The character 耳 (ěr): ear

On a golden cream ground, a large ear is seen in profile at the left, drawn flat in coral with a pale peach inner shell and a few red lines for its folds, and a soft yellow glow around it. Three teal arcs of growing size fan away to the upper left. At the right, the character 耳 in dark brown: a bar on top, two uprights, two inner bars, and a bottom bar that juts far out to the left while the right upright drops below it.
Pronunciation
ěr
Strokes
6
Radical
耳

What it means

ear; handle (archaeology); and that is all (Classical Chinese)

Where its shape comes from

An ear, drawn. Xu Shen defines it by what it does, "that which governs hearing", and files it among the pictures without saying anything more. The forms engraved on bone still show the outer rim and the fold inside it; the two bars of today's character are what is left of that fold. A pictogram, and nobody disputes it.

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

How it used to be written

Forms, sources and dates: the 字形演變 database of 小學堂, Academia Sinica, public domain (CC0).

A way to remember it

The upright frame of 目, with two bars inside it, except that the lower bar juts out on the LEFT, which the frame of the eye never does. That overhang is how you tell the ear at a glance.

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

Words it appears in

Writing it

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

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