酌 (zhuó) · to pour wine, to drink wine, to deliberate

Meanings

1 to pour wine
2 to drink wine
3 to deliberate
4 to consider carefully

Characters

酌

zhuó

to pour wine, to consider

Examples

HSK 4

二人对酌，谈笑风生。

Èr rén duì zhuó, tánxiào-fēngshēng.

The two drank together, chatting and laughing merrily.

HSK 5

请酌情处理这件事。

Qǐng zhuóqíng chǔlǐ zhè jiàn shì.

Please handle this matter at your own discretion.

Tips

usage

In modern Chinese, 酌 rarely appears alone. It is most common in formal written compounds: 酌情 (at one's discretion), 斟酌 (to weigh up/deliberate), and 对酌 (to drink together).

Components

radical

酉 yǒu

wine vessel

Left 酉 - pictograph of a narrow-necked wine jar with liquid inside. The indexing radical that puts 酌 in the alcohol family alongside 酒, 醉, 醋, 酱. Everything in this family involves fermented liquid being poured or aged in a jug.

semantic

勺 sháo

ladle; spoon

Right 勺 - pictograph of a ladle with a single dot for the liquid inside. Combined with the wine jar on the left, the image is literally 'ladling wine from a jar' - the etymological scene that gave 酌 its meanings 'to pour wine, drink, deliberate.' Faint phonetic echo too: sháo drifted to zhuó.