The character 土 (tǔ): earth

A village courtyard under a blue sky: a grey brick wall pierced by a round moon gate, ivy along the coping, and a tree spilling over a pale wall. The whole lower half is a bed of ochre earth in loose clods, where a young green seedling with two leaves has come up beside a terracotta pot lying on its side. At the right, planted in the earth, the character 土 in very dark brown: a short bar, an upright rising through it, and a longer bar along the bottom.

Pronunciation: tǔ
Strokes: 3
Radical: 土

What it means

earth; dust; clay; local; indigenous; crude opium; unsophisticated; one of the eight categories of ancient musical instruments 八音[ba1 yin1]

Where its shape comes from

Xu Shen describes ground with things coming out of it: the two horizontal strokes would be the underside and the inside of the earth, and the vertical one whatever pushes up through them. The forms cut into bone are simpler, showing a lump of earth resting on a ground line. What that lump stands for is debated: a heap of soil for some, the earthen altar of the god of the soil, later written 社 (shè), for others. A figuring either way.

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

A way to remember it

A short bar, a shaft, a long bar underneath: a heap of earth sitting on the ground. The trap is best seen by comparison. In 士 (shì), the scholar, the TOP bar is the longer one; in 土 it is the BOTTOM one. Shorten a single stroke and you have written a different character.

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

Words it appears in

土地 tǔ di · HSK 5 local god; genius loci
土豆 tǔ dòu · HSK 5 potato (CL:個|个[ge4]); (Tw) peanut (CL:顆|颗[ke1])
土壤 tǔ rǎng · HSK 6 soil
领土 lǐng tǔ · HSK 6 territory
国土 guó tǔ country's territory; national land
本土 běn tǔ one's native country; native; local; metropolitan territory

Writing it

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