How to Write 蟏 (xiāo) — Meaning “Long-legged spider”

Imagine a spider (虫) with extremely long legs that look like the complex strokes of 蕭, weaving an intricate web. Say 'xiāo' like 'shh-ow' to recall the sound of a spider silently moving.

Start by writing the left radical 虫 in three strokes (horizontal, vertical, then bottom horizontal). Then write the right side 蕭 with 14 strokes, paying attention to the top grass radical 艹 and the complex 肅 component below. A common mistake is misordering the many inner strokes of 蕭, so practice each part separately.

蟏 specifically means a long-legged spider, while 蝌 (kē) means a tadpole and 蝎 (xiē) means a scorpion. Visually, 蟏 has the phonetic 蕭 on the right, 蝌 has 科, and 蝎 has 曷, making them easy to distinguish by their right-side parts.

蟏 is a classical character not used in everyday modern Chinese, but it appears in classical literature and poetry to describe spiders or spider webs (蟏蛸网). It is mostly studied by learners of classical Chinese or encountered in historical texts about nature and folklore.

Common words containing 蟏 include: 蟏蛸 (xiāo shāo) — Long-legged spider; 蟏蛸网 (xiāo shāo wǎng) — Spider web; 大蟏蛸 (dà xiāo shāo) — Long-legged spider.