颞

Right-side head radical - the simplified six-stroke form of the head pictograph. The indexing radical here, supplying the meaning: 颞 names the temple of the head and the underlying temporal bone, where the skull is thinnest. The radical anchors 颞 in the anatomy-of-the-head family along with 颅 skull, 颊 cheek, 额 forehead, 颈 neck.

Left side 聂 supplies the sound - niè read straight across with no shift. 聂 stacks one ear over a pair of ears, picturing whispered talk; modern surname Nie carries this character. A faint semantic match rides along: the temple is the strip of skull right beside the ear, so the ear-stack mirrors the bone's location.