Words
The one Chinese character 胡 was used for many hu words besides the Hu surname.
In Classical Chinese, hu 胡 meant: "dewlap; wattle" and was a variant Chinese character for "how; why; what" (he 何), "long-lasting; far-reaching" (xia 遐), "part of a dagger-axe", hu- in "butterfly" (hudie 蝴蝶), and "Northern Barbarians".
In Modern Standard Mandarin, hu 胡 means: "foreign" (e.g., huqin 胡琴 "two-stringed bowed instruments"), "recklessly; irrelevantly" (hushuo 胡說 "talk nonsense; drivel"), "dewlap", (literary) "why; when; how", "Surname", and (historical) "non-Han peoples in the northwest" (Huren 胡人 "the Northern tribes"); or 胡 is a variant character for hu 鬍 (huzi 胡子/鬍子"moustache; beard; whiskers; bandit") and hu 衚 (hutong 胡同/衚衕 "lane; alley"). Compare Honghuzi 紅胡子 (literally "Red Beards") "bandits in the Sino-Russian borderlands".
Read more about this topic: Hu (surname)
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