北běi

Simplified form (簡體). 北 (běi, "north") remains unchanged from its traditional counterpart — the character depicts two people standing back to back, a visual that once meant "to turn away" before settling on the cardinal direction opposite the sun. As the right-side radical 阝, it appears in 陆 (land), 阴 (yin), 阳 (yang), and 都 (capital), characters that trace the ancient association between place-names and this fundamental direction.