Simplified Characters
Simplified Chinese characters often contain radicals which have been simplified according to two basic rules:
- Replace several lines and/or dots with one line
- Replace the traditional radical with a small, unique portion thereof
The difference between the traditional and simplified version of the same character can therefore lie solely in the visual appearance of the radical. One example is the character for "language"; the traditional character is 語, whilst in the simplified 语 only the radical is altered.
Read more about this topic: Radical (Chinese Character)
Famous quotes containing the words simplified and/or characters:
“I have simplified my politics into an utter detestation of all existing governments; and, as it is the shortest and most agreeable and summary feeling imaginable, the first moment of an universal republic would convert me into an advocate for single and uncontradicted despotism. The fact is, riches are power, and poverty is slavery all over the earth, and one sort of establishment is no better, nor worse, for a people than another.”
—George Gordon Noel Byron (1788–1824)
“Of all the characters I have known, perhaps Walden wears best, and best preserves its purity. Many men have been likened to it, but few deserve that honor. Though the woodchoppers have laid bare first this shore and then that, and the Irish have built their sties by it, and the railroad has infringed on its border, and the ice-men have skimmed it once, it is itself unchanged, the same water which my youthful eyes fell on; all the change is in me.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)