Written Chinese
Written Chinese () comprises Chinese characters used to represent the Chinese language. Chinese characters do not constitute an alphabet or a compact syllabary. Rather, the writing system is roughly logosyllabic; that is, a character generally represents one syllable of spoken Chinese and may be a word on its own or a part of a polysyllabic word. The characters themselves are often composed of parts that may represent physical objects, abstract notions, or pronunciation. Literacy requires the memorization of a great many characters: educated Chinese know about 4,000. The large number of Chinese characters has in part led to the adoption of Western alphabets as an auxiliary means of representing Chinese.
Radical 1
In the Kangxi Dictionary there are 42 characters (out of 49,030) to be found under this radical.
Radical 1, in this case known as 橫 "héng" "horizontal", is one of the eight principles of the character 永 (永字八法 Yǒngzì Bāfǎ) which are the basis of Chinese calligraphy.