下 Below

Radical Combination

• 一

  Ground
• ト

  Toe

Meaning

Primary

Below

Alternatives

Down, Under, Beneath

Mnemonic

There's the ground, and there's a toe just below it. Yep, you know this means "below" because the ground has a toe below it in this kanji.

Hints

Where's that toe again? Below the ground. Maybe it's your toe. Imagine digging it out and thinking, Ugh, why does it have to be under the ground like this? So irritating. Will I be able to sew it back on in time to save it?

Readings

On’yomi

か, げ

Kun’yomi

した, さ, くだ, お, しも, もと

Nanori

None

Mnemonic

You keep digging in the ground for the toe below, but instead you hit something hard and metallic. You try to dig around it, but it's huge. Turns out it's a car (か). Keep digging until you unearth the car below. (Inside, you find the toe you were looking for.)

Hints

There's another useful on'yomi reading that just isn't useful enough for you to learn now. That reading is げ, but we're only going to worry about that much, much later when you have to learn one or two vocab words that read 下 as げ. That's the problem with really common kanji — too many readings.