尘 (chén): dust

Meanings

1 dust
2 dirt
3 this world (Buddhist)

Characters

尘

chén

dust; dirt

Examples

桌子上落了一层尘。

Zhuōzi shàng luò le yī céng chén.

A layer of dust settled on the table.

风把尘吹了起来。

Fēng bǎ chén chuīle qǐlái.

The wind blew up the dust.

Tips

usage

尘 is more literary; 灰尘 (huichen) is the common everyday word for 'dust'. 尘 also appears in Buddhist terms like 红尘 (the mortal world).

memory

Simplified 尘 = 小 (small) + 土 (earth) = small bits of earth = dust.

Components

radical

小 xiǎo

small; tiny

Top indexing radical 小 (Kangxi #42) — three strokes meaning 'small.' Sits above 土 (earth) to give a transparent ideograph: small + earth = tiny grains of dust. Same radical anchors 少, 尔. The PRC simplified 尘 from traditional 塵 (deer-over-earth, kicked-up dust); the modern form is a clean compound ideograph crafted in 1956.

semantic

土 tǔ

earth; soil

Bottom 小 (Kangxi #42, xiǎo) — small. Combined with 土 below the picture is 'tiny pieces of earth' — exactly dust. The Buddhist sense 'this dusty world' (红尘) comes from extending the metaphor: mortal life is fine particles drifting in the air. 小 here is the indexing radical.