The Calligrapher — Chǔ Suíliáng 褚遂良

Tang chancellor and regular-script master of elegant, balanced strokes.

Tang calligrapher (596–658), master of regular script — Tang master of graceful, tensile regular script favored by the imperial court. Tang dynasty

Etymology & Meaning · 字义溯源

2 · The Character: 万 万 (wàn, 4th tone), traditionally 萬, is one of the great ironies of the script. The Shuowen Jiezi glosses 萬 not as a number but as an animal: 蟲也。从厹，象形 — 'an insect; from 厹 (a clawed foot), pictographic' — the graph is generally identified as a scorpion; the Song-era Piya adds 蜂一名萬, 'the wasp is also called wàn.' The numeral 'ten thousand' is a phonetic loan (假借) that never gave the character back. Classically 万 means uncountability rather than a figure: the Yijing's Qian commentary closes 首出庶物，万国咸宁, 'he stands first among things and the myriad states are at peace'; Zhuangzi writes 万物与我为一; the Shijing (Beifeng, Jianxi) records 方将万舞, the great wàn dance performed with shield and axe. 万 is a free morpheme but a quantifying one. Honest disclosure: standing alone it reads as a bare figure — '10,000' on a price tag — and as the surname Wàn; note also that the Buddhist symbol 卍 is literally called 万字 (wàn-zì) in Chinese.

Cultural Story

萬 once showed a scorpion, a creature so prolific the graph became ten thousand. 莊子 speaks of 萬物 as the ten thousand things breathing without ceasing. An emperor's birthday drew the cry 萬歲, may you live ten thousand years, though no one believed it. The 史記 tallies 萬戶 as a measure of fief and household, a number too large to picture.

Where a Western reader can stand: Where a Western reader can stand: 万 means 'ten-thousand / myriad', a word for everything, not eternity; Chu Suiliang's hand orders it, but note it is also the surname Wàn and names the swastika 卍.

Common words & phrases

• 万岁 long live · hurrah · His Majesty
• 万物 all things · everything · the universe
• 万一 just in case · one in ten thousand · unlikely event
• 万能 almighty · all-powerful · universal
• 万象 all phenomena · everything · the myriad things
• 万事 everything · all matters · all things

Read the story behind the character

万事通 is the know-it-all at the office; 万象城 is a shopping megamall in a dozen cities. 万一 you forget your umbrella, the rain will teach you. 万能 is slapped on glue and remote controls alike. The word no longer means a real count, it means a whole lot, the way English says a million. It has shrunk into an intensifier and a brand name.