What 临 means
It marks nearness; the surrounding word decides the sense. 临 is the simplified form, standard in mainland China; 臨 is traditional, used in Taiwan and Hong Kong.
An ancestral form appears in an early Western Zhou royal inscription on the bronze vessel Da Yu ding. There it invokes heavenly oversight and protection. Later senses include arrival, facing, imminence, and copying calligraphy.
Analyses differ: one links the bronze form to 監 without 皿 (a dish-shaped component); the Shuowen, an early character dictionary, reads 臨 as 臥 (a “lying down” component) plus a sound component.
Neutral in modern compounds; older idioms can sound literary.
Don’t carry “temporary” from 临时 into every word containing 临.
Part of the collection
Who writes 临
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What it means when someone sends it to you
3 readingsA temporary or last-minute change.
Related characters
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Questions people ask
1Why does 临 show as a box on some devices?
Because that device's fonts have no glyph for it. The character is still correct and still copies correctly — the box is a missing glyph, not a broken character.
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How to type or find 临
- Search it as
- 临 meaning · 臨 · 临时 · 面临 · 临摹
- Shows up in
- Anything that takes text · its shape is whatever your font draws
临\4E34Codes and encoding1 code points
A visible symbol can contain several code points. JS .length counts UTF-16 units; UTF-8 counts bytes.