Meaning & readings
gigantic, big, large, great
On’yomi キョ
Nanori おお、か、こ、なお
Origin
This character appears to show three box-like shapes stacked or combined together. The repeated boxes likely suggest something vast or expansive by multiplying or layering the same element. The idea is that just as multiple boxes together take up more space than one alone, this character came to mean "gigantic" or "large" — the repetition of the shape itself conveys the sense of something big and substantial. Over time, the visual concept of accumulated or multiplied forms became associated with the meaning of greatness and size.
Components
- 匚
- 匚
- 匚
Common words
Reference
- Strokes
- 5
- Kangxi radical
- 48
- Formation type
- Compound ideographic (combined meanings)
- Grade
- Jōyō (secondary school)
- Frequency rank
- #892 (newspapers)
- Former JLPT
- level 2
- Unicode
- U+05DE8