玉 (yù): jade

Measure Word

一块玉 kuài

Meanings

1 jade
2 gem; precious stone

Characters

玉

yù

jade; precious stone

Looks like 王 (king) with a dot, jade was the king's stone.

Examples

HSK 4

中国人喜欢戴玉。

Zhōngguórén xǐhuan dài yù.

Chinese people like to wear jade.

HSK 5

玉是中国文化的象征。

Yù shì Zhōngguó wénhuà de xiàngzhēng.

Jade is a symbol of Chinese culture.

HSK 7-9

这块玉很值钱。

Zhè kuài yù hěn zhíqián.

This piece of jade is very valuable.

Tips

culture

Jade holds a status in Chinese culture comparable to gold or diamonds in the West. The character 玉 appears in many names and idioms. 抛砖引玉 ('throw a brick to attract jade') means to offer a modest idea hoping to inspire a better one.

history

The radical 玉 (king + dot) appears in many gem-related characters: 珠 (pearl), 琴 (musical instrument), 理 (reason, originally meant the veins in jade).

Components

semantic

王 wáng

strung jade discs

Three horizontals strung on a vertical cord, originally a pictograph of jade discs threaded together. The character 王 'king' descends from the same shape; 玉 is the older meaning.

ideograph

丶 zhǔ

distinguishing dot

Small dot on the lower right, the only thing that separates 玉 (jade) from 王 (king), which are otherwise identical.

Radical

Jade Kangxi #96

Hugely productive — marks characters about jade, gemstones, and precious objects. Inside compounds it almost always appears in its dot-less form 王 on the left (玉字旁): 玩 (play), 现 (appear, originally polishing jade), 珍 (precious), 玻 (glass), 球 (ball). Strong meaning clue when you see the left-side 王 shape.