Definitions
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.
- noun A traditional type of Chinese residence consisting of four houses with a courtyard in the middle; a Chinese quadrangle.
Etymologies
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License
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Examples
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Sharing our siheyuan were my aunts and uncles and a few tenants: the families of a tailor, an electrician, and a clerk.
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Back in those days, the location of a hutong, formed by the space between the siheyuan (courtyards of homes), was significant: In the Ming Dynasty (1368-1644), they were organized by social rank; the highest-ranking elite lived closest to the Forbidden City.
City Walk: Beijing Kristina P 2010
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"Chinese believe that in a siheyuan you can feel the spirit of the earth because unlike in a high-rise apartment, you step on it every day."
Archive 2008-07-01 The Nag 2008
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In the summer, pale jasmine opened up at night, filling our siheyuan with its fragrance.
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It's siheyuan -- si means four, he means enclosed, yuan means yard, so it's a four-sided enclosed yard.
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Also on display at the Beijing Planning Exhibition Hall are wooden models of old-style architecture, such as the Forbidden City and a siheyuan, or traditional courtyard house.
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The group's current principal interest is documenting life in Beijing's hutongs, traditional-style alleyways flanked by siheyuan (courtyard houses).
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Built about 170 years ago as part of a general's siheyuan
Rooms With a Past 2008
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Some of the siheyuan [courtyard houses] along this Qing Dynasty hutong look fairly modern.
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For example, living in a high-rise apartment, you have a bathroom, toilet, and central heating, but living in this kind of one-floor bungalow house [siheyuan, or courtyard house], in a hutong, you don't feel the same way.
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