乙 yǐ second
second; second of the ten Heavenly Stems 十天干; second party
How it came to be
One stroke bending twice on the way down, and nobody agrees what of. Some see a flying swallow, some a crooked sprout. Borrowed for the second of the ten stems, it lost its picture.
用法
- Bound character meaning "second", the second of the ten heavenly stems (甲乙丙丁..., functioning like A, B, C, D).
- Its main real-world use is in formal contracts and lists: 乙方 (yǐfāng, "Party B"), paired with 甲方 (jiǎfāng, "Party A").
- Outside these fixed formal slots, 乙 carries little independent meaning for a learner to worry about.