By Zou Xinsheng & Huang Lu

Amajority of Chinese characters are phonograms. They consist of two parts, one suggesting the meaning of the character while the other its pronunciation. And橋 (qiáo; bridge) is one such example.

橋 (qiáo; bridge), a noun commonly used in daily life, transcends its ordinary use when considered in light of its social context. As a mixture of utilitarianism and utopianism, the Chinese character橋 is endowed with brilliant Chinese wisdom.

From the perspective of structure,橋 is a phonogram composed of two parts: the left part木 (mù; wood) refers to the earliest material used in bridge building, and the right 喬 (qiáo; height) indicates the pronunciation of the soundmeaning compound. As recorded in Shuowen Jiezi (《說文解字》; literally: “Explaining Graphs and Analyzing Characters”), an early 2nd-century Chinese dictionary from the Han Dynasty, 橋refers to “a wooden structure across the river.” Although modern bridges are made from different materials, the structure of the character has stood the test of time and remained not much changed, giving a hint to its history and background.

橋 can be used in a variety of different phrases when a material precedes it. For instance, if a bridge is made of stone, we call it 石橋 (shíqiáo; stone bridge). And if it’s made of birds, like magpies, we can call it 鵲橋 (quèqiáo; magpie bridge).

In the romantic tale between Cowherd Dong Yong and the Weaving Maid, a magpie bridge plays an important role in their fate. Dong Yong, a mortal, fell in love with the Weaving Maid, without knowing that she was actually the seventh daughter of Queen Mother of the Western Heavens. They married as a happy couple but were separated by the rule of the heavens when the Weaving Maid, or the seventh fairy, was discovered to have a mortal husband. The Queen Mother brought the Weaving Maid back to the heavens, only allowing her to reunite with her husband once a year on the 7th evening of the 7th lunar month, when magpies would fly together to form a bridge over the Milky Way. It is called 鵲橋相會, meaning “meeting over a magpie bridge.” The tale was the origin of the Chinese festival Qixi, which is still celebrated by modern Chinese today.

Other adjectives can also be added before橋 to indicate its location, shape or size. For example, 武漢長江大橋 (wǔhàn chángjiāng dàqiáo; the Wuhan Yangtze Great Bridge), which was opened to the public in 1957, was often referred to as 萬里長江第一橋 (wànlǐ chángjiāng dìyī qiáo; the first bridge built across the 10000-li-long Yangtze River). And when we talk about 小橋, we’d associate it with the poem line 小橋流水人家 (xiǎoqiáo liúshuǐ rénjiā; “l(fā)ittle bridge, murmuring brooks and rural cottage”), which portrays an idyllic tranquility.

When the meaning of 橋 extends from denotation to connotation in social life, it can refer to linkage between two sides, just as a concrete bridge does in nature. One example could be the well-known Chinese Proficiency Competition named 漢語橋 (hànyǔ qiáo; The Chinese Bridge). By evoking the bridge, the event strives to link China with the world via the Chinese language, which has thus been turned into a “cultural, friendship and soul bridge.”