Kanji Kaisen

漢字Kanji · in Animals & Wildlife

牛: cow

JLPT N44 strokesGrade 2Your ink: 白 Not met
4 strokes
  • 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.

Two readings, and the words that use each

ギュウgyuu · on'yomi · in compounds

  • 牛乳ぎゅうにゅう(cow) milk
  • 牛肉ぎゅうにくbeef
  • 闘牛とうぎゅうbull fight
  • 牛歩ぎゅうほsnail's pace; slow progress
  • 和牛わぎゅうWagyu (any of four breeds of Japanese…
  • 牛丼ぎゅうどんgyudon

うしushi · kun'yomi · on its own

  • 牛うしcow
  • 子牛こうしcalf

Words: Kanji alive, CC BY 4.0 · JMdict, EDRDG, CC BY-SA 4.0.

成り立ち

Where it comes from

Origin · sourced

Pictogram (象形)

Pictogram (象形) of a bull's head, with two horns and two ears. Perhaps unrelated to 告; unrelated to 先.

Source: Wiktionary, 牛 (rev. 92691725), CC BY-SA 4.0

Memory story · made up to help you remember

“The base kanji for cattle, the heart of traditional farming and a primary source of nourishment and strength.”
繋がり
Ink shades, lightest to darkest: 白 Not met, 淡 Met, 中 Learning, 濃 Familiar, 印 Mastered

Easy to confuse

The difference, side by side
牛 cow
vs午 noon
Compare the two shapes stroke by stroke.
In ChineseSame character in simplified and traditional · niú

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

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

Pinyin niú 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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