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量

liàng / liáng
noun #3,230

Meanings

  1. 1 quantity; amount; volume
  2. 2 capacity; tolerance
  3. 3 to estimate; to gauge
  4. 4 classifier (measure word) — abbr. of 量词

Examples

质量比数量更重要。
Zhìliàng bǐ shùliàng gèng zhòngyào.
Quality is more important than quantity.
他的酒量很大。
Tā de jiǔliàng hěn dà.
He can hold his liquor well.
去年的粮食产量创了纪录。
Qùnián de liángshí chǎnliàng chuàng le jìlù.
Last year's grain output set a record.

Tips

usage
The liàng reading is the noun reading — 'amount, quantity, capacity'. It anchors most of the high-frequency compounds: 数量 (quantity), 质量 (quality / mass), 重量 (weight), 能量 (energy), 尽量 (as much as possible). A few common compounds drop the tone to neutral 量 — 力量, 份量, 商量, 打量, 思量 — but these are still the 'quantity / weigh up' sense, just unstressed.
memory
Modern internet 量 — 流量 (web traffic, also a person's clout), 流量明星 (a star whose value is measured purely in click-count), 播放量 (play count), 点赞量 (likes), 阅读量 (reads). When you see -量 on a noun in social media context, read it as 'count of'.

Components

radical
里 lǐ
village; inside; mile
Bottom indexing radical 里 (Kangxi #166) — historically depicted a field plus earth, then 'lined-out village.' In 量 the lower 里 is a graphic residue of the body of the measuring vessel below its mouth. The pairing gives the picture of a calibrated container — exactly 'quantity / amount.' Same radical anchors 重 (heavy / weight), tightly related to measuring.
semantic
旦 dàn
dawn; sun above horizon
Top 5 strokes — graphically 旦 (sun above the horizon), but historically the top of an ancient measuring vessel: a 日-shaped opening with a horizontal lid. The whole 量 originally depicted a graduated container used to measure grain, with the 日 representing the open mouth from above. Read this slot as the vessel's mouth, not literally 'dawn.'

Stroke Order

量 liàng