Character by character
marks preceding phrase as modifier of following phrase; it, him her, them; go to
plum; judge; surname
Why it works
Associated with the plum tree, a simple botanical image with a quiet, modest tone.
Why it reads this way
之李 (Zhī Lǐ) is an editorial Chinese given name. 之 means marks preceding phrase as modifier of following phrase; it, him her, them; go to. 李 means plum; judge; surname. The feel is quiet, modest, botanical, leaning neutral. It's a literary two-character given name, so use it as a starting point and check the full name with a Chinese speaker.
Sound
The pinyin is Zhī Lǐ. Say it slowly, then at normal speed. If a tone feels difficult, practice the syllable alone before putting the full name together. A Chinese speaker will usually understand an imperfect tone in context, but the closer you get, the more natural the name feels.
How to introduce it
“My Chinese name is 之李. 之 — marks preceding phrase as modifier of following phrase; it, him her, them; go to; 李 — plum; judge; surname.”
A common full-name pattern would be 李之李 (Lǐ Zhī Lǐ), using the surname 李. You can also use no surname at all.
This page is editorial. A name can be a good fit even if it is not in our corpus; use the name checker for an existing name, or the Finder for a new one.