How to Write 裾 (jū) — Meaning “the hem of a robe; the tail of a coat”

Imagine a person wearing a long robe with a hem that drags on the floor, and the sound "jū" reminds you of "juice" spilling onto the hem. The right side 居 contains 尸 (corpse) and 古 (old), so you can picture an old corpse's robe ending in a hem.

Write the left radical 衤 first with 5 strokes: dot, horizontal left-falling, vertical, left-falling, dot. Then the right side 居: start with 尸 (3 strokes: horizontal fold, horizontal, left-falling) followed by 古 (5 strokes: horizontal, vertical, vertical, horizontal fold, horizontal). A common mistake is making the left radical too wide or forgetting the final dot on 衤.

裾 (jū) means the hem of a robe, while 袱 (fú) means a cloth wrapper or bundle (like a handkerchief), and 袴 (kù) means trousers or pants. Visually, the right components differ: 裾 has 居, 袱 has 伏, and 袴 has 夸. All share the clothing radical 衤 but have different meanings and pronunciations.

裾 is not common in everyday speech but appears in literary or formal descriptions of traditional Chinese clothing, such as in poetry or historical texts. A cultural example is the phrase 裙裾飞扬 (qún jū fēi yáng), which describes a skirt's hem fluttering in the wind, often used in romantic or elegant imagery.

Common words containing 裾 include: 裙裾 (qún jū) — Hem or tail of a skirt; 衣裾 (yī jū) — The hem of a garment; 长裾 (zhǎng jū) — Long hem.