箔 (bó): foil (thin metal sheet)

Meanings

1 foil (thin metal sheet)
2 metal leaf (gold leaf, silver leaf)
3 plaited matting (of bamboo or rushes)
4 silkworm rearing tray (made of woven bamboo)

Characters

箔

bó

foil, leaf, woven matting

Examples

佛像贴满了金箔。

Fóxiàng tiē mǎnle jīnbó.

The Buddha statue is covered with gold leaf.

请用锡箔纸包好食物。

Qǐng yòng xībózhǐ bāo hǎo shíwù.

Please wrap the food in tin foil.

蚕农把蚕放在箔上养。

Cánnóng bǎ cán fàng zài bó shàng yǎng.

The silkworm farmer raises the silkworms on bamboo trays.

Tips

usage

Modern usage is dominated by metal-foil compounds: 金箔 (jīnbó, 'gold leaf'), 锡箔 (xībó, 'tinfoil'), 铝箔 (lǚbó, 'aluminum foil' — the kitchen kind), 锡箔纸 (tinfoil paper). The original sense — woven bamboo matting used as silkworm-rearing trays — survives mostly in agricultural / classical contexts.

memory

The 竹 (bamboo) radical on top is your clue to the original meaning: a bamboo mat. From there, the meaning generalized to 'thin sheet', and modern Mandarin reattached it to thin metal sheets — gold leaf, silver leaf, foil.