Meaning & readings

aid, help, assist

On’yomi フ
Kun’yomi たす.ける

Origin

The left side 扌 is a hand radical that indicates this character involves manual action or support. The right component 夫 serves as a sound hint, showing roughly how the character should be pronounced. Together, the hand doing an action (suggested by the left part) combined with the sound element creates a character meaning to help or aid someone—literally lending a hand to support or assist another person.

扶 7 strokes

Components

  • 扌 radical left
  • 夫 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

  • 扶助 ふじょ aid; help
  • 扶養 ふよう support (e.g. of one's dependents); maintenance

Reference

Strokes
7
Kangxi radical
64
Formation type
Phono-semantic (meaning + sound hint)
Grade
Jōyō (secondary school)
Frequency rank
#1879 (newspapers)
Former JLPT
level 1
Unicode
U+06276