Chinese Character Wiki
冥

míng

dark

Depicts a cover (冖/宀) over the sun (日). 宀 also provides the pronunciation. The purpose of the bottom 六 component is unclear.

Components
宀 sound,iconic component

宀  Sound Iconic component

mián

  

roof

日 iconic component

日  Iconic component

rì

  

sun

六 unknown component

六  Unknown component

liù

  

six

Originally written as 大.

Evolution

冥 Seal script Shuowen (~100 AD)

Seal script

Shuowen (~100 AD)
冥 Clerical script Eastern Han dynasty (25-220 AD)

Clerical script

Eastern Han dynasty (25-220 AD)
冥 Regular script Modern

Regular script

Modern
Definitions

冥  

míng

dark, gloomy, night; deep; dark; stupid; the underworld

冥 (㝠) 

míng

old variant of 冥[míng]

Most common words with 冥
Freq.
Word
Meaning

冥

dark

冥王星

Pluto (dwarf planet)

冥想

to meditate

冥冥之中

in the unseen world of spirits

幽冥

dark

Component uses

Meaning component in 2 characters (0 verified)

瞑 溟

Sound component in 4 characters (0 verified)

瞑 螟 暝 蓂

Historical pronunciation

Old Chinese

Middle Chinese

Pinyin

Gloss

*mˤeŋ

meng

míng

dark


Statistics

Not found in HSK word list

Appears in 3.4599% of movies

2407th most common character in movies

2739th most common character in books

Miscellaneous

Strokes

10

Unicode

U+51A5

Shuowen

“冥，幽也。从日，从六，冖聲。日數十，十六日而月始虧，幽也。”


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