To Know One’s Onions
Friday, June 1st, 2007
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When a Japanese friend emailed me a recipe, one ingredient jumped out at me: 玉ねぎ (tamanegi: onion). I hadn’t realized that “onion” contains 玉 (GYOKU, tama), the character for “jewel.” I momentarily enjoyed thinking of onions as the gems of the vegetable world!
As I soon found, though, 玉- is also a prefix meaning “spherical” or “round.” That’s the sense 玉- conveys in 玉ねぎ.
On 玉- as a Prefix
Meaning “Spherical” …
Oh, well. Seeing the 玉 of 玉ねぎ as “round” is a little more mundane than imagining a white onion as the pearl of the produce store, a yellow onion as a topaz, or a red onion as a ruby!
The “onion” compound isn’t the only food word containing 玉. These do, too:
玉菜 (tamana: cabbage) round + vegetable
You can’t get more straightforward than that breakdown!
玉藻 (tamamo: seaweed) exquisite + seaweed
As a prefix, 玉- can mean “beautiful” or “exquisite.” One dictionary says that 玉藻 and 藻 (SŌ, mo) have identical meanings but that 玉藻 is the more elegant way to say “seaweed.” So I’m guessing that 玉 means “exquisite” here, though I have no idea. (I’m also struggling to imagine seaweed as beautiful, exquisite, or elegant!)
飴玉 (amedama: candy) candy + ball
And, as it turns out, there are two ways to write tamago, “egg,” one of which features 玉:
1. 玉子 (tamago) spherical + thing
This compound refers to an egg that humans would consider eating (especially a hen egg).
2. 卵 (tamago)
This version of tamago refers to any type of egg, whether edible (from the human, non-vegan point of view) or inedible. The kanji 卵 also means “an expert in the making.” I love that second definition, which implies that one can see full potential for mastery and achievement in a mere egg!
Jewel-Studded Compounds
Most 玉 compounds employ the kun-yomi tama. In the rarer instances when the on-yomi GYOKU appears, 玉 means “jewel” or “precious stone,” as in this case:
宝玉 (hōgyoku: jewel, gem, precious stone) treasure + jewel
What a beautiful repetition of shapes! The first character, 宝, appears to be a jewel (玉）under a roof (宀). This kanji means “treasure”; perhaps a treasure chest supplies the roof in this case.
Shortly after stumbling upon 宝玉, I found this compound:
国宝 (kokuhō: national treasure) nation + treasure
Again, a delightful repetition of forms! How many more look-alike compounds could there be with 玉? Maybe there’s such a word as 国玉, meaning “national jewels”!
No, unfortunately, it doesn’t exist.
Well, how about if we combine these look-alike kanji with another one, 掴 (KAKU, tsuka(mu): to capture)? Maybe there’s a compound 掴国 for “capturing another country” or even better, 掴国宝玉, “capturing the jewels of another country.”
No such luck in either case.
Kingly jewels in 王玉?
No.
Jewels from all over the country? 全国玉?
Not a chance. Hmph.
I consoled myself by creating this phrase:
王が全国の玉と宝を掴みました。
Ō ga zenkoku no tama to takara o tsukamimashita.
The king grasped at jewels and treasures from all over the country.
And now I offer you a panoply of quizzes (which you can think of as games or puzzles if you tend to get test anxiety!).
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Verbal Logic Quiz 1: Match the words in the numbered list with the lettered possibilities. Then click on the Answers link below to see how you did! 1. 弾き玉 (hajikidama) bullet + jewel
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For Answers to
Verbal Logic Quiz 1 …
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Verbal Logic Quiz 2: Here’s a straightforward compound:
Can you guess the meanings of the following compounds, which embellish on the word for “eyeball”? After you take a shot at it, click on the Answers link below to see how you did! 1. 大目玉 (ōmedama) big + eye + ball
2. 目玉商品 (medama shōhin) eye + ball + merchandise (last 2 chars.)
3. 目玉焼き (medamayaki) eye + ball + to bake
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For Answers to
Verbal Logic Quiz 2 …
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Verbal Logic Quiz 3: Which of the following compounds are real words? Mark them T (true) or F (false). Then click on the Answers link below to see how you did! |
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| T or F? | ||||
| 1. 火玉 (hidama: ball of fire) | fire + ball | _______ | ||
| 2. 雪玉 (yukidama: snowball) | snow + ball | _______ | ||
| 3. 水玉 (mizutama: drops of water, dew) | water + ball | _______ | ||
| 4. 玉虫 (tamamushi: iridescent winged insect) | jewel + insect | _______ | ||
| 5. 鎖玉 (kusaridama: ball and chain) | chain + ball | _______ | ||
| 6. 悪玉 (akudama: bad guy) | bad + jewel | _______ | ||
| 7. 善玉 (zendama: good guy) | good + jewel | _______ | ||
| 8. 玉の汗 (tama (no) ase: beads of sweat) | ball + sweat | _______ | ||
| 9. 年玉 (toshidama: New Year’s gift) | year + jewel | _______ | ||
| 10. 替え玉 (kaedama: dead ringer) | substitute + jewel | _______ | ||
| 11. 肉玉 (nikudama: meatball) | meat + ball | _______ | ||
| 12. 親玉 (oyadama: boss) | parent + jewel | _______ | ||
Posted by Eve Kushner in Kanji Curiosity |
June 2nd, 2007 at 8:12 am
Way to go, JPod, for bringing Ms. Eve Kushner to the site! I’ve only been a fan of hers for a month, but I think she’s the 蜂の膝 (the bee’s knees). Hi Eve! I’m looking forward to your book!
June 2nd, 2007 at 11:28 am
Funny you should mention 玉, I’ve been fascinated by 玉米 (it’s Chinese), or sweet corn. I had always thought it was ‘jade rice’, and I’m a little disappointed that it’s actually ’round rice’.
