多边
duō biān · HSK 7
multilateral
🤝🌐 duō biān = many + sides — literally many-sided, i.e. multilateral
duō means many or much, biān means side or edge. Together they describe something with many sides involved, like a multilateral agreement or negotiation between multiple parties.
多 — two 夕 (evening) stacked
多 originally depicted two pieces of meat (夕, a variant of 肉) stacked together, suggesting abundance. Over time it was reanalyzed as two 'evenings' piled up — many evenings meaning many days, hence 'many, much'. The doubling itself conveys quantity.
边 — 辶 (walk) + 臱 (phonetic)
边 is the simplified form of 邊. It combines the walking radical 辶 with the phonetic component 臱, suggesting a place reached by walking — the edge or border of a territory. The meaning extended from 'frontier' to 'side' or 'edge' in general.