癣 (xuǎn): ringworm

Meanings

1 ringworm
2 tinea (any fungal skin infection)

Characters

癣

xuǎn

ringworm; fungal skin disease (radical 疒 sickness, 19 strokes)

Examples

他的脚上长了癣。

Tā de jiǎo shàng zhǎng le xuǎn.

He has tinea (athlete's foot) on his feet.

癣是一种常见的皮肤病。

Xuǎn shì yì zhǒng chángjiàn de pífūbìng.

Ringworm is a common skin disease.

Tips

usage

癣 is the cover term for a family of fungal skin infections, named by location: 头癣 (head / scalp ringworm), 脚癣 (athlete's foot), 体癣 (body ringworm), 股癣 (jock itch). Note the 疒 (sickness) radical — present on most disease characters: 病, 疼, 疫, 癌.

Components

radical

疒 nè

sickness radical

Sickness radical wrapping the top-left — pictures a sick person on a bed. Indexes 癣 firmly in the disease family with 病, 疼, 痒, 疫, 疮. Every character capped by 疒 is something that ails the body; here it marks ringworm and related fungal skin conditions.

phonetic

鲜 xiān

fresh; bright

Inside 鲜 supplies the sound — xiān drifted to xuǎn, an irregular shift typical of older phono-semantic pairings. 鲜's own 'fresh fish + sheep' imagery contributes nothing semantic here; it is purely the sound peg holding the medical label together with 疒.