How to Write 禽 (qín) — Meaning “bird; poultry; fowl”

Imagine a person (人) holding a net (离) to catch a bird. The net has a curved handle on top and the bird is trapped inside the bottom square, making it easy to recall the meaning of bird or poultry.

Be careful with the top part: it looks like 人 but the strokes are slightly wider and the left stroke is a downward slant. The bottom part 离 has a diagonal stroke that often gets straightened; make sure the top of 离 has a dot and two short lines on the left side.

禽 starts with a person radical but is not a left-right structure; it is top-bottom. 倞 and 倠 are both left-right characters with a person radical on the left, while 禽 has the person on top. Also, the right side of 倞 is 京 and 倠 is 隹, which look different from the bottom 离 in 禽.

禽 is used in compound words for birds and poultry, like 家禽 (farm birds) and 鸣禽 (songbirds). In Chinese culture, 禽 sometimes appears in idioms like 衣冠禽兽 (a person who behaves like a beast), which literally means a well-dressed bird or beast, used as an insult.

Common words containing 禽 include: 家禽 (jiā qín) — Poultry; 禽类 (qín lèi) — poultry; birds; 鸣禽 (míng qín) — Songbird.