草案
cǎoàn · HSK 7
plan
📋 草案 = grass + plan — a rough draft, still raw like uncut grass
The first character 草 means grass or rough/crude, and 案 means plan or proposal. Together they literally say rough-plan, i.e. a draft or blueprint that hasn't been finalized yet.
草 — grass radical 艹 + 早 (zǎo, phonetic)
草 is a semantic-phonetic compound. The top 艹 (grass radical, derived from 艸) gives the meaning 'grass' or 'plant', while 早 underneath supplies the sound. Originally 草 referred to a specific plant and acorn-like fruit, but it shifted to mean grass and vegetation broadly, and by extension 'rough' or 'draft'.