Pictographs and Syllabries of the Japanese Language
Created | Updated Jan 28, 2002
A pictograph is a picture or graphic symbol used in some writing systems to represent a word or idea, a famous example being the hieroglyphs of ancient Egypt. Kanji, the pictographic system of the Japanese language, was imported from China in the late fifth century, as Japan at that time had no writing system of its own. Knowledge of roughly 2,200 kanji is needed in modern Japanese to read newspapers and other printed media.
Kanji Readings
A single kanji is used to represent one core idea and any number of related yet different meanings. The character with the core idea of --life-, for example, can also mean -to give birth-, -to grow- (a beard), -raw-, and -draft- (beer). Because each meaning has a unique reading (pronunciation), the number of readings per kanji is often quite high. Readings can be divided into two groups: kun-yomi and on-yomi.
KUN-YOMI. This is the native Japanese word that existed prior to the introduction of the kanji. For example, the character meaning -under-or -below- has the kun-yomi of _shita_ because this is the original, non Chinese-influenced word.
ON-YOMI. This is the reading of the kanji imported along with its picture form, used only in compound nouns with other kanji. Transcripted, on-yomi are usually capitalized. The on-yomi of _shita_ is KA because that represents its Chinese pronunciation. Hundreds of thousands of new words entered the Japanese language via compound nouns read using their on-yomi.
If the same kanji entered the Japanese language at different time periods or from different Chinese dialects, the character may have several different on-yomi. The KA reading above is most common, but another possible reading is GE (as in _gesoku_, "footwear").
THE SYLLABRIES. By about the tenth century, stylization and simplification of the kanji had resulted in the creation of two separate syllabries. A syllabry is a writing system where each symbol represents a phonetic sound, and the syllabries of Japan came to be called hiragana and katakana. In modern usage, katakana is mostly for words imported from other languages (table, computer, etc.), and hiragana a supplement to the kanji.
Kanji written as-is are limited to representing nouns and prepositions; simply writing the character _shita_ makes no distinction between, say, the adjective -below- and the verb -to lower-. To address this, verbs and adjectives are written using a combination of kanji and hiragana, where the kanji identifies the core meaning and the hiragana the verb/adjective suffix (in Japanese, all verbs end in -ru and all adjectives in -i). Hiragana used in conjunction with kanji in this fashion is called okurigana.
Learning the Japanese Writing System
In 1981, the Japanese Ministry of Education announced what it deemed the 1,945 most essential characters, called the Jouyou Kanji ("Kanji for Everyday Use"). All Jouyou Kanji are tested before graduation from high school, after which additional kanji is acquired through personal study. The two syllabries, hiragana and katakana, are mastered by about the age of 6.
Kanji Readings
A single kanji is used to represent one core idea and any number of related yet different meanings. The character with the core idea of --life-, for example, can also mean -to give birth-, -to grow- (a beard), -raw-, and -draft- (beer). Because each meaning has a unique reading (pronunciation), the number of readings per kanji is often quite high. Readings can be divided into two groups: kun-yomi and on-yomi.
KUN-YOMI. This is the native Japanese word that existed prior to the introduction of the kanji. For example, the character meaning -under-or -below- has the kun-yomi of _shita_ because this is the original, non Chinese-influenced word.
ON-YOMI. This is the reading of the kanji imported along with its picture form, used only in compound nouns with other kanji. Transcripted, on-yomi are usually capitalized. The on-yomi of _shita_ is KA because that represents its Chinese pronunciation. Hundreds of thousands of new words entered the Japanese language via compound nouns read using their on-yomi.
If the same kanji entered the Japanese language at different time periods or from different Chinese dialects, the character may have several different on-yomi. The KA reading above is most common, but another possible reading is GE (as in _gesoku_, "footwear").
THE SYLLABRIES. By about the tenth century, stylization and simplification of the kanji had resulted in the creation of two separate syllabries. A syllabry is a writing system where each symbol represents a phonetic sound, and the syllabries of Japan came to be called hiragana and katakana. In modern usage, katakana is mostly for words imported from other languages (table, computer, etc.), and hiragana a supplement to the kanji.
Kanji written as-is are limited to representing nouns and prepositions; simply writing the character _shita_ makes no distinction between, say, the adjective -below- and the verb -to lower-. To address this, verbs and adjectives are written using a combination of kanji and hiragana, where the kanji identifies the core meaning and the hiragana the verb/adjective suffix (in Japanese, all verbs end in -ru and all adjectives in -i). Hiragana used in conjunction with kanji in this fashion is called okurigana.
Learning the Japanese Writing System
In 1981, the Japanese Ministry of Education announced what it deemed the 1,945 most essential characters, called the Jouyou Kanji ("Kanji for Everyday Use"). All Jouyou Kanji are tested before graduation from high school, after which additional kanji is acquired through personal study. The two syllabries, hiragana and katakana, are mastered by about the age of 6.
