How to ‘thief’ in Chinese
Learn “thief” (小偷, 賊)
Did you know? There are at least two ways to say “thief” in mandarin.
First, we have the word for “thief” or “burglar” is 小偷 (xiǎo tōu) which is made of:
- 小 (xiǎo): meaning “little.” It looks a little like a small person spreading his hands out.
- 偷 (tōu)**: meaning “to steal.” It’s made of the person radical on the left, and then the phonetic component 俞 (yú) which is an ancient word means to accede or assent
(although now it’s mostly used as a surname. It may have had a pronunciation contribution to the word in the past, but today pronunciations have changed).
Another way to say “thief” or “robber” in Chinese is 賊 (zéi) which is made of:
- 貝 (bèi): On the left. It traditionally refers to “shells” but in many characters is associated with wealth or valuables. (Because some have said that shells used to be people’s form of currency)
- 戎 (róng): On the right historically means “arms” or refers to militaristic or weapon-related items.
So together, these components refer to the idea of stealing valuables, armed robbery, plunder, etc.
It’s a more literary form of the word, though. So when people talk about thieves in a casual way, they are slightly more likely to use the first word, 小偷 (xiǎo tōu).
Here’re a couple sample sentences:
小偷慌忙逃走了。
Xiǎotōu huāngmáng táozǒule.
The thief scurried away in a hurry.
警察抓到賊了。
Jǐngchá zhuā dào zéi le.
The police caught the thief.
And there you have it!
Today’s mini vocab lesson was a request from a reader. What Chinese word would you like to learn?
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