辕 (yuán): shaft (of a cart or carriage)

Meanings

1 shaft (of a cart or carriage)
2 (by extension) government office; yamen gate

Characters

辕

yuán

cart shaft

Examples

马被套在两根车辕之间。

Mǎ bèi tào zài liǎng gēn chēyuán zhījiān.

The horse was harnessed between the two shafts.

想去南方却南辕北辙。

Xiǎng qù nánfāng què nányuánběizhé.

To want to go south but drive the shafts north — heading the wrong way.

Tips

culture

辕 is the wooden shaft of a cart. The idiom 南辕北辙 — 'shafts pointed south but tracks running north' — describes acting in a way that defeats your own goal.

Components

radical

车 chē

cart; vehicle

The vehicle radical on the left, a simplified picture of a cart seen from above. It marks the character as a part of a cart — here the draft shaft. It groups 辕 with 轮, 轴, and 辙.

phonetic

袁 yuán

phonetic component

Supplies the sound, read identically as yuán. It works purely as a pronunciation marker; the same element gives 园 and 猿 their reading.