爱情
àiqíng · HSK 2
love affair
💕 爱情 = 爱 (love) + 情 (feeling/emotion)
Compound of 爱 ài 'love' and 情 qíng 'feeling, sentiment'. Together they name the romantic-love sense specifically — the emotion of love, as opposed to 爱 alone which covers love broadly (family, hobbies, etc.).
爱 — 爫 (claw) + 冖 (cover) + 心 (heart) + 夂 (slow walk)
Originally written 㤅, showing a heart 心 with breath above, depicting deep feeling. The modern form adds 夂 (a slow-walking foot) below, suggesting reluctance to leave a loved one. The traditional form 愛 keeps 心 inside; simplified 爱 drops the heart but retains the meaning 'love, cherish'.
情 — heart radical 忄 + 青 (qīng)
A semantic-phonetic compound. The heart radical 忄 signals that the meaning involves feelings or inner states, while 青 supplies the sound 'qing'. Originally referring to genuine feelings or emotion arising from the heart, 情 expanded to cover sentiment, affection, and circumstances or situations more broadly.