The character 大 (dà): big

On a cream ground, the character 大 in very dark brown stands in front of a large glowing yellow disc of sun that fills the middle of the picture. The character is wide and heavy: a short vertical at the top, a long horizontal bar across it, and two strokes that sweep out from the crossing to the lower left and the lower right. Below the character, tiny and pale yellow, the silhouette of a person standing with both arms held straight out to the sides.

Pronunciation: dà
Strokes: 3
Level: HSK 1

What it means

big; large; great; older (than another person); eldest (as in 大姐[da4jie3]); greatly; freely; fully; (dialect) father; (dialect) uncle (father's brother)

Where its shape comes from

The graph shows a person seen from the FRONT, where 人 shows one from the side. The contrast is an old one, and Chinese commentators had already remarked on it. Its first sense is thought to have been "adult", as against a child, with "big" following from that. Whether the arms are flung wide is another matter: several specialists read them as hanging down in the early forms.

Source: Xu Shen, Shuowen Jiezi (121 CE) and Duan Yucai's commentary (1815); the Chinese University of Hong Kong character database.

A way to remember it

Take the two legs of 人 and lay a bar across them at shoulder height: someone throwing their arms wide open. The middle stroke pokes out above the bar, and without that small piece showing at the top you no longer have 大.

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

Words it appears in

大家 dà jiā · HSK 2 everyone; influential family; great expert
大概 dà gài · HSK 4 roughly; probably; rough; approximate; about; general idea
大约 dà yuē · HSK 4 approximately; probably
大夫 dài fu · HSK 4 doctor; physician
大使馆 dà shǐ guǎn · HSK 4 embassy; CL:座[zuo4],個|个[ge4]
大型 dà xíng · HSK 5 large; large-scale

Writing it

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