字の旅3,000 years in four forms
Oracle bone · ShangShang · c. 1200 BCE前6.49.3 合17067
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.
部首Radical · in Nature & Elements
火 fire (side form)
ひへん hihen · side form of 火 ひ hi
4 strokesRadical of 16 kanjiPart of 18
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
“Careful, it’s hot! This radical brings the heat, energy, and transformative power of fire to its characters. When it sits on the left side, think of burning, cooking, artificial light, or an intense passion that glows like a torch. It is the radical of the forge, the hearth, and the spark of creation that changes everything it touches.”
Where it sits in a kanji
Indicates physical fire, heat, the process of burning or cooking, light sources (lamps), or intense emotions and energy.
What it grows into
- 炎inflammationエン · ほのお
- 燃burnネン · もえる
火 + 然sound
Burn with fire. Originally 然, but because it was phonetically borrowed for abstract senses, 火 was added for differentiation.
Phono-semantic compound · Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0
- 焼bakeショウ · やく
火 + 堯sound
Phono-semantic compound · Wiktionary, 燒, CC BY-SA 4.0
Every kanji with 火 as its radical
All 16 kanji