The character 王 (wáng): king
- Pronunciation
- wáng
- Strokes
- 4
- Radical
- 玉
What it means
king or monarch; best or strongest of its type; grand; great
Where its shape comes from
The Shuowen passes on Dong Zhongshu's famous explanation: three strokes for heaven, earth and humankind, and the one who joins them is the king. Confucius, Xu Shen adds, called it "the one that runs through three". That is a scholar's reading, made on a shape already regularised. Palaeographers of the twentieth century propose another, now the majority view: the graph draws a large ceremonial axe, blade turned downwards, the emblem of military power, of which tombs have yielded bronze examples. The two readings still stand side by side.
Source: Xu Shen, Shuowen Jiezi (121 CE), citing Dong Zhongshu; the Chinese University of Hong Kong character database, which follows the reading of the axe.
A way to remember it
Three bars with a shaft joining them: the longest is the bottom one, and the middle bar sits closer to the top than to the bottom. Count them as you write. Add a dot in the lower right corner and you have written 玉 (yù), jade.
This is a memory aid, not the origin of the character.
Words it appears in
- 王子 wáng zǐ · HSK 5 prince; son of a king
- 国王 guó wáng · HSK 5 king
- 王国 wáng guó kingdom; realm
- 大王 dài wang robber baron (in opera, old stories); magnate
- 王朝 wáng cháo dynasty
- 天王 tiān wáng emperor; god; Hong Xiuquan's self-proclaimed title; see also 洪秀全[Hong2 Xiu4 quan2]
Writing it
See the stroke order of 王, animated stroke by stroke.