verb #18,997

Meanings

  1. 1 to bind
  2. 2 to tie up
  3. 3 to fetter
  4. 4 to restrain

Examples

Tā bèi shéngzi jǐnjǐn fù zhù, wúfǎ dòngtan.
He was tightly bound with rope and could not move.
Bùyào bèi jiù guānniàn shùfù, yào yǒngyú chuàngxīn.
Don't be shackled by old ideas — dare to innovate.

Tips

usage
is often seen in 束缚 (shùfù, to bind/shackle) and the idiom 作茧自缚 (zuò jiǎn zì fù, 'spinning a cocoon around oneself' — trapped by one's own doing).

Components

radical
silk; thread (left-side radical of 糸)
Left silk radical, the simplified 3-stroke form of . Indexes in the threads-and-cords family ( rope, 线 thread, weave) and supplies the meaning: binding someone with cord or ribbon, hence the extended sense of fettering or restraining.
phonetic
to spread out (here phonetic)
Right — a hand spreading something out — supplies the sound fū → fù. The same phonetic frame sits inside broad, tutor, to grapple, here. Knowing unlocks the whole bó/fù family of readings.

Stroke Order