熊

See also: 態

Translingual

Han character

熊 (Kangxi radical 86, 火+10, 14 strokes, cangjie input 戈心火 (IPF), four-corner 2133₁, composition ⿱能灬)

References

• Kangxi Dictionary: page 679, character 10
• Dai Kanwa Jiten: character 19294
• Dae Jaweon: page 1090, character 32
• Hanyu Da Zidian (first edition): volume 3, page 2227, character 5
• Unihan data for U+718A

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Chinese

trad.		熊
simp. #		熊

熊

Glyph origin

Historical forms of the character 熊
Warring States	Shuowen Jiezi (compiled in Han)	Liushutong (compiled in Ming)
Chu slip and silk script	Small seal script	Transcribed ancient scripts
Oracle bone script j22798 Small seal script File:ACC-s07258.svg s07258 Transcribed ancient scripts L30031 File:ACC-L30032.svg L30032 File:ACC-L30033.svg L30033 File:ACC-L30034.svg L30034 File:ACC-L30035.svg L30035 File:ACC-L30036.svg L30036 File:ACC-L30037.svg L30037 File:ACC-L30038.svg L30038 File:ACC-L30039.svg L30039 File:ACC-L30040.svg L30040 File:ACC-L00946.svg L00946 File:ACC-L00947.svg L00947 File:ACC-L00948.svg L00948 File:ACC-L00949.svg L00949 File:ACC-L00950.svg L00950
References: Mostly from Richard Sears' Chinese Etymology site (authorisation), which in turn draws data from various collections of ancient forms of Chinese characters, including: Shuowen Jiezi (small seal), Jinwen Bian (bronze inscriptions), Liushutong (Liushutong characters) and Yinxu Jiaguwen Bian (oracle bone script).

Phono-semantic compound (形聲／形声, OC *ɢʷlɯm) : phonetic 能 (OC *nɯː, *nɯːs, *nɯːŋ, *nɯːŋʔ) + semantic 火 (“fire”).

This character originally represented an onomatopoetic word (熊熊 (xióngxióng, “(of flame) raging”)). Later its phonetic compound 能 (OC *nɯː, *nɯːs, *nɯːŋ, *nɯːŋʔ), the character for the Old Chinese word "bear", was borrowed for another word. This character thus began to represent the word "bear" instead.

Etymology

From Proto-Sino-Tibetan *d-wam. Cognate with Tibetan དོམ (dom, “bear”), Burmese ဝံ (wam) (in ဝက်ဝံ (wak-wam, “bear”)).

Definitions

(deprecated template usage) 熊

1. bear (mammal) (Classifier: 頭／头 m; 隻／只)
2. (colloquial) to scold
3. to oppress, to tyrannise
4. mean; malicious; merciless
5. loutish; oafish
6. (slang) bear; a large, hairy man, especially homosexual one
7. Xiong (mainland China), Hsiung (Taiwan), Hung (Hong Kong)

Compounds

(deprecated template usage)

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Japanese

Kanji

熊

(Fourth grade kyōiku kanji)

1. bear

Readings

• Go-on: う (u)
• Kan-on: ゆう (yū)
• Kun: くま (kuma, 熊, Jōyō)
• Nanori: かげ (kage)

Compounds

Compounds

• 牡(おす)熊(くま) (osukuma): a male bear
• 雌(めす)熊(くま) (mesukuma): a female bear; a she-bear
• 子(こ)熊(くま) (kokuma): a bear cub
• 小(こ)熊(くま) (kokuma): a species of small bear
• 白(しろ)熊(くま) (shirokuma): a white bear (polar bear)
• 北(ほっ)極(きょく)熊(ぐま) (hokkyokuguma): a polar bear
• 黒(くろ)熊(くま) (kurokuma): the Asian black bear

• 熊(くま)笹(ざさ) (kumazasa): bamboo grass ()
• 熊(くま)葛(つづら) (kumatsuzura): common vervain (Verbena officinalis)
• 熊(くま)手(で) (kumade): bamboo rake
• 熊(くま)襲(そ) (Kumaso): the Kumaso people

Etymology

熊 (kuma): a brown bear.

Kanji in this term
熊
くま Grade: 4
kun'yomi

From (deprecated template usage) [etyl] Old Japanese. Probably cognate with 隈 (kuma, “inside corner; inner bend; hollow or hole in something”), perhaps from the way that bears often live in dens. Probably also cognate with Korean 곰 (gom, “bear; hole”).

Noun

熊(くま) or 熊(クマ) • (kuma) 

1. a bear (large mammal of family Ursidae)
2. (slang) a bear, an otter (a hairy man, especially one who is gay)

Usage notes

As with many terms that name organisms, this term is often spelled in katakana, especially in biological contexts (where katakana is customary), as クマ.

Derived terms

Derived terms

• 熊(くま)鼠(ねずみ) (kumanezumi): Rattus rattus, the black rat
• 穴(あな)熊(ぐま) (anaguma): Meles meles, the Eurasian badger

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Korean

Hanja

熊 (eumhun 웅 곰 (ung gom))

1. bear

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Vietnamese

Han character

(deprecated template usage) 熊 (hùng)

1. This term needs a translation to English. Please help out and add a translation, then remove the text {{rfdef}}.