jīng
noun #12,219

Measure Word

一头 tóu

Meanings

  1. 1 whale

Examples

Wǒmen zài hǎishàng kàndào le yītóu jīng.
We saw a whale at sea.
Lán jīng shì shìjiè shàng zuì dà de dòngwù.
The blue whale is the largest animal in the world.

Tips

usage
is often combined with as 鲸鱼 (jīngyú) in everyday speech, even though whales are mammals, not fish.

Components

radical
fish
Left — pictograph of a fish, simplified from with the four bottom strokes flattened into one horizontal. As the indexing radical it carries the meaning: ancient Chinese classified whales as giant fish (only modern science reclassifies them as mammals). Family: shark, carp, eel.
phonetic
jīng
capital (here phonetic)
Right supplies the full sound — jīng read identically in the parent. There is also a faint semantic boost: originally pictured a tall watchtower, and a whale is the tallest, vastest creature of the sea — same scaling-up imagery. Same phonetic powers cool, scenery, oak.

Stroke Order

jīng