AFTER A LONG DAY OF LISTENING TO UNPLEASANT OLD MEN

Sometimes I stumble upon a rabbit hole. It's like I'm galloping along on the high plains of the American outback when my steed pits his foot, left or right front, in a declivity and wobbles to regain his balance lest he be shot for breaking his leg. A whinied"oh crap" escapes his lips.

I came across a word that I just had to look up. The shape sent me on several wild goose chases, seeing as it wasn't under moon (月), flesh (肉), or boat (舟), which had all been suggested by the painted form as possible dictionary sections. Twenty strokes total.

Turns out it was under the horse radical (馬).

騰 To gallop, to prance. To soar, to rush with energy as horses do. To clear out or vacate, to absquatulate with all due speed. Indicative of repeated or repetitive actions.


Moon is four strokes, flesh is six. Normally the radical on the left indicates the section, but given that the meaning is horse-related, that is a more logical basket for the character

.In the seal-script version of 騰 ('tang') shown above, the boat is recognizably the leftmost component.

What, you might ask, was it that led me on that journey? Scoping out the calligraphy of 鄧石如 ('tang sek yu'), a scholar from two centuries ago famous for his mastery of the ancient scripts and his elegant and commanding renditions thereof.

His works bring infinite pleasure.



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