茗荷

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Japanese

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茗荷 (myōga, mega): a myoga flower bud.
茗荷 (myōga): one of the various designs of the myoga family crest.
Commons:Category
Commons:Category

Etymology 1

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Kanji in this term
みょう
Hyōgai

Grade: 3
on'yomi
Alternative spelling
蘘荷 (rare)

/meɡa//meuɡa//mjoːɡa/

From earlier mega (see below).[1][2][3] The kanji spelling is an example of phonetic ateji.[1][3]

Pronunciation

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Noun

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(みょう)() or 茗荷(ミョウガ) (myōgaめうが (meuga)?

  1. myoga or Japanese ginger (Zingiber mioga), of which only the shoots and flower buds are used in cooking
  2. a dimwit, an idiot, a stupid person (from a folk belief that excess consumption of myoga causes forgetfulness)
  3. a kind of 家紋 (kamon, family crest)
Usage notes
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As with many terms that name organisms, this term is often spelled in katakana, especially in biological contexts (where katakana is customary), as ミョウガ.

Derived terms
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Etymology 2

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Kanji in this term

Hyōgai

Grade: 3
irregular
Alternative spelling
蘘荷 (rare)

From Old Japanese [Term?]. Some sources[1][2][3] mention that this might be a compound of (me, sprout) + (ka, fragrant). However, the semantics are backwards compared to most other Japanese compounds. In addition, this term appears in writings of the Nara period with the spellings and .[1] The me syllable here is spelled phonetically with the so-called Type-A or 甲類 (kōrui) reading of e1, but in Old Japanese had the Type-B or 乙類 (otsurui) reading of e2. These two different e phonetic values were distinct in Old Japanese, indicating that (me, sprout) + (ka, fragrant) is not the actual derivation.

(For more details on Old Japanese spellings and phonetic values, see Jōdai Tokushu Kanazukai on Wikipedia.Wikipedia )

This reading is obsolete in modern Japanese.

Pronunciation

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Noun

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()() (mega

  1. (obsolete) myoga or Japanese ginger (Zingiber mioga)

References

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  1. 1.0 1.1 1.2 1.3 Shōgaku Tosho (1988) 国語大辞典(新装版) [Unabridged Dictionary of Japanese (Revised Edition)] (in Japanese), Tōkyō: Shogakukan, →ISBN
  2. 2.0 2.1 2.2 Matsumura, Akira, editor (2006), 大辞林 [Daijirin] (in Japanese), Third edition, Tokyo: Sanseidō, →ISBN
  3. 3.0 3.1 3.2 Matsumura, Akira (1995) 大辞泉 [Daijisen] (in Japanese), First edition, Tokyo: Shogakukan, →ISBN
  4. ^ NHK Broadcasting Culture Research Institute, editor (1998), NHK日本語発音アクセント辞典 [NHK Japanese Pronunciation Accent Dictionary] (in Japanese), