Meaning & readings
contain, form, looks
Origin
The character 容 combines a roof radical 宀 on top — which classifies it as being about enclosed spaces or containment — with 谷 (valley) below, which serves as a sound hint for pronunciation rather than contributing to the meaning. The roof suggests something held within or protected, which naturally leads to meanings like "contain" or "hold inside." Over time, the sense of something contained also extended to "form" or "appearance" — what you hold or display in a space.
AI-generated (claude-haiku-4-5), not yet reviewed. Formation type (automated guess): Phono-semantic (meaning + sound hint).
Components
- 宀
- 谷
A sound hint component points at the character’s pronunciation, not its meaning — don’t read a meaning into it.
Common words
Reference
- Strokes
- 10
- Kangxi radical
- 40
- Grade
- Grade 5 (Kyōiku)
- Frequency rank
- #264 (newspapers)
- Former JLPT
- level 2
- Unicode
- U+05BB9