革
contributes the sense of tanned leather and things made from hide — harness · Kangxi radical 177
contributes the sense of tanned leather and things made from hide — harness, saddlery, shoes and whips
革 is a picture of a whole animal skin stretched out flat for curing: the top stroke and small horizontal are the head, the wide middle box is the spread-out body of the hide, and the two long downstrokes at the bottom are the split hind legs or the tail. In the modern shape you can still read it top to bottom as head, body, legs. Because a raw skin has to be scraped and worked to become leather, 革 also came to mean stripping away and changing, but as a component in characters it almost always points to leather goods — 鞋 shoes, 鞭 a whip, 鞍-type saddle gear and 勒 a bridle.
革 at a glance
- Meaning
- contributes the sense of tanned leather and things made from hide — harness
- Strokes
- 9
- Characters
- 29
- Role
- Contributes meaning
- Kangxi radical
- 177
Characters with 革 (22 of 29)
HSK 3 · 1
HSK 5 · 1
Beyond HSK · 18
Frequently asked questions
What does the component 革 mean?
革 means "contributes the sense of tanned leather and things made from hide — harness". In the characters that contain it, it contributes meaning.
How many Chinese characters contain 革?
29 characters in this dictionary contain 革, including ones at HSK 3, HSK 5, HSK 6.
Is 革 a radical?
Yes — 革 is Kangxi radical 177, one of the 214 traditional indexing radicals used to organise Chinese dictionaries.
How many strokes does 革 have?
革 is written in 9 strokes.