漢字Kanji · in Time & Sequence
十: ten
Oracle bone · Shang Bronze · Western Zhou Small seal · Qin Today
Oracle bone and bronze: Wikimedia Commons, traced from Academia Sinica, CC0. Small seal: Academia Sinica 小學堂, CC0. Today’s form: KanjiVG, CC BY-SA 3.0.
Three readings, and the words that use each
ジュウjuu · on'yomi · in compounds
- 十じゅう10
- 十年じゅうねん10 years
- 十分なじゅうぶんなenough
- 十人十色じゅうにんといろseveral men, several minds
ジュッju · on'yomi
- 十か月じゅっかげつ10 months
- 十冊じゅっさつ10 (bound objects)
- 十匹じゅっぴき10 (animals)
- 十分じゅっぷん10 minutes
- 十本じゅっぽん10 (long cylindrical objects)
とおtoo · kun'yomi · on its own
- 十日とおか10 days, 10th of the month
Special readingsThese words are read as a whole, not from the readings above.
- 二十才はたち20 years old
- 二十日はつか20 days, 20th day of the month
Also read ジッ, と, そ, with no example words in our sources. Words: Kanji alive, CC BY 4.0.
Where it comes from
Origin · sourced
Ideogram (指事)
In oracle-bone script, 十 is mostly written as a single vertical stroke; a few examples add a central dot, as in HJ 9204. Later forms added 一, making a cross.
Source: Wiktionary, 十 (rev. 93531290), CC BY-SA 4.0
Memory story · made up to help you remember
“The base kanji for the number ten—representing the first great milestone in counting and the peak of the primary digits.”
Connections
Also read ジュウ
11 kanji share this on'yomiIn ChineseSame character in simplified and traditional · shí
Same form: 十 is written the same way in mainland China (simplified) and in Taiwan and Hong Kong (traditional).
- Simplified
- 十 mainland China, Singapore
- Traditional
- 十 Taiwan, Hong Kong
Pinyin shí most common reading
Forms and pinyin: Unicode Unihan database (Unicode License v3). Pinyin lists the most common reading, not every reading.