嗾
Character Story & Explanation
In contemporary Chinese, 嗾 is predominantly used in formal or critical contexts—not daily conversation. It appears in news reports (e.g., 'suspect accused of 嗾使 others to commit fraud'), legal documents, and literature to denote calculated provocation. A well-documented phrase is 嗾狗 (sǒugǒu), historically referencing feudal-era enforcers who set dogs on dissenters; today it’s a metaphor for using proxies to attack others. The idiom 嗾人為惡 (sǒu rén wéi è, 'to incite others to do evil') appears in Ming-Qing moral texts and remains cited in ethics education.
The character’s form is not pictographic but phono-semantic: 口 (mouth) as semantic radical indicates speech-related action; the right component 梳 (shū) serves as phonetic clue (though sound has shifted from shū to sǒu over centuries). No oracle-bone or bronze inscriptions contain 嗾—the earliest verified attestations appear in Tang dynasty texts and Song legal commentaries, confirming its late emergence as a specialized term for deliberate instigation.
The Chinese character 嗾 (sǒu) is a vivid, action-oriented verb meaning 'to urge on' or 'to incite', especially in contexts involving prompting others—often animals or people—to act, usually with negative connotations like manipulation or provocation. Its radical 口 (mouth) signals speech-based action, while the phonetic component 梳 (shū, 'to comb') hints at its pronunciation but not meaning. Unlike neutral English verbs like 'encourage', 嗾 carries moral weight—it implies instigation toward undesirable behavior, making it common in legal, journalistic, and literary criticism.
In classical and modern usage, 嗾 frequently appears in compound words like 嗾使 (sǒushǐ, 'to instigate') and 嗾狗 (sǒugǒu, 'to set dogs on someone'), evoking imagery of deliberate, often unethical incitement. It’s rarely used in isolation and almost never in positive or polite registers—unlike English 'urge', which can be neutral ('urge caution') or even laudatory ('urge reform'). This semantic gravity aligns it more closely with English terms like 'incite', 'provoke', or 'egregiously prompt'—all carrying legal or ethical implications.
Culturally, 嗾 resonates with Western concepts like 'stirring up trouble' or 'playing devil’s advocate'—but with sharper moral condemnation. In Anglo-American law, 'incitement' (e.g., to violence) is a defined criminal offense; similarly, in Chinese legal discourse, 嗾使 is used precisely in statutes addressing instigation of crime (e.g., Article 29 of the PRC Criminal Law). Its usage reflects Confucian-influenced values that emphasize personal accountability: to 嗾 someone is to evade responsibility by outsourcing harmful action—a serious breach of ethical conduct.
Example Sentences
Common Compounds
Similar Characters — Don't Mix These Up
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