On Apr 28, 11:51 am, Space Cowboy > wrote:
> I guess. Another li4 character without the grass radical on top means
> sharp. You find that character using the dao radical on the right
> which is the downstroke and hooked downstroke.
>
> Jim


The "Li" character on my tea packaging is the "Li4" that means sharp.
According to three different dictionaries I have (all from mainland),
the "Li" used in the word "jasmine" is the same as the "Li4" that
means "sharp", except with the grass ("cao") radical. Both "li"'
characters appear to use that "Dao" radical within them, except I
guess it is not the "radical" when the grass radical is on top.

Since we've gone this far into a Chinese discussion (it would be a lot
easier if I could just post a picture of the character, but this has
given me a great excuse to pull out old chinese text books), the "li"
on my packaging contains the grass, or "Cao" radical on top
(simplified form), the growing grain, or "He" radical on the lower
left (similar to the tree radical, only with a slanted line on top),
and the knife, or "Dao" radical on the lower right. It almost looked
like, in the packaging you sent that the lower left in some writings
of "Li" could use what I understand to be a "wei" character (meaning
"not, no") instead of the "he" character. Due to the font, I can't
tell which one babelcarp uses.

Interestingly, neither "Mo" nor "Li" appear to have any independent
meaning. Anyone know why they are used together for the word
"jasmine" (e.g., is the word is a phonetic approximation of a foreign
word), or is that just the way the word is written?

-Charles