木 mù — tree, wood

simplified

traditional · same

mù

tree · wood · timber · the wood element

HSK 1 笔画 4 部首木 (itself) 声调第四声 (falling) all mu readings →

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笔顺 bǐshùn · Stroke order

部首 radical (whole character) 书写 your drawing

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字源 zìyuán Etymology & Structure

a whole tree

木 is a pictograph of a tree seen whole. The vertical stroke is the trunk; the horizontal near the top is the branches spreading; the two diagonal strokes at the bottom are the roots reaching into the ground. The oracle bone form is more naturalistic (branches curl outward, roots curl down), and the modern character is a schematised version of the same image.

The pictograph is durable enough that once you see it as a tree, every later character containing 木 starts to read as "something to do with a tree or wood." This is one of the most productive radicals in the script.

本末 běn mò Root and Tip

the 一-stroke family , pointing at parts of the tree

Add a single stroke to 木 and you get another character that picks out a specific part of the tree. These are some of the oldest indicative compounds in the script.

本 (běn) , a stroke at the bottom, marking the root. Extended meaning: origin, foundation, the fundamental. 本来 (originally), 根本 (fundamentally), 书本 (book , "root-thing").
末 (mò) , a stroke at the top, marking the tip of the branches. Extended meaning: end, tail, tip, the trivial. 末端 (the tip), 周末 (weekend, "week's end"), 本末倒置 (běn mò dào zhì, "to put root and tip backwards" , confused priorities).
未 (wèi) , a shorter stroke at the top, looking similar to 末 but with the added stroke shorter than the branch below it. Means "not yet." A separate character now, but shares the tree-pictograph origin.
朱 (zhū) , a stroke through the trunk, originally marking a particular red-wooded tree. Now mostly a surname and the sound component in many characters.

部首 bùshǒu As a Radical

Kinds of tree

松 sōng (pine), 柏 bǎi (cypress), 柳 liǔ (willow), 桃 táo (peach), 梅 méi (plum), 杨 yáng (poplar), 楠 nán (Phoebe tree). Every named tree in classical poetry carries 木.

Things made of wood

桌 zhuō (table), 椅 yǐ (chair), 床 (bed, older form 牀), 板 bǎn (plank), 棍 gùn (stick), 柱 zhù (pillar), 梁 liáng (beam). The furniture of traditional life was almost entirely wooden, and the vocabulary records it.

Tree parts

枝 zhī (branch), 根 gēn (root), 叶 yè (leaf , simplified from 葉, which has 艹 grass-radical rather than 木, but the family is clear), 果 guǒ (fruit , showing a tree with a fruit at the top), 花 (flower, now under 艹).

Actions with wood

植 zhí (to plant), 栽 zāi (to cultivate), 枯 kū (to wither), 朽 xiǔ (to rot). The life-cycle of wood from planting through decay has its own small vocabulary.

林森 lín sēn Trees Stacked

一木二木三木 · one tree, two trees, three trees

Chinese compounds "tree" visually to get "forest":

木 (mù) , one tree.
林 (lín) , two trees side by side: a wood, a grove, or a concentration of things (武林 wǔlín, the "martial grove" , world of martial artists).
森 (sēn) , three trees stacked: a forest, and by extension "dense, dark, severe" (森严 sēnyán, stern; 森林 sēnlín, a proper forest).

The progression from one to many by repetition is a pattern used elsewhere in the script: 人 (rén, person) → 从 (cóng, follow) → 众 (zhòng, crowd); 火 (huǒ, fire) → 炎 (yán, flame) → 焱 (yàn, blaze). The character system is transparent enough to make these stackings feel natural rather than arbitrary.

五行之木 wǔxíng zhī mù Wood as Element

木 in the five phases

Wood (木) is the phase of spring, the direction east, the colour green/blue (青 qīng), the liver in the body, and the planet Jupiter. In the generative cycle, water feeds wood (rivers nourish forests); wood feeds fire (trees become fuel). In the destructive cycle, metal overcomes wood (the axe fells the tree); wood overcomes earth (roots break rock). This structure organises Chinese medicine, divination, traditional calendar computation, and the cosmological poetry of the Han dynasty onward.

成语 chéngyǔ Idioms

本末倒置

běn mò dào zhì

"root and tip reversed" , confused priorities

The root (本) is fundamental; the tip (末) is trivial. To reverse them is to treat the important as incidental and the incidental as important: a common cultural criticism of bureaucracy.

独木难支

dú mù nán zhī

"a single tree can hardly hold up a roof"

Used to argue for collective effort. No one person, however capable, can carry a structure alone. Roughly the Chinese version of "no person is an island."

木已成舟

mù yǐ chéng zhōu

"the wood has already become a boat": what's done is done

Once the timber has been shaped into a hull, you cannot turn it back into a tree. Said of irreversible situations. Often used in advice: stop arguing with what has already happened.

草木皆兵

cǎo mù jiē bīng

"every grass and tree looks like a soldier": paranoia

From the Battle of Féishuǐ (383 CE), where a fleeing general mistook the grass and trees on a distant hill for enemy troops. Used for panicked overestimation of threats.