The Chinese word **牡蛎 (mǔlì)** for "oyster" is a compound noun formed by combining two characters: **牡 (mǔ)**, which historically denotes "male" or "sturdy" (often used in terms for male animals or robust plants), and **蛎 (lì)**, a character specifically associated with mollusks like oysters. Together, they create a binomial term where 蛎 provides the core category (oyster-type shellfish) and 牡 likely originally emphasized a perceived characteristic, such as the hard, sturdy shell, eventually evolving into a standard, fixed lexical unit for the edible bivalve.