一眼
yī yǎn · HSK 7
a glimpse
👁️ 一眼 = 一 one + 眼 eye → one eye's worth of looking = a single glance
一 means one and 眼 means eye. One eye, one look: the quick once-over you give something before moving on. 看了一眼 = took one glance.
一 — single horizontal stroke
一 is one of the simplest pictographs in Chinese, depicting a single horizontal line to represent the number one. It has retained essentially the same form since oracle bone script over 3,000 years ago. By extension it also means 'first,' 'whole,' or 'same.'
眼 — eye radical 目 + 艮 (phonetic)
眼 is a semantic-phonetic compound. The left side 目 means 'eye' and gives the meaning, while 艮 on the right supplies the sound. Originally referring to the eyeball, it broadened over time to mean 'eye' generally and, by extension, 'a hole' or 'key point'.