About
Originating from a pictographic concept, the character "只" evolved from the traditional form "隻", which structurally integrates the radical for a short-tailed bird with the component for a hand to symbolize a single bird in grasp, thus defining its primary role as a measure word for individual animals. Through linguistic development, its meaning expanded beyond quantification to adopt an adverbial function indicating limitation, such as "only" or "solely", while the simplified form "只" derived from historical abbreviated versions, maintaining these dual usages with a reduced graphical complexity.
Etymology Hide
Example Sentences Hide
我有一只小猫。
他只喝牛奶。
我只要一杯水。
这只是个开始。
我们只有三个苹果。
只吃零食不健康。
他只完成了作业的一部分。
尽管他只有十岁，但他已经读了很多书。