漢字Kanji · in Nature & Elements
火: fire
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
カka · on'yomi · in compounds
- 火事かじfire
- 火力かりょくthermal power
- 火曜日かようびTuesday
- 火山かざん
- 火災かさいconflagration; fire
- 噴火ふんかeruption; volcanic eruption
ひhi · kun'yomi · on its own
- 火ひflame, fire
-び-bi · kun'yomi
- 花火はなびfireworks
Also read ほ-, with no example words in our sources. Words: Kanji alive, CC BY 4.0 · JMdict, EDRDG, CC BY-SA 4.0.
Where it comes from
Origin · sourced
Pictogram (象形)
Pictographic representation of a fire. Written as 灬 when at the bottom of a character, but still seen in the original form in the character 灸.
Source: Wiktionary, 火 (rev. 94507178), CC BY-SA 4.0
Memory story · made up to help you remember
“Look at 火 and see the campfire! The central stroke is the main flame, and the side strokes are sparks dancing in the wind.”
Connections
In ChineseSame character in simplified and traditional · huǒ
Same form: 火 is written the same way in mainland China (simplified) and in Taiwan and Hong Kong (traditional).
- Simplified
- 火 mainland China, Singapore
- Traditional
- 火 Taiwan, Hong Kong
Pinyin huǒ most common reading
Forms and pinyin: Unicode Unihan database (Unicode License v3). Pinyin lists the most common reading, not every reading.