The Chinese Character, an Interpretable Chinese Culture

“Chuang” (“窗”) was originally a pictographic character written like this   in ancient Chinese books. The form is pretty much like a round window. In the small seal script, the character is changed to this , representing a hole in the roof to let in light and let out smoke. So it's clear that this character was used to indicate a window or a chimney in ancient times. In the clerical script, it's written as  , with an additional “穴” (pronounced as “xue”, meaning “a cave”) radical representing a room to the small seal script version . The character has therefore becomes a word exclusively referring to windows, and “chong” (囱) is used solely to mean chimneys. In the regular script, the character “chuang” remains basically the same shape as that in the clerical script.

Windows are among the most important components of traditional Chinese buildings. For instance, open-carved windows, otherwise known as “floral windows” or “patterned windows”, feature patterns in openwork. They are mainly used to decorate the walls. In ancient China, such windows were mostly made of roof bricks, tiles, wood, mortar and iron wires etc into regular or natural shapes. The character “chuang” is also used as a general term for any hole in a room, vehicle or shipping vessel for letting in light and air. The Chinese phrase “han chuang”, literally meaning “a seat by the window in cold winter days”, refers to difficult learning conditions. And another phrase “tong chuang” (literally “the same window”) means people studying in the same room. It's a common way of saying “classmates” or “schoolmates”.