漢字Kanji · in States & Attributes
色: color
𠂊 and 巴 are drawn in
Bronze · Spring and Autumn Small seal · Qin Today
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
ショクshoku · on'yomi · in compounds
- 地方色ちほうしょくlocal color
いろiro · kun'yomi · on its own
- 何色なにいろwhat color
- 黄色きいろyellow
- 色々いろいろvarious
- 顔色かおいろcomplexion
Special readingsThese words are read as a whole, not from the readings above.
- 景色けしきscenery, landscape
Also read シキ, with no example words in our sources. Words: Kanji alive, CC BY 4.0.
Where it comes from
Origin · sourced
Ideogrammic compound (會意)爪 claw; hand + 卩 kneeling person
It depicts a hand pressing down on a kneeling person. 色 was an ancient form of 印; they both originally meant "to press down", meaning now written with 抑.
Source: Wiktionary, 色 (rev. 93477218), CC BY-SA 4.0
Memory story · made up to help you remember
“The base kanji for the spectrum of light and the quality of physical "charm" or attractiveness in a person or object.”
Connections
Also built on comma-design (巴)
Also read ショク
11 kanji share this on'yomiAlso read シキ
4 kanji share this on'yomiEasy to confuse
The difference, side by sideIn ChineseSame character in simplified and traditional · sè
Same form: 色 is written the same way in mainland China (simplified) and in Taiwan and Hong Kong (traditional).
- Simplified
- 色 mainland China, Singapore
- Traditional
- 色 Taiwan, Hong Kong
Pinyin sè most common reading
Forms and pinyin: Unicode Unihan database (Unicode License v3). Pinyin lists the most common reading, not every reading.