shú
pronoun #16,054

Meanings

  1. 1 who; which; what

Examples

Shì kě rěn, shú bùkě rěn?
If this can be tolerated, what cannot?
自有公论
Shú shì shú fēi, zìyǒu gōnglùn.
Who is right and who is wrong - the public will judge.

Tips

register
is classical Chinese and only appears in set phrases in modern usage. Key phrases: 孰是孰非 (who's right, who's wrong), 孰能无过 (who can be without fault), 是可忍孰不可忍 (if this is tolerable, what isn't).

Components

phonetic
xiǎng
enjoy; offer
carries the original sound (later drifted to shú) and historically depicted a sacrificial hall offering food. In it preserves that ritual flavor - what is being cooked or offered, hence the early sense ripe/cooked before the borrowed who reading. Indexed under Kangxi #39 by tradition; no visible -element survives.
semantic
wán
ball; pellet
contributes the curved shape of a kneeling figure tending the offering; some readings treat it as a rounded morsel. Together with it pictures someone preparing cooked food, the original meaning before was borrowed for the interrogative who.

Filed under radical (zǐ, #39) by convention. is not a separate component in , so no strokes are highlighted.

Stroke Order

shú