鞠 (jū): to incline (one's torso), to bow, leather ball used in ancient times, (literary) to bring up, to rear

鞠 (jū) is a Chinese character meaning “to incline (one's torso).” Classified as HSK Level 7-9 (HSK 3.0 Standard, CLEC 2022), it is composed of 革 (semantic) and 匊 (phonetic). It ranks #2765 in character frequency (SUBTLEX-CH corpus).

Etymologically derived, 鞠 leather. Its radical form 革 (leather) appears in many related characters such as 鞋 (xié, shoe), 革 (gé, animal hide), 靴 (xuē, boots).

Spoken pronunciation

Definitions

  1. to incline (one's torso)
  2. to bow
  3. leather ball used in ancient times
  4. (literary) to bring up
  5. to rear

Etymology & Origin

鞠

pictophoneticleather

Decomposition: ⿰革匊 (layout: left-right)

Stroke Order

1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17

Practice writing 鞠 with real-time feedback — trace each stroke in the correct order and build muscle memory in the HanziFeed app.

Words & Compounds

Common Compounds

WordPinyinMeaning
鞠躬verbjū gōngto bow
鞠躬尽瘁phrasejū gōng jìn cuìto bend to a task and spare no effort (idiom)
鞠躬尽瘁,死而后已jū gōng jìn cuì , sǐ ér hòu yǐto bend to a task and spare no effort unto one's dying day (idiom)
蹴鞠nouncù jūcuju, ancient Chinese football (soccer)
4
Total compounds
75
As first character
25
As last character
0
As middle character

鞠 appears in 4 compound words: 75 as the first character, 25 as the last, and 0 in a middle position. Compound statistics computed from SUBTLEX-CH and HSK 3.0 vocabulary data.

Strongest Collocations

Characters that most frequently co-occur with 鞠 in natural Chinese text, ranked by NPMI (Normalized Pointwise Mutual Information) — a statistical measure of association strength.

躬gōng
0.8091,907 co-occurrences
蹋tà
0.51932 co-occurrences
歉qiàn
0.502351 co-occurrences
萍píng
0.443118 co-occurrences
莉lì
0.369240 co-occurrences
跪guì
0.36220 co-occurrences
朱zhū
0.353186 co-occurrences
尽jǐn
0.350116 co-occurrences
盈yíng
0.33736 co-occurrences
铭míng
0.33434 co-occurrences

Idioms & Chengyu (1)

鞠躬尽瘁jūgōngjìncuìHSK 7+

to bend oneself to a task and exert oneself to the utmost; to spare no effort in the performance of one's duty

phrase

Example Sentences

AI-Generated

这个鞠字在古汉语中有不同的含义。

zhè gě jū zì zài gǔ hàn yǔ zhōng yǒu bù tóng de hán yì .

The character "鞠" has different meanings in Classical Chinese.

中国新闻网·体育Jul 2026

终场哨响后,他深情亲吻了门柱,随后转身向四面看台鞠躬,眼眶泛红。

zhōng chǎng shào xiǎng hòu , tā shēn qíng qīn wěn le mén zhù , suí hòu zhuǎn shēn xiàng sì miàn kàn tái jū gōng , yǎn kuàng fàn hóng .

After the final whistle blew, he gave the goalpost a tender kiss, then turned and bowed to the stands on all four sides, his eyes reddened.

中国新闻网·体育Jun 2026

董路甫一出现,面对前来欢呼接机的华侨华人和球迷,立即停下脚步,向人群深深鞠了一躬。

dǒng lù fǔ yī chū xiàn , miàn duì qián lái huān hū jiē jī de huá qiáo huá rén hé qiú mí , lì jí tíng xià jiǎo bù , xiàng rén qún shēn shēn jū le yī gōng .

As soon as Dong Lu appeared, he stopped in his tracks upon seeing the overseas Chinese and fans who had come to cheer him on, and bowed deeply to the crowd.

中国新闻网·文化May 2026

投壶、蹴鞠、拓印等传统文化互动项目,让大人孩子在创作中触摸非遗温度。

tóu hú , 蹴 jū , tuò yìn děng chuán tǒng wén huà hù dòng xiàng mù , ràng dà rén hái zǐ zài chuàng zuò zhōng chù mō fēi yí wēn dù .

