出汗
chū hàn · HSK 5
to sweat
💦 出汗 = exit + sweat (sweat comes out)
出 means to go out or exit; 汗 means sweat. Together they literally describe sweat exiting the body. 汗 (hàn) sounds a bit like the English exclamation 'hot' — a useful audio hook for the meaning.
出 — foot 止 emerging from enclosure 凵
出 is a pictograph showing a foot or plant stepping out of a hollow or enclosure, depicting the act of going forth. The original sense of 'coming out' or 'emerging' has remained stable since oracle bone script. It now broadly means 'to exit, go out, or produce.'
汗 — water radical 氵 + 干 (gān, phonetic)
汗 is a phono-semantic compound. The water radical 氵 signals liquid, and 干 supplies the sound. Together they denote sweat — the water that comes out of the body. Read hàn it means sweat; read hán it appears in 可汗, a loanword for a Mongol or Turkic ruler (khan).