福

Translingual

Etymology

Late Middle Chinese pjuk入, Old Chinese *pjək (Li Fanggui (1971)). Cognate with Chinese 富 (OC *pjəg, MC pjəu去), Old Tibetan ཕྱུགས (phyugs, “livestock”).

Phono-semantic, 示 (semantic) + 畐 (phonetic).

Han character

福 (radical 113 示+9, 14 strokes, cangjie input 戈火一口田 (IFMRW), four-corner 3126₆)

1. blessing
2. happiness
3. good fortune

References

• KangXi: page 845, character 2
• Dai Kanwa Jiten: character 24768
• Dae Jaweon: page 1265, character 23
• Hanyu Da Zidian: volume 4, page 2404, character 3
• Unihan data for U+798F
• Unihan data for U+FA1B ZVariant

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Cantonese

Hanzi

福 (Yale fuk1)

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Japanese

Kanji

福 (grade 3 “Kyōiku” kanji)

Readings

• On: ふく (fuku)
• Kun: さいわい (saiwai), ひもろぎ (himorogi)

Synonyms

• (bless(ing)): 祝
• (spells): 祝福, 福, 祝福する

Derived terms

• 幸福 (こうふく, kōfuku): happiness
• 福禄寿 (fukurokuju): lit. "happiness, wealth and longevity" -- Fukurokuju; one of the seven gods of good fortune
• 福印 (ふくいん, fukuin,) "Bless(ed/ing) Seal/Stamp"
• 福札 (ふくふだ, fukufuda,) "Bless(ed/ing) Paper," a "Paper Blessing"
• 福術 (ふくじゅつ, fukujutsu,) "Blessing Technique"/"Technique of Blessing"

Antonyms

• 咒 "curse"

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Korean

Hanja

福 (hangeul 복, revised bok, McCune-Reischauer pok, Yale pok)

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Mandarin

Hanzi

福 (pinyin fú (fu2), fù (fu4), Wade-Giles fu², fu⁴)

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Middle Chinese

Han character

福 (biuk)

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Min Nan

Hanzi

福 (POJ hok)

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Vietnamese

Han character

福 (phúc, phước)