xiè
verb #31,216

Meanings

  1. 1 to profane
  2. 2 to disrespect
  3. 3 obscene
  4. 4 improperly familiar

Examples

HSK 7-9
Bùkě xièdú shénmíng.
One must not profane the gods.
HSK 7-9
Tā yòng xiènì de kǒuwěn gēn tā shuōhuà.
He spoke to her with an inappropriately familiar tone.

Tips

usage
rarely stands alone. You'll meet it inside compounds: 亵渎 (to blaspheme/profane), 猥亵 (obscene; to molest), 亵昵 (improperly intimate). The (clothing) component reflects its original meaning: 'underclothes' / 'home clothes,' i.e. private things, and from there, anything that crosses the line into the indecent.

Components

semantic
clothing; garment
Outer , pictograph of a robe with collar above and skirt panels below, wrapped around the inner element. Originally meant 'undergarments, intimate clothing', not to be displayed; from that came 'obscene, indecent.' Indexed under Kangxi #8 (tóu) by tradition, taken from the lid-like top strokes of .
phonetic
zhí
hold; manage
Inner sits inside the robe and supplies the sound (zhí to xiè, regular palatal drift across this phonetic series). itself pictures a hand grasping something firmly; here that imagery is incidental, though memorable: something held tightly under your clothes, exactly the indecency or private-impropriety meaning of .

Filed under radical (tóu, #8) by convention. is not a separate component in , so no strokes are highlighted.

Stroke Order

xiè