Learn about the fire radical 火
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| Hi everyone. |
| Welcome to the Japanese Kanji video series. |
| In this lesson, you'll learn the "fire" radical. |
| Take a look at these kanji characters. Can you guess what they mean? |
| By the end of this lesson, you'll be able to grasp the meaning behind these kanji characters. |
| 火, 災, 炎, 炭 |
| First off, can you spot the radical in all of these kanji characters? |
| It's this part here. |
| 火 |
| This particular radical is called... |
| ひ or ひへん. |
| When it's used on the left side, it's called specifically ひへん because へん means "left-position" radical. |
| The "fire" radical is used in some of the most common kanji characters. Let's take a look at it in more detail. |
| Meaning |
| On its own, the "fire" radical looks like this. |
| 火 |
| We mentioned before that some radicals can be kanji on their own. |
| This radical is one such example. |
| The meaning behind this particular kanji is "fire." |
| When this radical appears as a part of another kanji, like in these examples, the appearance changes slightly. When it's a component like this, it adds the meaning of "fire" to the entire kanji character. |
| 火, 災, 炎, 炭 |
| From left to right, the first kanji means "fire," the second means "disaster, calamity, evil" the third character means "inflammation, flame, blaze" and fourth character means "charcoal, coal." |
| 2. 災 |
| The second kanji has the "fire" radical, paired with this second character. |
| This other character almost looks like the lines from an earthquake. One way to memorize this character is by imagining that a fire can most likely burst out after an earthquake which would end up as a disaster. This kanji character means "disaster, calamity, evil." |
| 3. 炎 |
| The third kanji has the "fire" radical twice. |
| You could think of it as the dancing flame of a campfire. This kanji means "inflammation, flame, blaze." |
| 4. 炭 |
| The last kanji has the "fire" radical means "charcoal, coal." |
| For more ways to remember these characters and many more kanji examples that include the "fire" radical, go to JapanesePod101.com and check the Lesson Notes PDF. OK. Let's move on! |
| Common positions |
| The "fire" radical has more than one common positions. If it sits in the bottom-position it connects with another radical above it and shrinks in size. |
| As seen in the original examples for "disaster, calamity, evil," "inflammation, flame, blaze" and "charcoal, coal." |
| There is another case where the "fire" radical is used in the bottom-position. Its shape changes, as seen in these examples 点 and 煮 meaning "point, mark, speck" and "to boil, to cook." |
| The part of 灬 is a variation of the "fire" radical. |
| It can also be in the left-position, like in this example meaning "to cook, to boil, to burn" where it's squished vertically. 炊 |
| Okay. Now let's learn how to write this radical. |
| Stroke Order |
| The "fire" radical is very simple. There are only four strokes. |
| When the radical is on its own, it looks like this: |
| 火 |
| The first stroke is a short, vertical stroke on the left. |
| Then, we make a short diagonal stroke on the right, around the same height as the first stroke. |
| The third stroke is a long vertical sloping stroke, left down from the middle. |
| The fourth and final stroke starts at the middle of vertical stroke and goes diagonally down to the right. |
| When this radical is a part of another kanji, it's squished vertically or shrinks in size. |
| Like in these examples... |
| 炊, 炎 |
| And that's it! You're done! |
| Common Readings |
| When the "fire" radical is on its own, the kanji can be read as... |
| 火 |
| カ、ひ、ほ |
| And when the "fire" radical is a part of another kanji... |
| サイ、わざわ(い) |
| 災 |
| for the "disaster, calamity, evil" kanji. |
| エン、ほのお |
| 炎 |
| for the "inflammation, flame, blaze" kanji. And... |
| タン、すみ |
| 炭 |
| for the "charcoal, coal" kanji. |
| Lesson Review |
| In this lesson, you learned about the 'fire' radical. |
| You also learned the kanji characters for "disaster, calamity, evil" "inflammation, flame, blaze" and "charcoal, coal" in which this radical appears. |
| It's most commonly found in the left- and bottom-positions, making it appear like this. |
| And it's written with four strokes, starting with a short, vertical stroke on the left, a diagonal stroke on the right, then a vertical, sloping stroke, left down from the middle, and a final stroke starts at the middle of vertical stroke and goes diagonally down to the right. |
| In the next lesson, you'll learn about another common radical used in some of the most common and basic kanji characters, the "mountain" radical. |
| See you in the next lesson. Bye! |
| Bye~! |
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