zhù
verb #17,847

Meanings

  1. 1 to cast (metals)
  2. 2 to forge
  3. 3 to found

Examples

Gǔrén yòng tóng zhùzào qiánbì.
Ancient people cast coins from bronze.
Yī bù zǒu cuò, zhùchéng dà cuò.
One wrong step leads to a grave mistake.

Tips

usage
often appears in the idiom 铸成 (to make an irreversible mistake) — literally 'to cast a great error,' as cast metal cannot be easily undone.

Components

radical
jīn
metal (radical form of 金)
Metal radical on the left — the side-form of , the indexing radical. Casting is the original metalworking act: molten bronze poured into a mould. The radical anchors in the metallurgy family with (forge), (smelt), (silver), (copper).
phonetic
寿 shòu
longevity (here phonetic)
Right side 寿 is the simplified form supplying the sound (shòu → zhù with onset shift). The traditional had a fuller phonetic on the right, depicting the long, winding act of pouring metal — and casting a great bell was once seen as a way of fixing fame to outlast the maker, an early link between 'cast' and 'longevity'.

Stroke Order

zhù