Also, I think you’ve made a mistake, it’s 目玉, not 日玉 at the beginning of verbal logic quiz 2. Missed a horizontal bar!
June 2nd, 2007 at 11:41 am
On “On Jewels of many colours”: 紅 is the more common 漢字 of red here in China. It’s written 红 here on the mainland.
On “On The “Thing” Suffix -子”: In 中國語, 子 is MORE COMMONLY used as ‘thing’ than as ‘child’. I always have an inner giggle at the names ‘春子’ and our own ‘夏子’ because I instinctively translate them as ’summer thing’ and ’spring thing’. I should laugh though, my own name has this character: 罗子杰， 儸子傑 in complex characters.
I can’t believe there’s someone as interested in 漢字 as I am! I think maybe 漢字 could be incorporated into 英語, or at least this series of 文章. What do you 思？ Maybe usher in a 新 時代 of 日本・中国 relations!
June 2nd, 2007 at 12:05 pm
First, thanks so much, Andorei, for the nice comments! I’ve never been compared to any insect, much less to one’s joints, so I’m thrilled! I’ll need to think about bee’s knees a bit more to get a handle on that idea, though!
Then, thanks to Max for catching that typo, which I’ve now fixed. How did that thing get in there anyway?!
Great, too, to get the comparisons to hanzi!
Thanks for the comments!
June 3rd, 2007 at 3:28 am
I only know about 450 kanji, so far, from using Heisig, and even less readings (I’m still a beginner), but this was an interesting read, and useful too. Kanji was a large part of my attraction to the language; both the aesthetic appeal of and the history and culture behind the characters are strong sources of inspiration (second only to JPod101, of course ;)).
I look forward to more bloggage from Eve in the future.
June 5th, 2007 at 1:30 am
In regard to Max’s 2nd comment, it is interesting that 子 has completely different meanings in Chinese and Japanese. I would appreciate if you could comment on these Japanese words; in science, physics in particular, we have 素粒子 (elementary particle), 量子 (quantum), 光子 (photon), 演算子 (operator), etc. In all of these, 子 perhaps means ”thing” (e.g. operator = operation + thing) as in Chinese, rather than “child”. I am curious, are these terms used in China with the same meanings, and were they invented in China?
Another question is, if 子 only means “thing”, what do those 子 mean in the names of the great Chinese thinkers 孔子, 荘子, 孟子?
As to the incorporation of kanji into English, well, it is fascinating but how large is the kanji (hanji) / English bilingual population?
June 6th, 2007 at 12:42 am
Eve-san, welcome aboard! Great to have you!! My mnemonic for 玉 is a king with a “jewel” in his pocket, with the extra stroke being the jewel. It is kind of proportional to where a king’s pocket would be, no?
June 7th, 2007 at 3:14 am
Sorry if I’m a little slow on the draw with my comments. I’ll try to be faster!
Thanks for the comment, Peter-san, and for the mnemonic. It’s a good one! I think I’d feel a little imbalanced with a big jewel in one pocket, but then again, I’m not royalty! Maybe they can handle such things.
Javizy, if you know 450 kanji, you’re hardly a beginner! You’re a quarter of a way to easy newspaper reading (if that’s your goal–it’s certainly never been mine!). Anyway, thanks for the supportive comment.
Max, I’ve been thinking more about your 玉米, and I’m a little confused. Is it corn or rice? It’s written as rice but it’s corn? I certainly hope it isn’t green! I was thinking about why you chose “jade” out of all the possible jewels, and then I remembered from a looooong-ago trip to a Shanghai jade factory how jade is THE Shanghai product. Or at least that was true way back when. Is it still true? If I’m remembering correctly (and I may not be!), we saw everything from jade ashtrays to jade chopsticks produced in that factory.
And as for Andorei with his bee’s knees comment, I’m still getting a kick out of that. I was wondering if you invented it, but lo and behold, I found this on Wiktionary:
Etymology: 1920s. A pun on “the business.”
And then this from Mark Israel’s alt.usage.english FAQ:
———
A bee’s “corbiculae”, or pollen-baskets, are located on its
tibiae (midsegments of its legs). The phrase “the bee’s knees”, meaning “the height of excellence”, became popular in the U.S. in the 1920s, along with “the cat’s whiskers” (possibly from the use of these in radio crystal sets), “the cat’s pajamas” (pyjamas were still new enough to be daring), and similar phrases which made less
sense and didn’t endure: “the eel’s ankle”, “the elephant’s instep”, “the snake’s hip”. Stories in circulation about the phrase’s origin include: “b’s and e’s”, short for “be-alls and end-alls”; and a corruption of “business”.
———–
Ah, the ’20s! I’ve always felt an affinity with that era! I’m probably closer to an elephant’s instep than a bee’s knees, but I do very much appreciate the compliment.
I’ll do my best to keep serving up “pollen.” And I hope everyone will keep the comments coming. Thanks so much!
July 11th, 2007 at 2:16 am
This blog is nifty.
July 11th, 2007 at 2:18 am
Thanks, Michael!
June 18th, 2008 at 5:37 am
You’d never guess from the movie, but Michener’s Sayonara involves Takarazaka actresses, not geishas. It was the very first I’d heard of the revue. Osamu Tezuka, the great mangaka, was a native of Takurazaka. Tezuka’s Princess Knight may be the precursor to all those big-eyed heroines that have come since.
And speaking of big eyes, I was bowled over by 大目玉 (ōmedama) meaning both “big eyes” and “a scolding” because one of the most popular of those big-eyed heroines, Skuld of Aa-Megami-sama, has a name that evolved into “scold” in modern English. A manifestation of an ancestral memory shared by the Japanese and the Norse?