noun #13,193

Meanings

  1. 1 toilet; lavatory; restroom

Examples

Cèsuǒ zài nǎr?
Where is the restroom?
Qǐng bǎochí cèsuǒ gānjìng.
Please keep the restroom clean.

Tips

usage
Almost always used in the compound 厕所 (cèsuǒ). More polite alternatives: 洗手间 (xǐshǒujiān) or 卫生间 (wèishēngjiān).
register
Standard reading is cè. In some northern dialects is read sì, but only inside the word (máosi, an outhouse or latrine). Everywhere in standard Mandarin the reading is cè.

Components

radical
hǎn
cliff; shelter
is a cliff-overhang radical and depicts a small lean-to structure — appropriate for an outhouse, which is what originally named. Indexing radical here, even though the simplified is much sparser than traditional 's 广.
phonetic
rule; then
supplies the sound, drifting from zé to cè (z- to c- is a regular old-Chinese alternation). appears in many phono-semantic compounds — cè (side), cè (measure), cè all share both phonetic and tone.

Stroke Order