p8nda
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粪

糞
fèn
noun HSK 7-9 #8,826

Meanings

  1. 1 manure
  2. 2 dung
  3. 3 excrement

Examples

农民用牛粪做肥料。
Nóngmín yòng niúfèn zuò féiliào.
Farmers use cow dung as fertilizer.
粪便需要妥善处理。
Fènbiàn xūyào tuǒshàn chǔlǐ.
Excrement needs to be properly handled.

Components

radical
米 mǐ
rice; grain
Top rice radical — the indexing radical. Etymologically the top was 釆 (animal tracks, the source of 番), reanalyzed into 米 in the modern shape. The image is that of undigested grain in animal droppings — a bluntly literal compound ideograph for 'manure'. Pair with 屎 (excrement).
semantic
共 gòng
together; both hands holding (here semantic)
Bottom 共 — two hands lifting an object up. In 粪 it depicts the act of two hands sweeping up the night soil with a dustpan, giving the original verb sense 'to sweep clean'. The classical 粪除 'to sweep away' preserves this meaning; the noun 'manure' grew out of what was being swept.

Stroke Order

粪 fèn