颜 (yán): face; countenance

Meanings

1 face; countenance
2 color; hue
3 prestige; reputation

Characters

颜

yán

face; color; countenance

Examples

你喜欢什么颜色？

Nǐ xǐhuan shénme yánsè?

What color do you like?

她的颜值很高。

Tā de yánzhí hěn gāo.

She is very good-looking. (lit: Her face value is high.)

五颜六色的气球。

Wǔyán-liùsè de qìqiú.

Colorful balloons.

Tips

usage

颜 is mainly used in 颜色 (color). Also in: 颜值 (attractiveness score, internet slang), 五颜六色 (colorful, idiom). 颜值 has become hugely popular in modern Chinese internet culture.

Components

radical

页 yè

head; page

Head radical on the right — simplified from the traditional form — marks 颜 as a face/head word. Originally pictured a kneeling person with an emphasized head. Same radical drives the entire face-family: 颊 (cheek), 顶 (crown), 项 (nape), 颈 (neck), 额 (forehead).

phonetic

彦 yàn

talented man; scholar

彦 supplies the sound — yàn → yán — through a tone shift, and adds faint semantic loading: a scholar's distinguished face. Same 彦 phonetic also appears in 谚 (proverb). The element pictures a forehead 文 with descending hair-strokes 彡 below — itself a face-related composition.