東
Meaning in Englisheast
Animated kanji stroke order
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Word context
What it means
What does 東 mean? 東 is the kanji that denotes the cardinal direction east and the adjective 'eastern', used to indicate orientation, the side where the sun rises, or a region located on the eastern side of a place.
Main meanings
- Geographical/cultural label for 'the East' or 'the Orient' in broader contexts, including historical and geopolitical uses.
- Component in place names and institutions that marks an eastern area or district.
- Tile and role indicator in mahjong and other games representing the east wind or east round.
- Directional marker on maps, building plans and train stations to indicate an east entrance or wing.
- Suffix/prefix in technical or descriptive terms to specify eastern varieties, styles, or orientations.
How to use it
In everyday speech people use higashi (higashi) to indicate direction or say 'to the east' in casual and polite conversation, while the reading tō</i (tō) appears mainly in Sino-Japanese compounds, place names and formal labels; the kanji is common on signs, maps, timetables and in proper nouns.
Variants and close terms
- 西, nishi, west
- 北, kita, north
- 南, minami, south
- 東洋, tōyō, the Orient / eastern ocean
Composition
The character is a pictographic compound combining 木 (ki) 'tree' and 日 (hi) 'sun', visually suggesting the sun rising behind or among trees—an image that came to represent the direction of sunrise and thus 'east'.
Etymology
東 (tō) preserves two reading histories: the on-yomi tō comes from Middle Chinese *tung and entered Japanese with Sino-Japanese vocabulary, while the native kun-yomi higashi is the indigenous Japanese word for the direction and developed separately as the common spoken reading.
Origin
The character was imported from Chinese writing into Japan during the early centuries of kanji adoption (roughly 5th–8th centuries CE) and was applied to compass directions, maps and place names as the Japanese writing system absorbed Chinese characters and their meanings.
Word class
noun (名詞), kanji (漢字)