色 Radical 139 — colour; countenance, expression; hue
sè (fourth tone, falling)
colour; countenance, expression; hue
Radical 1396 strokes0 characters
Where the shape comes from
One account reads it as a person bent over another, sharing or taking on their feeling until it shows on the face — countenance as the visible trace of an inner state, which is how the character came to mean colour, any visible hue being the face a thing shows to the eye. It names complexion directly in 脸色, one’s look, one’s expression, and colour broadly in 颜色 and 色彩.
characters filed under 色
No published character on HSK Guide is filed under this radical yet. Character explorer.