砍 (kǎn): to chop

Meanings

1 to chop
2 to hack
3 to cut down
4 to slash

Characters

砍

kǎn

to chop; to hack

Examples

他用斧头砍树。

Tāyòng fǔtóu kǎn shù.

He chopped the tree with an axe.

别砍价了，已经很便宜了。

Bié kǎnjià le, yǐjīng hěn piányi le.

Stop haggling, it’s already very cheap.

他把木头砍成两半。

Tā bǎ mùtou kǎn chéng liǎng bàn.

He chopped the wood in half.

Tips

usage

砍价 (kǎnjià) is a common colloquial expression meaning 'to haggle/bargain' — literally 'to chop the price.'

Components

radical

石 shí

stone

Left stone radical — pictograph of a rock face (top 厂 = cliff overhang) with a boulder 口 fallen below. Anchors 砍 in the stone-tool family alongside 破 (break), 碎 (smash), 砸 (pound). The original 砍 named the action of working stone with a stone axe — chopping, hacking.

phonetic

欠 qiàn

to yawn; lack (here phonetic)

Right 欠 supplies the sound — qiàn drifted to kǎn through a regular Old Chinese k/q alternation. 欠 itself depicts a person leaning over with mouth open (yawning, sighing, owing). Same phonetic in 砍's near-twin 坎 kǎn (pit), 嵌 qiàn (inlay). Pure phonetic loan; the 'yawn' meaning contributes nothing semantic.