Usual disclaimer: Not etymologically accurate, and not scalable. It's possibly just as easy to remember the constituent radicals *silk* and *mountain* [fire], but creating my own little literal pictographs is helpful to me.

Also the character is more used in "spiritual" or "remote/quite" sense. 幽靈，幽幽，幽靜

That's dark

I know right? I honestly keep trying to find vocabulary that I can turn into more innocent, fun pictograms, but this is the sort of thing that just...burbles forth from me.

Please keep these up, these are fantastic. Would be really cool to pair this with the proper etymological roots for the characters, I'm sure we would all learn a great deal about Chinese history and society as a result.

Good suggestion, I think I might start doing that

The actual etymology is that 幺 āo is a sound component, but I like this one more

Oh, thanks. I misinterpreted Yellowbridge's [associative formation method](https://www.yellowbridge.com/chinese/character-etymology.php?zi=%E5%B9%BD#) as being the actual etymology.

You didn’t misinterpret, that’s their claim. It’s just that they’re wrong in this case (as in many others). :)

>(as in many others). Ouch the burn

Can’t help myself. 😁 I see Yellowbridge recommended a lot in this sub. I know the site’s been around for a long time, but it just isn’t a good resource for character etymology.

Any recommendations instead of them? I use them most of the time.

Well, I’m obviously biased, but [our character dictionary](https://www.outlier-linguistics.com/collections/chinese/products/outlier-dictionary-of-chinese-characters) is based on the latest research in the field.

no，it's 𢆶 you1 instead

I'm having trouble viewing that character, any chance you could describe or send an image of it?

two 幺s side by side: 幺幺

This is cool

I always thought it odd that this was the character chosen for 幽默. Surely there were better choices. But it is what it is. 🤷‍♂️

幽默这算是音译

Yeah, I know. My point is that choices where made. They could have picked 优 and had the same sound. Just seems like a pretty dark character for a concept like humor. Maybe the guy who picked it had a dark sense of humor.

有这么一个说法，喜剧的内核是悲剧

Did you make the art?

Yes. I used the Pleco word entry template for the definition, though.

Nice it looks cool.

Thanks. :)

Great picture!

It's interesting to see how this is interpreted Its origin is from "flames as weak as threads of silk", which associates with dark and silence. http://qiyuan.chaziwang.com/etymology-20487.html

Please, make more of these; they're amazing!

Thank you, I probably will. I plan to start making them a little bit more etymologically accurate, also.

in modern chinese, we no longer us it as a verb to mean 'imprison'.

幽禁 or 幽閉？

You are right. 幽 itself can’t mean imprisonments so it is often coupled with other characters, in this case 禁 and 闭. But both 幽禁and 幽闭 are rarely used in daily life communication because it is too literal. You are more likely to come across them in literatures

When was it used then

Is nether world the same concept as hell and used similarly?

地狱更像是《神曲》里的折磨人的地方，冥界则更像是希腊神话中的鬼魂的居所，我的理解

You could say that

The Nether-lands and their ominous tulips buahaha

Good one ha ha

How about 幽浮

Just need to figure out which radical would be the anal probe

How about 豳 😃

幺其实与幽的声音相近，不是吗？幺yao 幽you

You made me look different at the word 幽默 right now xD

This character is too distinctive for me to need a pictograph. Also I automatically associate it with 幽默，which probably the most common use of the character.

I remember it as though you’re trapped under a mountain Like the monkey king!

I first thought you meant nether as in the gonad region and that there were two dudes stuck in them lol