解 (xiè) · Xie (surname)

Meanings

1 Xie (surname)
2 skill; technique (esp. in martial arts; bound in 解数)
3 acrobatic display, esp. on horseback (archaic)

Characters

解

xiè

Xie (surname)

Examples

HSK 3

解老师是我们学校的校长。

Xiè lǎoshī shì wǒmen xuéxiào de xiàozhǎng.

Mr Xie is the principal of our school.

HSK 7-9

他使出浑身解数也没能赢得比赛。

Tā shǐ chū húnshēnxièshù yě méi néng yíngdé bǐsài.

He used every trick in his repertoire but still couldn't win the match.

Tips

register

Two distinct xiè uses to remember. As a surname, 解 is uncommon but real - never read a person named 解 as jiě. As a noun, xiè only survives in 解数 (a martial-arts move; by extension, every skill one has), almost always inside the idiom 浑身解数 ('every trick at one's disposal'). The 'acrobatic display' sense is archaic; you won't meet it outside historical texts.

Components

radical

角 jiǎo

horn

Horn radical on the left - the indexing radical and the focus of the action. 解 is one of the classic 会意 (compound-meaning) characters: the horn is the part being detached. The same radical also heads 触 (touch with horn) and 觉 (perceive).

semantic

刀 dāo

knife

Knife in the upper-right - the tool doing the cutting. Together with 角 (horn) and 牛 (ox) below, the picture is a butcher dismembering an ox: horn + knife + ox = to break apart. From this concrete butchery sense came every 'undoing' use - solving, explaining, untying.

semantic

牛 niú

ox

Ox at the bottom-right - the body being divided. The ancient cook of 庄子's 庖丁解牛 fable inhabits this character: he carves the ox so skilfully the blade never dulls. Whenever you see 解, recall the three-element scene - horn, knife, ox - and 'separate / untangle / solve' falls out naturally.