Example sentences

nǐ你jǐ几suì岁le了?

How old are you?

tā他èr二shí十suì岁。

He's twenty.

The story behind the character

岁

岁 originally meant Jupiter. Xu Shen wrote it plainly: 岁, 木星也: "the wood star." The ancients saw that Jupiter circles the sky in twelve years, so they used it to count years. When you say "I'm X years old," you're really saying "Jupiter has gone around X times."

Related words