Meaning & readings
ritual, offer prayers, celebrate, deify, enshrine, worship
On’yomi サイ
Kun’yomi まつ.る、まつ.り、まつり
Origin
This character most likely combines two visual elements: the left side shows a shrine or altar (represented by the roof-like strokes), and the right side depicts a hand or person making an offering. The overall image captures the physical act of presenting something to a deity at a sacred place, which is the core meaning of ritual worship and celebration. Over time, the character's strokes became more stylized and abstract, but the fundamental idea remained: a person performing sacred acts at an altar or shrine to honor the gods.
Components
This character is treated as a single, undivided shape (祭).
Common words
Reference
- Strokes
- 11
- Kangxi radical
- 113
- Formation type
- Pictographic or simple
- Grade
- Grade 3 (Kyōiku)
- Frequency rank
- #1124 (newspapers)
- Former JLPT
- level 2
- Unicode
- U+0796D