The character 美 (měi): beautiful

A hillside meadow at sunrise: flowered green grass, blue grey hills, a golden sky with the sun on the horizon. At the left an orange figure faces us, arms spread wide, in a patterned robe with fringed sleeves and a fret belt, wearing a tall headdress of two ivory ram horns curling outward and cream and gold feathers standing between them. At the right the character 美 in near black: two short strokes on top, three bars crossed by a stem, then a wider bar and two strokes crossing below.

Pronunciation: měi
Strokes: 9
Radical: 羊
Made of: 羊大

What it means

beautiful; very satisfactory; good; to beautify; to be pleased with oneself

Where its shape comes from

Two readings share this character, and the reference works print them side by side. Xu Shen analyses it as 羊 plus 大 and glosses it as tasty: a big sheep is good to eat, and beauty is a matter of the tongue before it is a matter of the eye. Palaeographers read the ancient forms otherwise, as a person wearing a headdress of horns or feathers, that is, someone dressed up. Neither reading has been settled.

Source: Xu Shen, Shuowen Jiezi (121 CE); the Chinese University of Hong Kong character database.

A way to remember it

The top of 羊 set on 大, two characters already learned. WATCH THE UPRIGHT: in 羊 it crosses the last bar and juts out below; here it stops on the third bar, and 大 takes over underneath, with its own bar and its two slanting legs.

This is a memory aid, not the origin of the character.

Words it appears in

美丽 měi lì · HSK 4 beautiful
完美 wán měi · HSK 5 perfect
美术 měi shù · HSK 5 art; fine arts; painting; CL:種|种[zhong3]
优美 yōu měi · HSK 5 graceful; fine; elegant
赞美 zàn měi · HSK 5 to admire; to praise; to eulogize
美观 měi guān · HSK 6 pleasing to the eye; beautiful; artistic

Writing it

See the stroke order of 美, animated stroke by stroke.