480531170

1141
缶
KAN, kama
way that 33 ‘carriage, vehicle’ (originally,
can, boiler
pulled by humans or oxen, etc.) has been
L1
6 strokes
adopted in modern times for ‘motor vehicle’.
Incidentally, there is also the graph 鑵 (post-
KANzumecanned goods
KANkirican opener
Shuowen), listed in Kangxi zidian as meaning
‘container for liquids’ (the same as the
KIKANsteam boiler
definition in that dictionary for 罐 ), and the
determinative 16 ‘metal’ here would seem
OBI ; seal ; traditional 罐 . Shuowen
more appropriate for the sense ‘tin can’, but
defines as ‘earthenware vessel’; originally
it appears not to have been adopted for
used to hold water, then later the sense
that purpose. Then, in the script reform of
broadened to ‘container’ in general. What
1981 (the Jōyō kanji List of 1945 characters
is treated as the traditional form, in origin
which replaced the earlier [1946] Tōyō kanji
a separate graph found in a later version of
List of 1850 characters), 罐 was adopted in
Shuowen, is analyzed by Ogawa as ‘pot,
the form ; its inclusion in the 1981 List
container’, with 雚 468 (originally, ‘type of
reflected the rise in popularity of tinned
crested bird’) as phonetic with associated
items in Japan in the intervening period.
sense ‘pour water’, giving ‘water container,
DJ2009:v2:428; GY2008:2028; OT1968:795;
container’. As for modern usage in the sense
ZY2009:v3:980,v4:1423; CS2000:165-178. We
‘tin can’, this is an example of a linguistic
suggest taking this graph as 122 ‘noon’
form and its graph being pressed into service
for new technology. That is to say, this
combined with 26 ‘mountain’.
graph meaning ‘water container, container’
came to be used for ‘tin can’,in the same
Mnemonic: OPEN CAN FOR NOON PICNIC ON
MOUNTAIN
1142
L1
肝
KAN, kimo
LIVER, COURAGE
7 strokes
KANZŌliver
KANJIN navital, essential
kimottama‘guts’, courage
Seal ; late graph (Shuowen). Has 209
‘flesh, meat’, and 840 (‘dry’) as phonetic with
associated sense ‘base, foundation’ (Ogawa),
giving ‘bodily part which is essential’; Shirakawa
seems to support this interpretation. Katō,
alternatively, looks to take the associated sense
as ‘dwarf bamboo’, on the basis of the tubular
shape of the blood vessels linked to the liver,
giving ‘bodily part with blood vessels shaped
like dwarf bamboo stems’. In the former analysis,
the meaning is perhaps somewhat vague.
OT1968:816; SS1984:118; KJ1970:204.
Mnemonic: DRIED MEAT TURNS OUT TO BE LIVER
1143
冠
KAN, kanmuri
crown
L1
9 strokes
ŌKANroyal crown
EIKANlaurels
KANMŌcrest, plume
Seal ; late graph (Shuowen). Typically analyzed
as ‘cover, and 920 ‘hand, measure’,
and 117 (‘origin, source’) as semantic and
phonetic in its original sense ‘head’, giving ‘put
on a cap’, and by extension ‘cap’; Katō has a view
that differs somewhat, taking the associated
sense of here as ‘tie/bind the hair’, though
he arrives at essentially the same overall meaning
for the graph. TA1965:619; OT1968:101;
SS1984:119; KJ1970:330.
Mnemonic: CROWN MEASURED ORIGINALLY
TO ENSURE IT COVERED HEAD
342 The Remaining 1130 Characters