Meaning & readings
harmony, Japanese style, peace, soften, Japan
On’yomi ワ、オ、カ
Kun’yomi やわ.らぐ、やわ.らげる、なご.む、なご.やか、あ.える
Nanori あい、いず、かず、かつ、かつり、かづ、たけ、ち、とも、な、にぎ、まさ、やす、よし、より、わだこ、わっ
Origin
The character 和 combines a sound component on the left with a meaning component on the right. The left part, 禾, is a picture of grain or rice plants and serves mainly as a pronunciation hint — it doesn't directly contribute to the meaning. The right part, 口, represents a mouth or opening. Together, these suggest the idea of harmonizing or bringing things together peacefully, much like different grains coming together in a meal, or people gathering around food to speak and reach agreement. Over time, the character came to represent harmony, peace, and the Japanese people themselves.
Components
- 禾
- 口
A sound hint component points at the character’s pronunciation, not its meaning — don’t read a meaning into it.
Common words
Reference
- Strokes
- 8
- Kangxi radical
- 30
- Formation type
- Phono-semantic (meaning + sound hint)
- Grade
- Grade 3 (Kyōiku)
- Frequency rank
- #124 (newspapers)
- Former JLPT
- level 2
- Unicode
- U+0548C