The pictures inside the Japanese directions (東 西 南 北)

The four directions in Japanese are 東 (higashi), east, 西 (nishi), west, 南 (minami), south, and 北 (kita), north. Each kanji has a picture people like to see in it: the sun behind a tree, a bird on its nest, two people back to back and, for south, a mystery. Some of those pictures are history and some are old guesses, so here is which is which.

East: the sun behind a tree

東 looks like 日, the sun, caught in the branches of 木, a tree. That’s the old explanation, from the Shuowen Jiezi, a Chinese dictionary from around 100 CE: the sun coming up behind the trees at dawn.

Many scholars now read the oldest forms differently, as a sack or bundle tied at both ends. On this view, the word for that bundle sounded like the word for east, so the drawing was borrowed to write it. Either way, the sun in the tree is the easiest way to remember it.

West: a bird on its nest

The Shuowen reads 西 as a bird settling onto its nest. Birds go home at sunset, and the sun sets in the west. Many scholars see a basket or a bag here instead, again borrowed for its sound, and the experts still argue about it. Treat the bird as the traditional story rather than settled history.

North: two people back to back

北 is the one with solid history. It shows two people standing back to back, and it first meant “back”. It came to mean north because important buildings in old China faced south: stand facing south, and your back is to the north.

The “back” meaning later moved to a new kanji, 背 (se), which adds 月, here meaning flesh, under 北. A trace of the old sense survives in 敗北 (haiboku), a defeat: turning your back and running.

South: nobody’s sure

As the video says, nobody knows for certain what 南 shows. One idea is a hanging percussion instrument, like a bell, but then it’s hard to explain why it was borrowed to write south. Another, from the linguist Laurent Sagart, is the front of a house, since houses in parts of ancient China were built to face south.

How to use them

• 駅の東口で会いましょう。

  Eki no higashiguchi de aimashou.

  Let's meet at the station's east exit.

• 北海道は日本の北にあります。

  Hokkaidou wa Nihon no kita ni arimasu.

  Hokkaido is in the north of Japan.

• この部屋は南向きで明るいですね。

  Kono heya wa minamimuki de akarui desu ne.

  This room faces south, so it's nice and bright.

• 太陽は東から昇ります。

  Taiyou wa higashi kara noborimasu.

  The sun rises in the east.

• Japanese lists them as 東西南北 (touzainanboku): east, west, south, north.
• Big stations name their exits by direction: 東口 (higashiguchi), 西口 (nishiguchi), 南口 (minamiguchi) and 北口 (kitaguchi). In a station as big as Shinjuku, picking the right one can save you a long walk.
• On their own, they use Japanese readings: higashi, nishi, minami, kita. In compound words they switch to readings borrowed from Chinese: 東 is tou, 西 is sei or sai, 南 is nan and 北 is hoku, as in 南極 (nankyoku), the South Pole.
• Tokyo, 東京, is the “eastern capital”, named in contrast to Kyoto, the old capital to the west.

Words with the same kanji

Remember it

Follow the sun through the day. Morning: it climbs behind a tree (東). Evening: a bird flies home to its nest (西). Night: two friends sit back to back, keeping watch (北). And south (南) keeps its secret.

The kanji in this lesson

Tap Draw it to watch the stroke order. Numbers show where each stroke starts.

Draw it

Draw it

Draw it

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Sources

• Wiktionary: 東
• Wiktionary: 西
• Wiktionary: 南

Written by the Chirami team with the help of AI, then checked against JMdict and KANJIDIC2. How we write lessons. Spotted a mistake? Email support@brightsmilesolutions.org.