Meaning & readings

submit, offer, present, serve (meal), accompany

On’yomi キョウ、ク、クウ、グ
Kun’yomi そな.える、とも、-ども

Origin

This character combines a person marker on the left with the component on the right, which serves as a sound hint for pronunciation. The component originally depicts two people together, suggesting the idea of togetherness or cooperation. When paired with the person marker, the character came to mean actions a person performs together with or for others—such as offering something, serving food, or accompanying someone. The sound hint (pronounced きょう) guides how the combined character is read.

AI-generated (claude-haiku-4-5), not yet reviewed. Formation type (automated guess): Phono-semantic (meaning + sound hint).

8 strokes

Components

  • radical left
  • sound hint right

A sound hint component points at the character’s pronunciation, not its meaning — don’t read a meaning into it.

Common words

  • 供給 きょうきゅう supply; provision
  • 供出 きょうしゅつ obligatory supply (of goods to the government, e.g. during wartime); delivery (to the government at a fixed price, e.g. of rice)
  • 供述 きょうじゅつ affidavit; deposition
  • 供物 くもつ offering (e.g. to the gods); votive offering
  • 供与 きょうよ giving; provision
  • 供養 くよう memorial service for the dead; holding a service
  • 子供 こども child; children
  • 自供 じきょう confession

Reference

Strokes
8
Kangxi radical
9
Grade
Grade 6 (Kyōiku)
Frequency rank
#313 (newspapers)
Former JLPT
level 2
Unicode
U+04F9B