皂 (zào): soap

Measure Word

一块皂 kuài

Meanings

1 soap
2 black (literary)
3 the color black

Characters

皂

zào

soap / black

Examples

请用肥皂把手洗干净。

Qǐng yòng féizào bǎshǒu xǐ gānjìng.

Please wash your hands clean with soap.

他不分青红皂白就发火了。

Tā bùfēnqīnghóngzàobái jiù fāhuǒ le.

He flew into a rage without distinguishing right from wrong.

Tips

history

皂 originally referred to 皂斗 (zàodǒu) — acorns/oak nuts whose shells were boiled to produce a black dye. From 'black' the meaning extended to soap (which historically often was dark). The famous chengyu 不分青红皂白 (bù fēn qīng hóng zào bái, 'not distinguishing greens, reds, blacks and whites') means acting without considering right and wrong.

usage

On its own 皂 is rare in modern speech; most often you'll see it in 肥皂 (féizào, soap), 香皂 (xiāngzào, scented soap / bar soap), and the idiom above.

Components

radical

白 bái

white

白 is the indexing radical — ironically, since 皂 means black. It originally pointed to the white acorn cup or similar plant matter used to dye cloth black, with the dye-source standing in for the resulting colour. Same path as 黑-via-soot.

semantic

七 qī

seven; (here) graphic residue

The bottom is shaped like 七 but is historically 匕 — an angled hooking stroke depicting the sap or dye drawn from the acorn cup above. The two-stroke residue marks the drip; together with 白 it builds a tree-product-yields-black-dye picture.