Kanji Kaisen

漢字Kanji · in Action & Movement

武: warrior, military

Also: chivalry, arms

JLPT N28 strokesGrade 5Your ink: 白 Not met

止 carries the meaning · CDP-8CB8 is drawn in

8 strokes
  • Oracle bone · Shang
  • Today

Oracle bone: Wikimedia Commons, traced from Academia Sinica, CC0. Today’s form: KanjiVG, CC BY-SA 3.0.

Two readings, and the words that use each

ブbu · on'yomi · in compounds

  • 武士ぶしwarrior, samurai
  • 武器ぶきweapon, arms
  • 武力ぶりょくmilitary power
  • 武術ぶじゅつmartial arts
  • 武道ぶどうmartial arts, Bushido
  • 武装するぶそうするbe armed

ムmu · on'yomi

  • 武者震いむしゃぶるいshake with excitement [n.]
  • 影武者かげむしゃsecret power broker

Also read たけ, たけし, with no example words in our sources. Words: Kanji alive, CC BY 4.0.

成り立ち

Where it comes from

Origin · sourced

Ideogrammic compound (會意)戈 dagger-axe + 止 foot; to walk; to stop

Army going on an expedition. In the character 武, the 戈 component is written above the 止 component.

Source: Wiktionary, 武 (rev. 92200870), CC BY-SA 4.0

Memory story · made up to help you remember

“Stop right there! See the foot planted firmly on the earth.”
繋がり
Ink shades, lightest to darkest: 白 Not met, 淡 Met, 中 Learning, 濃 Familiar, 印 Mastered

武 gives its sound to

The family reading is フ (fu). Sound parts: KanjiVG.

In ChineseSame character in simplified and traditional · wǔ

Same form: 武 is written the same way in mainland China (simplified) and in Taiwan and Hong Kong (traditional).

Simplified
武 mainland China, Singapore
Traditional
武 Taiwan, Hong Kong

Pinyin wǔ most common reading

Forms and pinyin: Unicode Unihan database (Unicode License v3). Pinyin lists the most common reading, not every reading.

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