字の旅3,000 years in four forms
Oracle bone · ShangShang · c. 1200 BCE乙478 合21021 𠂤組
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 Action & Movement
食 food, to eat
しょく shoku
9 strokesRadical of 12 kanjiPart of 11
Origin · sourced
Ideogrammic compound會意
In the modern form, the bowl of rice has corrupted into the similar but unrelated 良 or 艮. The variant form 𠊊 preserves the original composition.
Built from 亼 “mouth” + 皀 “a bowl of rice on a stand”
Source: Wiktionary, 食 (rev. 93626765), CC BY-SA 4.0
Memory story · made up to help you remember
“A feast under the lid! Imagine lifting the cover of a steaming pot to find a meal prepared with care. This radical represents the energy of life—nutrition, appetite, and the domestic act of raising food. When you see it, think of the satisfaction of a full stomach and the effort required to "feed" a family or a nation.”
Where it sits in a kanji
Indicates food, the act of eating, raising animals (feeding them), nutrition, thirst/drinking, or concepts related to consumption and appetite.
What it grows into
- 養fosterヨウ · やしなう
羊sound + 食
Ideogrammic compound · Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0
- 飼domesticateシ · かう
食 + 司sound
Phono-semantic compound · Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0
Every kanji with 食 as its radical
All 12 kanji