病 bìng — illness, disease; to fall ill; a fault, a defect
bìng (fourth tone, falling)
illness, disease; to fall ill; a fault, a defect
10 strokesRadical 疒Frequency #415
Pinyin
- bìng (fourth tone, falling)
illness, disease; to fall ill; a fault, a defect
Character breakdown
Ideographic description
⿸疒丙The sequence reads left to right and describes how the parts are arranged.
- 疒meaning partno entry yetThe sickness radical: a person leaning against an upended bed, with two dots for the sweat of fever.
- 丙sound partno entry yet丙 bǐng for the sound; on its own it is the third of the ten heavenly stems.
Mnemonic
The sickbed 疒 with 丙 inside for the sound. Classical usage kept 疾 for a light ailment and 病 for a grave one; today 病 covers the lot. Two patterns to learn together: 生病 is to fall ill (a verb plus object, so "he fell ill twice" is 他生了两次病), and 看病 is to see a doctor about it — the same 看 as in 看医生.
A memory aid written by HSK Guide editors. It is not an etymology and does not describe the historical origin of the character.