Semantic Features of Chengyu which Contains Components of Elements and Animals

Abstract

The study of national and cultural peculiarities of idioms is considered of particular importance nowadays. The article analysis national and cultural specificity and semantic features of idioms that contain both elements (水 – water, 土 – land 木 – wood, 火 – fire 金 – metal) of ancient Chinese philosophy Wuxing (五行), and zoonyms. These idioms belong to a type of traditional Chinese idiomatic expression chengyu. Chengyu The analysis of data demonstrates that the combination of an element and a zoonym in the Chinese language is not productive (less than 30 examples were found). Chengyu with a negative connotative meaning prevail, meanwhile, the ratio of positive connotation is lower. Chengyu have some lexemes of domestic, wild animals, pets and mythical creatures, however significant segment of data collected has a domestic animal as a part of structure. It was discovered that some zoonyms and elements are combined in the 2 vertex complex chengyu The obtained results contribute to the development of the theory of sinology, language theory, and phraseology. The following study as a long-term issue could include analyses of functions, syntactic and etymology features, as potentially can be used for the researches in other languages.