鸣

鳴
míng
verb HSK 7-9 #11,572

Meanings

  1. 1 to cry (of birds, animals, insects)
  2. 2 to make a sound
  3. 3 to voice (one's feelings)

Examples

HSK 6
Gōngjī zài qīngchén míngjiào.
The rooster crows at dawn.
HSK 7-9
Qìchē bùtíng de míngdí.
The car keeps honking its horn.

Tips

memory
鸣 contains 口 (mouth) and 鸟 (bird) - a bird opening its mouth to call out.

Components

radical
鸟 niǎo
bird (simplified from 鳥)
Right bird radical - the indexing radical, marking 鸣 as a bird-family word. Simplified 鸟 collapses traditional 鳥's eleven strokes into five. The whole character originally meant 'bird's cry'; only later did it extend to ringing bells, chiming clocks, sounding sirens - anything that makes itself heard.
semantic
口 kǒu
mouth
Left mouth 口 - the source of the sound. 鸣 is a compound ideograph (会意字): mouth plus bird equals 'bird call'. Originally written with 口 at the bird's beak, the picture is the open beak from which the cry issues. Pair with 叫 (call), 啼 (cry of birds/animals).

Stroke Order

鸣 míng