanings

1 to stoop; to bend over (bound, dialectal; only in 猫腰)

Characters

猫

máo

to stoop; to bend over (bound, dialectal; only in 猫腰)

Examples

HSK 6

你猫下腰钻过去。

Nǐ máo xià yāo zuān guòqù.

Stoop down a bit and crawl through the gap.

HSK 7-9

他猫着腰捡起掉在地上的钥匙。

Tā máo zhe yāo jiǎn qǐ diào zài dìshàng de yàoshi.

He bent over to pick up the dropped key.

Tips

register

The máo reading is northern-dialect colloquial and stays inside 猫腰 (to stoop or hunch over) - typically describing someone crouching to pass through a low opening or pick something up. The image is a cat arching low along the ground. Taiwan Mandarin keeps the same word but pronounces it māoyāo with the standard first tone; the rising-tone version is mainland-northern.

Components

radical

犭 quǎn

dog; animal (radical form of 犬)

Left-side animal radical, the side form of 犬. Used for most four-legged mammals despite the 'dog' name - 猫 (cat), 狮 (lion), 狐 (fox), 狼 (wolf), and 猴 (monkey) all carry it. Files cats with the broader animal kingdom rather than as a unique pictograph.

phonetic

苗 miáo

seedling; sprout

Right side 苗 supplies the sound (miáo → māo, just a tone shift) - classic Chinese onomatopoeia for 'meow'. 苗 itself is 艹 over 田 (a sprout in a field) and contributes nothing semantic; the cat-naming logic was 'whatever sounds like miāo'. Cute coincidence: seedlings sprout where cats hunt.