The character 男 (nán): man
- Pronunciation
- nán
- Strokes
- 7
- Level
- HSK 2
- Radical
- 田
- Made of
- 田力
What it means
(bound form) male; baron, the lowest of the five ranks of nobility 五等爵位[wu3deng3 jue2wei4]
Where its shape comes from
Xu Shen leaves no room for doubt: "from 田 and 力; which is to say that the man puts his strength to work in the fields." Both elements are there from the oracle bones onwards. And if one follows the reading palaeographers now give of 力, a ploughing implement rather than a sinew, then what the character sets down is quite literally the plough in the field.
Source: Xu Shen, Shuowen Jiezi (121 CE); the Chinese University of Hong Kong character database.
A way to remember it
Two characters you already know, one above the other: 田, the field, on top, and 力 underneath. The slanting stroke of 力 rises above its own bar and runs a long way out to the left, under the field.
This is a memory aid, not the origin of the character.
Words it appears in
- 男人 nán rén a man; a male; men; CL:個|个[ge4]
- 男子 nán zǐ a man; a male
- 男女 nán nǚ male-female; male and female
- 男孩 nán hái boy; CL:個|个[ge4]
- 男性 nán xìng the male sex; a male
- 男生 nán shēng schoolboy; male student; boy; guy (young adult male)
Writing it
See the stroke order of 男, animated stroke by stroke.