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Meritorious Deed

On’yomiくん
Kun’yomiいさお
MeaningsMeritorious Deed, Merit
JLPT N1 15 strokes #1478 most common Secondary school Radical power
書き順 · Stroke order

How to write 勲

Stroke order is not decoration — it determines how the character looks handwritten and how dictionaries index it.

15 strokes
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分解 · What it is made of

The parts of 勲

Almost every kanji is built from a small set of reusable parts. Learn the parts once and you stop memorising thousands of unrelated shapes.

top move + bottom fire =
Meritorious Deed
Why it sounds the way it does. The part 熏V1 is the phonetic component — it carries the sound rather than the meaning. That is why 勲 is read くん. Roughly two-thirds of all kanji work this way, which makes unfamiliar readings guessable once you spot the pattern.
部首 · Radical

The radical of 勲

Radical 19 of 214
Power

The radical is the part a paper dictionary files a kanji under, and it usually hints at meaning. 勲 is filed under (power) — radical number 19 of the 214 in the Kangxi system.

Other kanji built on 力

練習 · Practice

Drill 勲 right now

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Meritorious Deed くん いさお
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熟語 · In real words

Words that use 勲

Kanji are almost never met alone. These are the most common words built from this character, ordered by how often they actually appear in Japanese.

勲章 くんしょう decoration; order; medal
殊勲 しゅくん distinguished services; meritorious deeds
文化勲章 ぶんかくんしょう Order of Culture (Japan); Order of Cultural Merit (South Korea)
叙勲 じょくん conferring of decorations
勲記 くんき commendation accompanying the award of a decoration
受勲 ジュクン reception of a decoration, reception of an order (of merit)
元勲 ゲンクン elder statesman
勲位 クンイ order of merit
武勲 ブクン feats of arms, military exploits, distinguished military service
勲等 クントー (an) order of merit, medals for merit; order (first, second, etc. of a medal or decoration
名乗り · Name readings

How 勲 is read in names

Japanese names use readings that appear nowhere else in the language. These are 勲's — the reason personal and place names are so hard to read even for native speakers.

いさむ
同音 · Sound-alikes

Kanji that sound like 勲

Japanese has far more kanji than syllables, so one reading is shared by many characters. These are the ones you will confuse with 勲 — learn them together, not separately.

画数 · 15 strokes

Other 15-stroke kanji

Useful when looking a character up by stroke count — and a common source of visual mix-ups.

頻度 · Frequency

Next in the frequency list

勲 is the 1478th most common kanji in written Japanese. Learning in frequency order is the fastest route to reading real text.

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質問 · Questions

About the kanji 勲

What does the kanji 勲 mean?

勲 means Meritorious Deed, Merit. It is the 1478th most common kanji in written Japanese.

How do you read the kanji 勲?

勲 is read on'yomi (Chinese-derived) くん; kun'yomi (native Japanese) いさお.

How many strokes does 勲 have?

勲 is written with 15 strokes. The animated diagram on this page shows the correct order.

What level is the kanji 勲?

It appears at JLPT level N1, and Japanese schoolchildren learn it in secondary school.

What is the radical of 勲?

The radical of 勲 is 力 (power), radical number 19 of the 214 Kangxi radicals. The radical is the component a dictionary files the character under, and it usually points at the character's meaning.

What parts is the kanji 勲 made of?

勲 is built from 動 (move) and 灬 (fire). Learning kanji as combinations of a few hundred reusable components is far more efficient than memorising each character as a separate shape.

Why is 勲 read くん?

勲 contains 熏V1 as its phonetic component — the part that carries the sound rather than the meaning, which is why 勲 is read くん. Roughly two-thirds of all kanji are built this way, so spotting the phonetic component often lets you guess the reading of a character you have never seen.

What words use the kanji 勲?

Common words written with 勲 include 勲章 (くんしょう, decoration; order; medal); 殊勲 (しゅくん, distinguished services; meritorious deeds); 文化勲章 (ぶんかくんしょう, Order of Culture (Japan); Order of Cultural Merit (South Korea)).

Which kanji sound the same as 勲?

勲 shares a reading with 君 (くん), 訓 (くん), 薫 (くん), 勳 (くん), 薰 (くん), among others. Same-sounding kanji are one of the most common sources of confusion in Japanese.

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