cāng
adjective #15,863

Meanings

  1. 1 dark blue
  2. 2 deep green
  3. 3 ash-gray
  4. 4 pale
  5. 5 vast

Examples

Cāngtiān bù fùyǒu xīn rén.
Heaven does not forsake those who try. (Proverb)
Tā de tóufa yǐjīng cāngbái le.
His hair has already turned gray/white.

Tips

usage
is literary and appears mainly in set phrases: 苍天 (heaven), 苍白 (pale), 苍老 (aged), 苍蝇 (fly, though unrelated in meaning). It conveys a sense of vastness, age, or muted color.

Components

radical
cǎo
grass; plant (radical form)
Top grass radical (the cap-form of ) — the indexing radical. Anchors in the plant family with grass, lush, indigo, 绿 green. Here the radical contributes the central colour image: names the deep blue-green of dense vegetation, sky, ocean — the colour of nature seen at scale.
phonetic
cāng
granary (here phonetic)
Bottom supplies the sound cāng, an exact match with no drift. The 'granary' sense plays no part in the meaning; pure sound peg here. Same phonetic powers (dark sea-blue), cabin, to grab, spear. and are near-twins, both evoking the vast blue-green expanse of nature.

Stroke Order

cāng