Interactive traditional cultural activities such as arrow-throwing, cuju, and block printing allow both adults and children to experience the warmth of intangible cultural heritage through creative expression.

马来西亚诗华日报新闻网Apr 2026

酒店员工提醒孩子勿玩旋转门 熊家长报警逼鞠躬道歉

jiǔ diàn yuán gōng tí xǐng hái zǐ wù wán xuán zhuǎn mén xióng jiā cháng bào jǐng bī jū gōng dào qiàn

Hotel staff warned a child not to play with the revolving door; the child’s overbearing parent called the police and forced the staff to bow and apologize

三立新聞網Mar 2026

红茶巴士4度鞠躬灭火!道歉全文一次看

hóng chá bā shì 4 dù jū gōng miè huǒ ! dào qiàn quán wén yī cì kàn

Black Tea Bus Bows Four Times to Put Out the Fire! Read the Full Apology Here

Tatoeba

没有人向他恭敬地鞠躬。

Méiyǒu rén xiàng tā gōngjìng de jūgōng.

No one respectfully bowed towards him.

Tatoeba

在日本,遇到人鞠躬是有礼貌的表现。

Zài Rìběn, yùdào rén jūgōng shì yǒulǐmào de biǎoxiàn.

In Japan, it is polite to bow when one meets someone.

Tatoeba

男孩向我鞠了个躬。

Nánhái xiàng wǒ jū le gè gōng.

The boy bowed to me.

Character Family

Semantic Family — Characters sharing the 革 (leather) component

革 Radical Family — Characters sharing the leather radical

Homophones — Characters pronounced jū

Frequently Asked Questions

What does 鞠 (jū) mean in Chinese?
鞠 (jū) primarily means "to incline (one's torso)." It is classified as HSK Level 7-9, making it an expert-level character. It ranks #2765 in character frequency.
What's the difference between 鞠 and 下?
鞠 (jū) and 下 (xià) are often confused. antonym. The key distinguishing feature: 鞠 (up) vs 下 (down).
How many strokes does 鞠 have?
鞠 is written with 17 strokes. The correct stroke order matters for recognition and handwriting speed — practice with the animated guide above to build proper technique.
What is the radical of 鞠?
The radical associated with 鞠 is 革 (leather). This radical appears in many characters related to leather.
What are the components of 鞠?
鞠 is composed of: 革 (semantic), 匊 (phonetic). Its IDS decomposition is ⿰革匊 with a left-right layout. Understanding the components helps with both memorization and recognizing related characters.
What are common words containing 鞠?
Common words with 鞠 include: 鞠躬 (jū gōng, "to bow"); 鞠躬尽瘁 (jū gōng jìn cuì, "to bend to a task and spare no effort (idiom)"); 鞠躬尽瘁,死而后已 (jū gōng jìn cuì , sǐ ér hòu yǐ, "to bend to a task and spare no effort unto one's dying day (idiom)"); 蹴鞠 (cù jū, "cuju, ancient Chinese football (soccer)"). There are over 4 compound words containing this character.
What characters sound the same as 鞠 (jū)?
Several characters share the pronunciation jū: 据 (according to), 具 (tool), 局 (narrow), 举 (to lift), and 4 more. Context and tones help distinguish between them in speech and writing.
Is 鞠 the same in simplified and traditional Chinese?
Yes, 鞠 is written the same way in both simplified and traditional Chinese.

Practice writing 鞠 with real-time feedback

Trace stroke sequences, hear spoken pronunciation, and build lasting retention with spaced repetition in the HanziFeed app.

Character data sourced from Unihan (Unicode Consortium), SUBTLEX-CH frequency corpus (Cai & Brysbaert, 2010), and Make Me a Hanzi (stroke data). Collocation strength measured via NPMI (Normalized Pointwise Mutual Information). Verified by the HanziFeed linguistics team.

HSK classification follows the HSK 3.0 Standard (Center for Language Education and Cooperation, CLEC, 2022 revision). Idiom data from Wiktionary (CC BY-SA 3.0).

Data last verified: March 2026.