Meaning & readings

promontory, cape, spit

On’yomi
Kun’yomi さき、さい、みさき

Origin

The character combines the mountain radical on the left, which shows this character describes a geographic landform, with on the right serving as a sound hint that guides the pronunciation. The mountain element makes sense because a promontory or cape is a pointed piece of land jutting out from a mountainous coast. The overall shape suggests a mountain with an angular or irregular peak, which matches how capes and peninsulas appear as distinctive jutting formations along coastlines. The component's main job is to signal how to pronounce the character rather than to add meaning to the definition.

AI-generated (claude-haiku-4-5), not yet reviewed. Formation type (automated guess): Phono-semantic (meaning + sound hint).

11 strokes

Components

  • radical left
  • sound hint right

A sound hint component points at the character’s pronunciation, not its meaning — don’t read a meaning into it.

Common words

  • 川崎 かわさき Kawasaki (city)
  • 長崎 ながさき Nagasaki (city, prefecture)

Reference

Strokes
11
Kangxi radical
46
Grade
Grade 4 (Kyōiku)
Frequency rank
#533 (newspapers)
Former JLPT
level 1
Unicode
U+05D0E