Meaning & readings
circle, yen, round
On’yomi エン
Kun’yomi まる.い、まる、まど、まど.か、まろ.やか
Nanori つぶら、のぶ、まどか、みつ
Origin
This character pictures a circle or rounded enclosure. The box-like component on the left (冂) represents a bounded circular space, while the component on the right serves as a sound hint for the Chinese pronunciation "en." Over time, the character came to mean both the literal shape of a circle and the Japanese currency yen, which uses the same name. The strokes work together to suggest something complete and enclosed, which fits both the geometric idea of roundness and the notion of a whole monetary unit.
Components
- 冂
- 員V
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
- 4
- Kangxi radical
- 13
- Formation type
- Phono-semantic (meaning + sound hint)
- Grade
- Grade 1 (Kyōiku)
- Frequency rank
- #69 (newspapers)
- Former JLPT
- level 4
- Unicode
- U+05186