(dēng) - lamp, light in Mandarin
dēngTraditional: 燈
Translation
lamp, light
Word origin
Phono-semantic. The traditional form 燈 puts 火 (fire) beside 登 (dēng, to climb) as the phonetic; the simplified 灯 keeps the fire and swaps in the shorter 丁 (dīng) to carry the sound.
- Origin
- phono-semantic
- Root
- 火 (fire) + 丁 (dīng, phonetic)
Stroke order
灯
Examples
。
Please turn the light on.
。
Remember to turn the light off when you leave.
，盏盏。
It grew dark and the lamps along the road came on one by one.
，。
The light in my room is broken and needs replacing.
，。
There is a red light ahead, so pull up.
灯 (dēng) is the lamp: the bulb, the lantern, the street light, the traffic signal. Its measure word is 盏 in careful speech, 个 in casual speech, and the two verbs you need with it are 开 and 关. 开灯 and 关灯 are among the first useful sentences a learner can build.
It compounds freely. 电灯 is an electric light, 台灯 a desk lamp, 路灯 a street lamp, 红绿灯 a set of traffic lights, and 灯笼 a paper lantern of the kind that goes up for the Lantern Festival.
The trap is that English "light" covers both the fitting and the brightness it gives out, and Mandarin splits them. 灯 is the object; 光 is the light itself. Sunlight is 阳光, never 阳灯, and "there is not enough light in here" is about 光线, not about the lamp on the table.
Where this fits
Used in
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灯: worksheet, infographic and listicle
Free printable study downloads for the Mandarin word "灯" (lamp, light): a worksheet with the answer key built in, an infographic, and a sentence listicle. Open any one to view, print or save.
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Start your free weekThis word is part of lesson 57.