Meaning & readings
winding, reel, spin, turn (pages), look up, refer to
Origin
The character 繰 combines the radical 糸, which means thread or string and classifies this as a character about textiles, with 喿 on the right side, which serves as a sound hint for pronunciation. The meaning "winding" and "reel" come directly from the thread radical, since winding thread onto a reel or spool is a fundamental textile operation. The right component doesn't add to the meaning but tells you roughly how to pronounce the character. Over time, the meaning extended from the physical act of winding thread to other senses of turning or spinning, and eventually to turning pages in a book.
AI-generated (claude-haiku-4-5), not yet reviewed. Formation type (automated guess): Phono-semantic (meaning + sound hint).
Components
- 糸
- 喿
A sound hint component points at the character’s pronunciation, not its meaning — don’t read a meaning into it.
Common words
- 繰る くる to reel; to wind
- 繰入 くりいれ inward transfer (of money); carry over (money from previous period)
- やり繰り やりくり making do; getting by (somehow)
- 繰り延べ くりのべ postponement
- 繰り出す くりだす to draw (a thread); to let out (e.g. a rope)
- 繰り返し くりかえし repetition; repeat
- 繰り返す くりかえす to repeat; to do over again
- 資金繰り しきんぐり fundraising; financing
Reference
- Strokes
- 19
- Kangxi radical
- 120
- Grade
- Jōyō (secondary school)
- Frequency rank
- #872 (newspapers)
- Former JLPT
- level 1
- Unicode
- U+07E70