慢慢
mànmàn · HSK 3
slowly
🐢 慢 = slow, doubled for emphasis: 慢慢 = slowly, gradually
Chinese often doubles an adjective to soften or stretch it. 慢 on its own means slow; 慢慢 turns it into the adverbial slowly/gradually, like easing into the action.
慢 — heart radical 忄 + 曼 màn (phonetic)
慢 is a phonetic-semantic compound. The heart radical 忄 signals a feeling or mental state, while 曼 supplies the sound màn. Originally it meant 'lazy' or 'negligent,' a slack state of mind, and later shifted to its modern sense of 'slow.'
慢 — heart radical 忄 + 曼 màn (phonetic)
慢 is a phonetic-semantic compound. The heart radical 忄 signals a feeling or mental state, while 曼 supplies the sound màn. Originally it meant 'lazy' or 'negligent,' a slack state of mind, and later shifted to its modern sense of 'slow.'