刀 dāo knife
Used as component 刀 in :分 fēn ; 初 chū ; 所 suǒ ; 剪 jiǎn ; 照 zhào
A measure word to use for this noun: 把 bǎ
Similar looking characters : 力 lì (strength)
Made with 2 strokes.
Ancient small seal form 
Different tone
岛 dǎo (island) ; 倒 dào (fall) ; 到 dào (arrive) ; 道 dào (road)This character is also represented as a radical in the form: 刂 dāo
Pronunciation
Sound file kindly provided by shtooka.net ➚ under a Creative Commons Attribution Share Alike License
Stroke order for character 刀, kindly provided under Wikimedia creative commons license ➚
Proverbs
刀山火海 dāo shān huǒ hǎi An extremely difficult and dangerous situation笑里藏刀 xiào lǐ cáng dāo Malice concealed by apparent friendliness. There is a story of Li Yifu who was a great flatterer of the early Tang dynasty. He was always smiles but sought to blackmail and deceive. Eventually Emperor Gaozong discovered his duplicity and he was banished.
杀鸡焉用牛刀 shā jī yān yòng niú dāo Taking unnecessary effort to tackle a small problem. Using an inappropriately large tool for the job.