Character: 老 (lǎo) old
老 (lǎo) “old” is a pictograph of an old person with long hair and a walking stick. It has extended to mean something related to a long period of time, such as “experienced” and “always.”
Used as a component
老 (lǎo) can be semantic or phonetic as a component, and it has two forms.
1. 耂 (top)
This variant of 老 (lǎo) has the bottom part, 匕, omitted. Only found at the top of a character, 耂 is also the radical of 老 (lǎo) itself. Note that in some rare cases, the bottom part is still intact.
| 耂 old |
zhě 者 one who |
kǎo 考 to test |
qí 耆 old man |
|---|
2. 老 (right and other)
老 (lǎo) has no change in form when placed on the right of a character or other positions. However, there is only one common character with 老 (lǎo) as its component in Mandarin Chinese, 姥 (lǎo) “grandma (maternal).”
Used as a morpheme/word
Wordlist
- HSK 1: 老师 (lǎoshī) teacher
- HSK 3: 老 (lǎo) old
- HSK 4: 老虎 (lǎohǔ) tiger
- HSK 5: 老 百姓 (lǎo bǎixìng) ordinary people
- HSK 5: 老板 (lǎobǎn) boss
How to pronounce
This character sounds like “loud” without the d.
| 3rd | Pinyin | Yale | IPA |
|---|---|---|---|
| Initial | l- | l | [l] |
| Final | -ao | au | [aʊ] |
