Meaning & readings

undress, removing, escape from, get rid of, be left out, take off

On’yomi ダツ
Kun’yomi ぬ.ぐ、ぬ.げる

Origin

The character combines a flesh or body component on the left (, used here as a classifier for body-related words) with a sound hint on the right (兌, which suggests the "dats" sound). The flesh element makes sense because removing or taking off typically involves the body—you undress your body, escape from a physical situation, or shed something like skin. Over time, the meaning expanded from the concrete idea of removing clothing or shedding skin to the more abstract sense of escaping or getting rid of something.

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

  • 逸脱 いつだつ deviation; departure
  • 脱ぐ ぬぐ to take off (clothes, shoes, etc.); to undress
  • 脱却 だっきゃく ridding oneself; freeing oneself of
  • 脱出 だっしゅつ escape; getting away (from)
  • 脱水 だっすい dehydration (removal of water); desiccation
  • 脱税 だつぜい tax evasion
  • 脱線 だっせん derailment
  • 脱退 だったい withdrawal (e.g. from an organization); secession

Reference

Strokes
11
Kangxi radical
130
Grade
Jōyō (secondary school)
Frequency rank
#782 (newspapers)
Former JLPT
level 1
Unicode
U+08131