哭 (kū): to cry

Meanings

1 to cry
2 to weep

Characters

哭

kū

to cry; to weep

Examples

别哭了。

Bié kū le.

Don't cry.

她哭了一整天。

Tā kū le yīzhěngtiān.

She cried the whole day.

那个电影让我想哭。

Nàge diànyǐng ràngwǒ xiǎng kū.

That movie made me want to cry.

Tips

memory

The character 哭 looks like two eyes (the two 口-like shapes on top) with tears streaming down.

Components

radical

口 kǒu

mouth

Top-left 口 is one of two mouth-shapes paired across the top of 哭 — together they picture a face wailing with its eyes squeezed shut. Indexing radical (registered under 口 in the dictionary) and direct meaning-cue: crying is a mouth-action. Same family as 叫 (shout), 喊 (yell), 啼 (weep).

semantic

口 kǒu

mouth

Top-right 口 mirrors the left mouth — the doubled 口 reads as 'two open mouths/eyes wailing'. The standard modern mnemonic is to see the pair as eyes squeezed shut with tears streaming down, with 犬 below as the body. The doubled top is the visual core of 哭.

semantic

犬 quǎn

dog

Bottom 犬 depicts a dog. The original 哭 may have pictured a dog howling with two yelps above — the source of the 'wail' meaning. Modern teaching reads 犬 as the crying figure's body and the two 口 above as tearful eyes, but the dog-howl etymology is the historical anchor.