Chinese Character Wiki
平

píng

flat

Original meaning: 

to strike

Depicts using a staff (丂) for striking. Based on the original meaning "to strike", now written as 抨. The meaning later shifted to "level", "even", and "flat".

Components
◎ iconic component

◎  Iconic component

  

characterless component

Depicts the moving motion of striking.

丂 iconic component

丂  Iconic component

kǎo

  

axe handle

Depicts a staff.

Evolution

平 Bronze script Early Warring States (~400 BC)

Bronze script

Early Warring States (~400 BC)
平 Seal script Shuowen (~100 AD)

Seal script

Shuowen (~100 AD)
平 Clerical script Western Jin dynasty (266-316 AD)

Clerical script

Western Jin dynasty (266-316 AD)
平 Regular script Modern

Regular script

Modern
Definitions

平  

píng

flat, level, even; peaceful; flat; level; equal; to tie (make the same score); to draw (score); calm; see also 平聲|平声[píng​shēng]

平  

Píng

surname Ping

Most common words with 平
Freq.
Word
Meaning

水平

standard

公平

fair

平

flat

和平

Heping district of Shenyang city 瀋陽市|沈阳市, Liaoning

平均

average

Component uses

Meaning component in 3 characters (1 verified)

坪 秤 枰

Sound component in 11 characters (5 verified)

評 评 苹 坪 抨 砰 怦 鮃 鲆 枰 泙

Iconic component in 1 character (1 verified)

抨

Historical pronunciation

Old Chinese

Middle Chinese

Pinyin

Gloss

*[b]en

bjien

pián

distinguish; punctiious

*breŋ

bjaeng

píng

even (adj.)

*m-breŋ

bjaeng

píng

make even


Statistics

HSK level 2

Appears in 76.4536% of movies

466th most common character in movies

215th most common character in books

Miscellaneous

Strokes

5

Unicode

U+5E73

Shuowen

“平，語平舒也。从亏，从八。八，分也。”


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