Meaning & readings
distant, far
On’yomi エン、オン
Kun’yomi とお.い
Nanori お、おに、ど、どお
Origin
The character 遠 combines a movement or travel radical on the left, which indicates this word relates to going places, with the component 袁 on the right. That 袁 component serves as a sound hint, telling you roughly how to pronounce the character—it doesn't describe the meaning itself. Over time, the concept of traveling or moving far away naturally led to the meaning "distant" or "far." The shape evolved from earlier forms that made the connection between the idea of distance and the act of moving away more visually obvious.
Components
- 袁
- ⻌
A sound hint component points at the character’s pronunciation, not its meaning — don’t read a meaning into it.
Common words
Easily confused with
These look alike but are unrelated in meaning — check the stroke that differs.
Reference
- Strokes
- 13
- Kangxi radical
- 162
- Formation type
- Phono-semantic (meaning + sound hint)
- Grade
- Grade 2 (Kyōiku)
- Frequency rank
- #887 (newspapers)
- Former JLPT
- level 3
- Unicode
- U+09060