yào medicine; drug; to poison

Made up of [ cǎo grass; herb radical 140]
Alternative traditional form of character:
Made with 9 strokes.
Original showed medicinal herbs giving harmony. The modern form has 'restrain' under the 'grass/herb' radical suggesting alleviate illness

Related characters


Also uses cǎo component: cài (vegetable) cǎo (grass) chá (tea) dǒng (to understand) huā (flower) jié (joint) (bitter) lán (blue) láo (to toil) mǎn (to fill) māo (cat) měng (Mongol) (do not) píng (apple) (grape) qián (front) ruò (to seem) (revive) táo (grapes) (skill) yīng (flower) zàng (treasury) zhēng (to steam)

Sounds same

yào (want)

Different tone

yāo (youngest) yǎo (to bite)

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Pronunciation

Sound file kindly provided by shtooka.net under a Creative Commons Attribution Share Alike License

Proverbs

对症下药 duì zhèng xià yào Take the right measures to solve a problem to achieve the desired result
换汤不换药 huàn tāng bú huàn yaò Not getting to the root of a problem, making superficial changes
苦口良药 kǔ kǒu liáng yaò It takes hard work and discomfort to achieve something worthwhile