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

Cultural Story

股 originally meant thigh, and classical history records its drama: the strategist Sun Bin had his 股 tendons cut, while statesmen of the 战国策 measured humiliation in kneeling. From slicing things into parts it came to mean a strand or portion — one strand of rope, one portion of a venture.

Common words & phrases

• 股票 stock · shares
• 股份 shares · stock
• 股东 shareholder
• 屁股 buttocks
• 一股 a strand · a stream

Read the story behind the character

That sense of portion lives on in finance: office workers check 股票 stock prices on the subway, argue over 股份 shares at startup meetings, and dream of being a 股东 shareholder. A 一股 a strand of cold wind slips through the train door, while toddlers learning to squat learn their 屁股 buttocks before their nouns.

Why this character belongs on skin

The great limb that bears the body's weight and drives it forward — 股, the thigh, the strongest muscle between root and ground. From it the ancients measured 股肱, the thighs and arms, the trusted limbs of a state, the ministers who held the realm upright as the body holds itself. To wound the 股 is to fall; to train it is to stand. There is a blunt, honest strength in this character, the powerful strand that does the unseen labor of every step you have ever taken. To wear 股 is to honor the working power beneath you, the part that lifts and carries and never asks for the credit. Let it be inked where the body's force gathers, a tribute to the thigh that climbed the hill, held the line, carried the sleeping child upstairs. Some glory lives in the largest, quietest muscle.