龙 lóng dragon
dragon; symbol of the emperor
How it came to be
A dragon in profile: the crested head at the top left, the mouth open, and the body coiling away to the right. The crest is what tells it from a snake.
用法
- Culturally loaded standalone noun: 龙年 lóngnián "Year of the Dragon" (zodiac), and the dragon as a symbol of China and the emperor.
- 水龙头 shuǐlóngtóu "faucet" is everyday vocabulary (literally "water dragon head"), and 龙头 lóngtóu alone has picked up the figurative sense of "leading/flagship" (龙头企业 "leading enterprise").
- Rich in idioms: 来龙去脉 (láilóng qùmài) "the whole story, ins and outs," 画龙点睛 (huàlóng diǎnjīng) "add the finishing touch that brings something to life," 跑龙套 (pǎo lóngtào) "play a minor role."
- 沙龙 shālóng "salon" is an unrelated phonetic loanword that happens to share the character.