lǒu
noun #32,577

Measure Word

Meanings

  1. 1 basket (woven from bamboo or wicker)

Examples

HSK 7-9
废纸字纸篓
Tā bǎ fèizhǐ rēng jìn le zìzhǐlǒu.
He tossed the scrap paper into the wastepaper basket.
HSK 7-9
Yúfū bēizhe yī gè yúlǒu huí jiā.
The fisherman went home with a fish creel on his back.

Tips

memory
has (bamboo) on top - the radical signals what it's made of. Common compounds: 字纸篓 (wastepaper basket), 鱼篓 (fish creel), 竹篓 (bamboo basket), 油篓 (oil-storage wicker container).

Components

radical
zhú
bamboo (top radical form of 竹)
Top bamboo radical (Kangxi #118 in its compressed 6-stroke top form). Anchors in the bamboo-basketry family: (basket), (square basket), (cage), (chapter - bamboo strip). Most Chinese baskets were woven from split bamboo, and the radical states the material upfront. specifically denotes a tall narrow-mouthed basket - for carrying fish, vegetables, or waste-paper (字纸篓).
phonetic
lóu
star name; basket-like (here phonetic)
Bottom supplies the sound - lóu shifted to lǒu, only tone differs. also lends a faint semantic flavour: it originally meant 'hollow, empty, basket-like' (and survives in 娄子 'mess' and the star-mansion name 娄宿). Same phonetic gives (multi-storey building), (hug), (count), (mole cricket).

Stroke Order

lǒu