Meaning & readings

reputation, praise, honor, glory

On’yomi
Kun’yomi ほま.れ、ほ.める
Nanori え、たか、たけ、ほまれ、ほめ、ほん

Origin

This character combines the speech radical , which marks it as relating to words and communication, with a sound component at the top that hints at its pronunciation. The bottom part establishes that is about language and speaking, which makes sense since reputation and praise are built through what people say about you. The upper component provides a phonetic clue to help with pronunciation rather than adding to the meaning. Together, the character literally pictures the idea of words and speech that build someone's reputation or honor.

AI-generated (claude-haiku-4-5), not yet reviewed. Formation type (automated guess): Phono-semantic (meaning + sound hint).

13 strokes

Components

  • つ+2+ sound hint top
  • radical bottom

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

Common words

  • 栄誉 えいよ honour; honor
  • 名誉 めいよ honor; honour
  • 誉れ ほまれ honour; honor
  • 名誉職 めいよしょく honorary position

Reference

Strokes
13
Kangxi radical
149
Grade
Jōyō (secondary school)
Frequency rank
#1064 (newspapers)
Former JLPT
level 1
Unicode
U+08A89