字の旅3,000 years in four forms
Oracle bone · ShangShang · c. 1200 BCE乙1144 合3990
Oracle bone: Wikimedia Commons, traced from Academia Sinica, CC0. Bronze and small seal: Wikimedia Commons, public domain. Today’s form: KanjiVG, CC BY-SA 3.0.
The oracle bone, bronze and seal stages show 玉, not 王 itself.
部首Radical · in Tools & Weapons
王 jewelry, jeweled king
おうへん ouhen
4 strokesRadical of 21 kanjiPart of 36
Origin · sourced
Pictogram象形
The character's shape was historically very similar to 王; a dot was introduced to differentiate the two.
Source: Wiktionary, 玉 (rev. 94584484), the entry for the full form, CC BY-SA 4.0
Memory story · made up to help you remember
“A treasure for royalty! While it looks like a "king," the true soul of this radical is "jade." When you see it on the left side of a kanji, imagine the shimmering glow of a precious gem or the clinking of a necklace. It brings a sense of value, beauty, and the "jeweled" quality of anything rare and important.”
Where it sits in a kanji
Indicates gemstones (especially jade), jewelry, precious objects, beauty, clarity, and things associated with royalty and high status.
What it grows into
- 現presentゲン · あらわれる
- 珍rareチン · めずらしい
王 + 㐱sound
Originally meant a rich, robust gemstone (玉), and then also developed the meaning of "rare".
Phono-semantic compound · Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0
- 理logicリ · ことわり
王 + 里sound
Phono-semantic compound · Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0
Every kanji with 王 as its radical
All 21 kanji