冥 (míng) · dark; dim

Meanings

1 dark; dim
2 the underworld; the netherworld
3 deep; profound

Characters

冥

míng

dark; underworld; profound

Examples

HSK 1

她坐在那里冥想。

Tā zuò zài nàlǐ míngxiǎng.

She sat there meditating.

HSK 5

他在冥冥之中感到一种力量。

Tā zài míngmíng zhīzhōng gǎndào yī zhǒng lìliàng.

He felt a mysterious force in the unseen.

Tips

usage

冥 often appears in compound words: 冥想 (meditation), 冥冥 (mysterious/unseen), 冥界 (underworld). It carries a sense of darkness, depth, and the supernatural.

memory

The character has 冖 (cover) on top and 日 (sun) - the sun covered up, hence darkness and the unseen world.

Components

radical

冖 mì

cover; lid

Top cover radical, a wide horizontal lid with a tiny tick on the left edge - a cloth thrown over something to hide it. It supplies the central image of 冥: covered, hidden, dark, obscured. The radical alone tells you this character lives in the dark-and-covered family alongside 写, 军, 冠 (though those use the related 冖 differently).

semantic

日 rì

sun

Middle sun radical, a pictograph of the sun with a central stroke. Its placement is the whole point: the sun is trapped between the cover above and the supporting element below - the sun has gone under, occluded. From this image the senses 'dark, obscure, hidden, the underworld' all flow naturally. 冥 is night thought of as something covering daylight.

semantic

六 liù

six (here graphic)

Bottom 六 here is graphic rather than 'six' in meaning - it traces back to 廾 (two hands lifting) which fused into the modern 六-shape over time. The original picture was a cover thrown over the sun by a pair of hands, hence 'to cover up, darken'. Today the bottom is conventionally read as 六; the lifting-hands etymology is preserved only in the silhouette.