guǐ
component #12,251

Meanings

  1. 1 rail
  2. 2 track
  3. 3 course
  4. 4 orbit

Examples

Guǐdào
track; orbit; trajectory
Dìtiě guǐdào
subway tracks

Tips

usage
vehicle + nine — vehicles following a set course

Components

radical
chē
vehicle; cart
Left (simplified from ) is the cart radical, indexing everything wheeled — wheel, to turn, measure word for vehicles. The traditional was a bird's-eye drawing of a chariot with axle and wheels; the simplified form keeps only the silhouette but the meaning still drives 's family of road and rail words.
phonetic
jiǔ
nine
Right supplies the sound — jiǔ drifting to guǐ via the old k/g initial cluster, the same shift behind , , in their older readings. The 'nine' meaning is irrelevant; is a pure sound-tag. The full picture: a cart with a phonetic marker, naming the cart's track — what we now read as 轨道, axis or orbit.

Stroke Order

guǐ