Mao Collection, Upper Volume Radical: Heart (xīn) Kangxi stroke count: 12 Page 390, Entry 45 Pronounced tan. Meaning to burn. Derived from the radical Heart and the phonetic element yan. Book of Odes (Shijing), Lesser Odes of the Kingdom: Sorrowful heart is like burning. Zheng Xuan annotation: Tan means to burn. The sorrowful heart feels as if it were being seared by fire. Also signifies to incinerate. Book of Odes (Shijing), Greater Odes of the Kingdom: Like burning, like scorching. Mao Commentary: Tan means to burn. Also pronounced tan. Also pronounced yan. The meaning remains the same. Also used interchangeably with the character yan. In the Book of Odes (Shijing), the passage like burning is written as yan in the Han school of the Book of Odes (Han Shi). The History of the Later Han (Hou Hanshu) also quotes the Book of Odes using the character yan. Commentary: Yan describes heat that is extremely intense. Note: Tan exclusively means to burn. Some individuals confuse this character with dan, dan, or dan, which is incorrect. When the Book of Odes (Shijing) states that the sorrowful heart is like burning, it merely expresses that sorrow has reached its peak, becoming as scorching as fire; it does not mean that the character tan itself carries the meaning of sorrow. If one were to interpret tan as sorrow, why would the text use the phrase like burning? The explanations found in dictionaries do not clearly convey the original intent; one should rely on the annotations and commentaries for accuracy.