阱 (jǐng): pitfall; trap

Meanings

猎人在林子里挖了陷阱来捕野猪。

Lièrén zài línzilǐ wā le xiànjǐng lái bǔ yězhū.

The hunters dug pits in the woods to catch wild boar.

他差点掉进骗子的陷阱。

Tā chàdiǎn diàojìn piànzi de xiànjǐng.

He almost fell into the swindler's trap.

usage

阱 is a covered pit dug to trap animals, and figuratively a scheme to ensnare people. It almost always appears as 陷阱 (a trap).

radical

阝 zuǒěrdāo

mound; terrain (left form)

The left-side ear radical 阝 here stands for 阜 (a mound or earthwork), pointing to digging into the ground, which is how a pit-trap is made.

phonetic

井 jǐng

a well (here phonetic-semantic)

Right side 井 (a well) supplies the sound jǐng exactly, and its image of a dug shaft fits the trap-pit meaning perfectly.

阱 jǐng