How to Write 蛵 (xīng) — Meaning “Dragonfly (archaic)”

Imagine a dragonfly (虫) hovering over a stream or water channel, which looks like the right part 巠. You can think of the three horizontal lines in 巠 as the dragonfly's long, thin body and its wings. This visual link between the insect and the water helps you recall that 蛵 means dragonfly.

The left radical 虫 is written with 6 strokes: first a vertical, then a horizontal, a central vertical, two short horizontals, and finally a bottom horizontal. The right part 巠 has 7 strokes: start with a top horizontal, then a small mouth shape (口), and end with a work-like shape (工) — be careful not to mix up the order of the horizontals. A common mistake is making the right part too tall or forgetting the small middle horizontal inside the mouth.

All three characters share the insect radical 虫, but they differ in their right sides: 蛵 has 巠, 蚯 has 丘 (a hill), and 蚰 has 由 (a reason). Their meanings are also distinct: 蛵 is an archaic word for dragonfly, 蚯 means earthworm, and 蚰 refers to a centipede-like insect. Visually, 蛵 has more horizontal strokes in its right part compared to the simpler shapes of 蚯 and 蚰.

蛵 is rarely used alone in modern Chinese; it is considered an archaic character. You may encounter it in classical literature or historical texts when describing dragonflies. Today, the common word for dragonfly is 蜻蜓 (qīng tíng), so 蛵 appears almost exclusively in compounds like 蛵蜻 (xīng qīng) or in scholarly discussions of ancient Chinese.

Common words containing 蛵 include: 蛵蜻 (xīng qīng) — Dragonfly; 蛵虫 (xīng chóng) — Dragonfly-like insect; 蛵子 (xīng zi) — Dragonfly (archaic).