Writing Balance Rule: Write the top horizontal line slightly shorter than the lower box to ensure structural stability and avoid top-heaviness.
1. Meaning
hundred (number 100)
numerousall kinds ofsurname Bai
number / nounNeutral#numbers#quantities#surnames
Sample Usage
这里有一百个人。
Zhè lǐ yǒu yì bǎi gè rén.
There are one hundred people here.
百花齐放
bǎi huā qí fàng
A hundred flowers bloom together (idiom meaning let a hundred intellectual schools contend).
2. Sound
/[paɪ̯²¹⁴]/Tone: 214
百
bǎibai3
|
++
ˇ(214)
=bǎi
Initial Consonant
b
Type: Unaspirated Bilabial
Sounds like: b sound as in English 'boy'
Unaspirated
Airflow Tactile Test: No burst of air. A tissue in front of lips should stay still.
Tongue & Mouth Position: Lips pressed together briefly before releasing the sound without any burst of breath.
Final Rhyme
ai
Vowel Group: -a vowel group
Sounds like: -ai rhymes with 'eye' or 'pie'
Mouth Shape Guide: Pronounce as standalone vowel 'eye'.
Common Learner Trap: Keep vowel quality steady across all 4 tone contours.
Tone
T3 (214)
2 → 1 → 4 (214)
3rd Tone (Low-Dipping)
Tone Pitch & Cadence: Tone 3 starts mid-high, dips low into the chest, and rises up, mimicking a skeptical English 'Really?'
Sandhi: When followed by another 3rd tone, bǎi changes to a 2nd tone (bái) in casual speech, though it is traditionally written as 3rd tone.
👂
Listening trap: Do not confuse the low dipping tone 3 of bǎi with the rising tone 2 bái (white), as the pitch direction is inverted.
👋
Physical Tone Gesture: Trace a checkmark in the air: dip down from your chest level to your stomach and curve back up to your collarbone.
3. Writing
Topology: Top-bottom · Strokes: 6 strokes
Writing Balance Rule: Write the top horizontal line slightly shorter than the lower box to ensure structural stability and avoid top-heaviness.
4. Components
Radical白 · White radical (white, clear)
The character '百' consists of a horizontal line on top of the character '白' (white). Anciently, a horizontal line above a base often represented a numerical indicator or a full cap.
一 Top horizontal stroke, representing one or a top boundary
白 Lower part meaning white or clear
Phonetic Family (形声字家族)
13· Phonetic Root: 白 (bái)
5. History
Liushu category: Indicative (指事)
Origin: Originally, oracle bone scripts depicted various symbols, but '百' evolved with an upper stroke capping '白' (which may have originally depicted a head or a thumb count). Over time, it was assigned to represent the number one hundred.
Semantic Evolution: From the exact numerical value of 100, it expanded metaphorically to mean 'many', 'all', or 'every' (as in 百姓 - a hundred surnames/the common people).
In ancient China, 'hundred' was often used as a hyperbolic term to mean 'countless' rather than an exact mathematical integer.
6. Sinosphere
🇻🇳
Sino-Vietnamese
bách
Matches the entering/checked tone concept historically, similar to Vietnamese sắc tone.
🇯🇵
Kanji (Japanese)
On: ハク, ビャク / Kun: momo
🇰🇷
Hanja (Korean)
백
Sound Shift Bridge: Cognate-like semantic borrowings exist in Sino-Xenic readings where Japanese uses 'haku' and Korean uses 'baek'.
7. Memory
Vivid Mnemonic Story
Imagine a **white** ghost wearing a top hat (**一**). This special ghost can multiply itself into **one hundred** ghosts all at once!
Phonetic Family (形声字家族)
陌
mòpath between fieldsAdd the mound radical (阝) on the left for dirt paths.
伯
bóeldest brother / uncleAdd the person radical (亻) on the left for an older male relative.
Lookalikes & Traps (形近字)
白(bái)
白 means 'white' and lacks the top horizontal stroke (一) found in 百 (hundred).
自(zì)
自 means 'self' and has an inner horizontal stroke instead of being the 'white' (白) character.
8. Mastery
Active Recall Challenge
这家店有[___]年的历史了。
Clue: bǎi
Common Learner Pitfall
Forgetting the top horizontal stroke (一) and accidentally writing '白' (bái - white) when trying to write '百' (bǎi - hundred).
Memory Prompts
Recognition: What number and alternative meaning does the character 百 represent?
Production: How do you write the character for 'one hundred' in Chinese?
Real-World Video Context
Watch authentic native speakers pronounce and explain this word in real-world YouTube videos.
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百bǎihundred
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