冰山
bīng shān · HSK 7
iceberg
🧊⛰️ bīng shān = ice + mountain — literally an ice mountain
The compound is transparent: 冰 (bīng) means ice, 山 (shān) means mountain. Stack them and you get a mountain of ice floating in the sea. The 'b' in bīng even echoes the 'b' in iceberg.
冰 — ice radical 冫 + water 水
冰 means 'ice' and combines 冫 (the 'ice' radical, originally a pictograph of ice crystals) with 水 'water'. The radical 冫 is itself a simplified form of an older character for ice, so 冰 is essentially 'frozen water'. The form 氷 is a variant still used in Japanese.
山 — pictograph of three mountain peaks
山 is one of the oldest pictographs in Chinese, originally drawn in oracle bone script as three pointed peaks rising from a baseline. The form was simplified over time into the modern three vertical strokes on a base. Its meaning has stayed remarkably stable: 'mountain' or 'hill'.