Kanji Kaisen

漢字Kanji · in Animals & Wildlife

雅: gracious, elegant

Also: graceful, refined

JLPT N113 strokesSecondary schoolYour ink: 白 Not met

隹 carries the meaning · 牙 gives the sound

13 strokes

One reading, and the words that use it

ガga · on'yomi · in compounds

  • 優雅ゆうが
  • 雅致がちartistry; good taste; elegance
  • 雅楽ががくgagaku; ceremonial Japanese court music
  • 雅文がぶんelegant (literary) style
  • 雅号がごうalias; pseudonym; pen name

Also read みやび, with no example words in our sources. Words: JMdict, EDRDG, CC BY-SA 4.0.

Learn it 4 steps
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成り立ち

Where it comes from

Origin · sourced

Phono-semantic compound (形聲)隹 a short-tailed bird (meaning) + 牙 (sound)

It represents the meaning of a rook, which is a type of crow. By extension, it is used metaphorically to mean "elegant" or "refined.".

Source: Wiktionary, 雅 (rev. 92262156), CC BY-SA 4.0

Memory story · made up to help you remember

“Tooth/refined (牙) + bird (隹). This refers to the elegant posture and "refined" song of a bird, representing the peak of high culture.”
From the 隹 old bird story
繋がり
Ink shades, lightest to darkest: 白 Not met, 淡 Met, 中 Learning, 濃 Familiar, 印 Mastered
牙

Also built on tusk (牙)

雅 takes the 牙 family's reading, ガ (ga).

隹

Also built on old bird (隹)

All 21

Also read ガ

9 kanji share this on'yomi

Easy to confuse

The difference, side by side
雅 gracious · 牙
vs稚 immature · 禾
雅 has 牙 where 稚 has 禾.
In ChineseSame character in simplified and traditional · yǎ

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

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

Pinyin yǎ 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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