端 (duān): end; extremity; beginning

Meanings

1 end; extremity; beginning
2 to hold something level with both hands; to carry
3 upright; proper

Characters

端

duān

end; to hold level; upright

Examples

她端着一杯茶走过来。

Tā duān zhe yī bēi chá zǒuguò lái.

She walked over carrying a cup of tea.

桌子的另一端坐着他。

Zhuōzi de lìng yī duānzuò zhe tā.

He was sitting at the other end of the table.

请把菜端上来。

Qǐng bǎ cài duān shànglái.

Please bring the dishes to the table.

她坐得很端正。

Tā zuò de hěn duānzhèng.

She sits very upright.

Tips

usage

As a verb, 端 means to carry something carefully and level (e.g., a bowl of soup, a tray). You 端 things that would spill — you don't 端 a book, you 拿 a book.

memory

Picture holding a tray perfectly level with both hands — that's 端.

Components

radical

立 lì

to stand

Left stand radical, originally a person standing upright on the ground line. It supplies the meaning: standing straight, hence the 'upright, proper' senses of 端 (端正 upright, 端庄 dignified). It also anchors the 'extreme end' meaning — the upright extremity of something. Joins 站, 竞, 章 in the standing-up family.

phonetic

耑 duān

sprout; beginning

Right 耑 supplies the sound — exact match duān with no drift. 耑 itself originally pictured a sprouting plant with roots reaching down and shoot rising up, the very image of 'a beginning, a starting end'. That meaning bleeds richly into 端: the start or tip of something, an extremity. 端 is in fact the modern written form for what 耑 once meant alone.