náng
noun #8,693

Meanings

  1. 1 bag; sack; pouch
  2. 2 pocket; purse

Examples

HSK 3
Tā bǎ suǒyǒu dōngxi dōu zhuāng jìn xíngnáng lǐ.
He packed everything into his travel bag.
HSK 7-9
Tā nángzhōng xiūsè, mǎibùqǐ zhège.
His pockets are empty - he can't afford this.
HSK 7-9
Zhōngguó duì nángkuò le suǒyǒu jīnpái.
The Chinese team swept all the gold medals.

Tips

usage
is literary and appears mostly in set phrases: 囊括 (to encompass/sweep), 囊中羞涩 (short of money, lit. 'embarrassed inside one's purse'), 行囊 (travel bag), 锦囊 (brocade bag - a clever strategy).

Components

radical
kǒu
mouth; sack opening
Top cluster centred on the small - the indexing radical, depicting the cinched mouth of a sack tied off with a lid stroke above and a horizontal binding below. Historical components have fused into this 5-stroke knot; treat it as one bag-mouth unit rather than splitting surrounding strokes.
phonetic
xiāng
to lift; to aid
Bottom supplies the sound - xiāng shifting to náng through nasal alternation. itself originally pictured someone hoisting and bundling cloth, so as phonetic here it doubles as a faint semantic hint: a heavy sack lifted up. The fullest stroke-block in the character, carrying most of the visual weight.

Stroke Order

náng