truy
Definition
- Verb:
- To pursue; to chase: To follow someone or something quickly in order to catch them.
- To investigate; to trace: To try to find the origin, cause, or details of something through examination or inquiry.
- To interrogate; to quiz: To question someone closely, often in a challenging or persistent manner, as in a classroom setting.
Usage Examples
- Verb:
- Cảnh sát truy kẻ tình nghi. (The police pursued the suspect.)
- Các nhà khoa học truy nguyên nhân của dịch bệnh. (Scientists investigated the cause of the epidemic.)
- Giáo viên truy bài học sinh. (The teacher quizzed the students on the lesson.)
Advanced Usage
"truy tặng": to award or confer posthumously.
- Ông được truy tặng danh hiệu Anh hùng. (He was posthumously awarded the title of Hero.)
"truy thu": to collect retroactively (e.g., taxes, debts).
- Cơ quan thuế truy thu số tiền còn nợ. (The tax agency collected the owed amount retroactively.)
Variants and Related Words
Truy đuổi (v): to chase, to hunt down.
- Họ truy đuổi tên trộm. (They chased the thief.)
Truy nã (v): to issue a wanted order, to manhunt.
- Tên tội phạm bị truy nã toàn quốc. (The criminal is wanted nationwide.)
Truy nguyên (v): to trace the origin, to find the root cause.
- Phải truy nguyên nguồn lây nhiễm. (We must trace the source of the infection.)
Synonyms
- Pursue: to follow and try to catch.
- Investigate: to carry out research or study into.
- Interrogate: to ask questions formally and intensively.
Related Idioms
Truy cùng diệt tận: to pursue and destroy completely; to eradicate.
- Họ quyết tâm truy cùng diệt tận bọn tội phạm. (They are determined to pursue and completely eradicate the criminals.)
Truyền thuyết (related concept: "truyền" meaning to transmit): While not a direct idiom with "truy," it is a common compound where "truyền" shares a conceptual root of passing something on, often found in the word for "legend."
- Truyền thuyết về vua Hùng. (The legend of the Hung Kings.)