字 Kanji Decipher

Meaning & readings

flock, group, crowd, herd, swarm, cluster

On’yomi グン
Kun’yomi む.れる、む.れ、むら、むら.がる
Nanori ぐり、ぐ、こお、こおり、ごうり

Origin

The character shows a sheep (羊) on the right side, which acts as a category marker indicating this character relates to animals. The component 君 on the left provides a sound hint for how to pronounce the character. When you see multiple sheep gathered together, or animals clustered as a group, it naturally evokes the idea of a flock or herd—and this visual logic is captured in the character's design, where the sheep radical connects the written form to the meaning of animals assembling in numbers.

群 13 strokes

Components

  • 君 sound hint left
  • 羊 radical right

A sound hint component points at the character’s pronunciation, not its meaning — don’t read a meaning into it.

Common words

  • 魚群 ぎょぐん school of fish; shoal of fish
  • 群れ むれ group; crowd
  • 群像 ぐんぞう lively group (esp. of young people); dynamic bunch
  • 群島 ぐんとう island group; archipelago
  • 抜群 ばつぐん outstanding; excellent
  • 群衆 ぐんしゅう group (of people); crowd
  • 群集 ぐんしゅう crowd; community
  • 群がる むらがる to swarm; to gather

Related kanji

Same sound component 君
Same radical

Reference

Strokes
13
Kangxi radical
123
Formation type
Phono-semantic (meaning + sound hint)
Grade
Grade 4 (Kyōiku)
Frequency rank
#1012 (newspapers)
Former JLPT
level 2
Unicode
U+07FA4