Meaning & readings
ride, power, multiplication, record, counter for vehicles, board, mount, join
Origin
This character combines two components: a tree (木) and the numeral thousand (千). The formation most likely developed from the idea of riding on or boarding something made of wood, such as a wooden vehicle or carriage. Over time, the meaning expanded from the concrete act of climbing onto or riding in something to the more abstract sense of multiplication and numerical operations — when you "ride" or layer numbers together, you multiply them. The character eventually came to encompass various meanings related to getting on, carrying, and counting, all stemming from the core image of boarding something wooden.
AI-generated (claude-haiku-4-5), not yet reviewed. Formation type (automated guess): Compound ideographic (combined meanings).
Common words
- 乗り のり riding; ride
- 乗る のる to get on (train, plane, bus, ship, etc.); to get in
- 乗員 じょういん crew member; crewman
- 乗降 じょうこう getting on and off; embarking and disembarking
- 乗車 じょうしゃ boarding (a train, bus, etc.); getting into (e.g. a taxi)
- 乗馬 じょうば horse riding; horseback riding
- 相乗 そうじょう multiplication; synergism
- 搭乗 とうじょう embarkation; boarding (a ship or aircraft)
Reference
- Strokes
- 9
- Kangxi radical
- 4
- Grade
- Grade 3 (Kyōiku)
- Frequency rank
- #377 (newspapers)
- Former JLPT
- level 3
- Unicode
- U+04E57