Meaning & readings
make, production, prepare, build
On’yomi サク、サ
Kun’yomi つく.る、つく.り、-づく.り
Nanori くり、さか、さっ、づくり、とも、なお、はぎ、まさか
Origin
The left side, the person radical, indicates this character relates to human action or labor. The right side is a sound hint that suggests the pronunciation, sounding roughly like "saku." Together, a person doing something or creating something became the character for "make" or "build." Over time, the character extended to mean production and preparation more broadly. The original idea of a person actively engaged in work is at the heart of this character's meaning.
Components
- 亻
- 乍
A sound hint component points at the character’s pronunciation, not its meaning — don’t read a meaning into it.
Common words
Easily confused with
These look alike but are unrelated in meaning — check the stroke that differs.
Reference
- Strokes
- 7
- Kangxi radical
- 9
- Formation type
- Phono-semantic (meaning + sound hint)
- Grade
- Grade 2 (Kyōiku)
- Frequency rank
- #103 (newspapers)
- Former JLPT
- level 3
- Unicode
- U+04F5C