豆蔻
Meanings
CC-CEDICT
- 1.cardamom (Elettaria cardamomum)
- 2.fig. a girl's teenage years
- 3.maidenhood
- 4.a budding beauty
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Wiktionary
- 1.cardamom, especially Cambodian cardamon (Wurfbainia vera) and Javanese cardamon (Wurfbainia compacta)
- 2.girl's teenage years (especially 13–14 years of age); maidenhood; budding beauty
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Etymology
Perhaps a variant of Tang-dynasty 多骨 (MC ta kwot), referring to cardamom imported from the Kakkola (伽古羅) country on the western coast of the Malaya Peninsula, which the Chinese from the eighth century thought produced both the nutmegs and the round cardamom (Amomum compactum), the latter possibly imported from Java (Donkin, 2003). Compare Sanskrit तक्कोल (takkola, “a kind of perfume”), कक्कोल (kakkola, “a kind of plant; a perfume”), Pali takkola, Arabic قاقُلَّة (qāqulla, “cardamom”), Tibetan ཀ་ཀོ་ལ (ka ko la, “cardamom”), Javanese kapulaga. Li Shizhen interprets this word as a compound of 豆 (“bean(-like)”) + 蔻 (“many; profusion”). Cardamom flowers bloom in early summer. They appear very plump before they bloom, and are commonly known as "fetal flowers", so they have become a symbol of girlhood. From the Tang Dynasty, one of Du Mu's two farewell poems
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Stroke order
Components
Components from cjk-decomp · MIT
Characters
More examples & usage (AI)
Derived terms
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