What does 猪 mean?
猪 (zhū) means pig, hog or swine. It stands alone as an ordinary word: 一头猪 (yì tóu zhū, “a pig”). Common forms include 小猪 (xiǎozhū, piglet), 母猪 (mǔzhū, sow), 公猪 (gōngzhū, boar), 野猪 (yězhū, wild boar), 猪肉 (zhūròu, pork), 猪排 (zhūpái, pork chop) and 猪圈 (zhūjuàn, pigsty). The traditional form is 豬, and 猪 carries the 94th radical 犬, written 犭 on the left.
家 is a roof over a pig
The character 家 (jiā, home or family) is written as 宀 (a roof) over 豕 (shǐ, the classical word for pig). One widely taught explanation is that a household’s stored pig was its wealth, so a roof with a pig beneath it stood for a settled home. Some scholars instead read 豕 here as a phonetic component, so the etymology is debated — but as a cultural reading it is the single most useful fact about the pig in Chinese writing, and it is how textbooks usually introduce the character.
There is a related point about accuracy. When explaining which part of 家 comes from the animal, cite 豕 (shǐ), not 猪. 豕 is the older, classical character; 猪 is a later form. Saying 家 contains 猪 is a common simplification but it is not the shape actually in the character.
猪 in the Chinese zodiac
猪 is the twelfth and final sign in the twelve-animal cycle, after 狗 Dog, and the cycle then returns to 鼠 Rat. It corresponds to the earthly branch 亥 (hài). Recent and coming Pig years are 2043, 2031, 2019, 2007, 1995, 1983, 1971 and 1959, continuing back in steps of twelve. The zodiac year follows the lunar calendar and usually begins in late January or February, so a January or early-February birthday needs the exact date checked rather than assumed.
What the tradition says about the Pig sign
Popular sign descriptions present the Pig as generous, easygoing, diligent, honest and sociable, with a tendency towards naivety or being too trusting. Those descriptions come from a storytelling tradition and from modern popular writing. They are not measurements, and sources differ in how they rank and phrase them.
The Pig shows how far apart a zodiac description and a literary character can sit. Popular lists call the sign generous and easygoing; 猪八戒 in Journey to the West is greedy, lazy and beloved. Both are the culture talking about a pig, and neither is a fact about a person born in a Pig year.
Compatibility in the traditional system
Traditional pairing uses the 六合 “secret friend” pairs and the 三合 three-harmony groups. In that system the Pig is paired with the Tiger, grouped with the Rabbit and the Goat, and set opposite the Snake as the clashing sign.
The pairing rules are relations between branches. 亥 joins 寅 in the 六合 pairs, so the Pig’s partner is the Tiger. Its 三合 trio is 亥卯未 — Pig, Rabbit and Goat. The Pig stands opposite 巳, the Snake, and that is the 冲. These sets have been stable for centuries; the personality verdicts attached to them vary by author, which is the clearest sign that they are commentary rather than rule.
Lucky numbers, colours and flowers
Lists of lucky numbers and colours for the Pig disagree with each other, and none of them descends from the classical rules. What the Pig actually has is the branch 亥, its position last in the cycle, and the fact that 家 is written with a pig under a roof — a far better design idea than any number taken from a popular list.
猪 in idioms and everyday phrases
The classical phrases skew heavily negative. 猪朋狗友 (zhū péng gǒu yǒu, “pig friends and dog friends”) describes a bad crowd. 猪狗不如 (zhū gǒu bù rú, “worse than pigs and dogs”) is a severe insult. 猪八戒照镜子 (Zhū Bājiè zhào jìngzi, “Zhubajie looks in a mirror”) describes being caught between two sides and criticised by both — the joke is that he is “neither inside nor outside a person”. 冷水烫猪 (lěng shuǐ tàng zhū, “scalding a pig with cold water”) describes wasted effort. 猪鼻子插葱，装象 (“a pig with spring onions in its nose, pretending to be an elephant”) describes someone dressing up a small thing as something grand, and 人怕出名猪怕壮 (“a person fears fame, a pig fears fattening”) notes that prominence brings its own trouble.
Everyday vocabulary is neutral by contrast: 猪肉 (zhūròu, pork) is simply the word in the butcher’s shop, 猪油 (zhūyóu) is lard, 猪肝 (zhūgān) is pork liver and 猪蹄 (zhūtí) is a pig’s trotter. The insult register and the food register use the same character, which is why 猪 needs context more than most animals on this list.
Zhubajie: the pig as a beloved protagonist
The strongest counterweight to the insult reading is 猪八戒 (Zhū Bājiè), “Pigsy”, one of the four main pilgrims in 西游记 (Xīyóujì, Journey to the West). He is greedy, lazy, fond of food and prone to complaining, but he is also brave when it counts, and he is one of the best-loved comic characters in Chinese literature. He appears in opera, television, cartoons and children’s books to this day.
That is the useful correction for anyone who reads Chinese pig imagery as simply unclean or contemptuous. In Chinese storytelling the pig is comic and flawed — a figure of appetite and honesty — rather than a figure of disgust. The negative idioms come from the farmyard and from insult speech, while the literary pig is a hero the audience is fond of.
One practical caution remains. 猪 is unusual in modern personal names and 猪 is used as an insult in forms such as 笨猪 and 猪头. A zodiac or folk-art use of 猪 sits comfortably in tradition; 猪 as a brand mark or a personal nickname needs a deliberate reason and a native-speaker read before it is used on anything that ships.