Meaning & readings
contact, touch, feel, hit, proclaim, announce, conflict
On’yomi ショク
Kun’yomi ふ.れる、さわ.る、さわ
Origin
This character combines the radical for "horn" or "angle" on the left with the character for "insect" on the right, which serves as a sound hint rather than contributing to the meaning. The horn radical suggests something that sticks out or projects, which connects to the idea of making contact or touching something. When you touch something, your hand or body makes contact much like a horn or antenna reaching out, so the radical conveys the sense of physical contact or touching. The insect character is there mainly to hint at the pronunciation, not to add a meaning layer to the character.
Common words
Reference
- Strokes
- 13
- Kangxi radical
- 148
- Formation type
- Phono-semantic (meaning + sound hint)
- Grade
- Jōyō (secondary school)
- Frequency rank
- #904 (newspapers)
- Former JLPT
- level 2
- Unicode
- U+089E6