The word "苹果" (píngguǒ) is formed by combining two characters, each contributing a key part of the concept. The first character, "苹" (píng), historically represented a type of plant or clover and uses the "grass" radical (艹) to categorize it as vegetation. The second character, "果" (guǒ), means "fruit" and pictorially resembles a tree (木) with a heavy, round object hanging from it. Together, they create a semantic compound where "苹" suggests the specific plant and "果" specifies its edible, fruiting nature, directly visualizing the idea of the "apple fruit" from the plant.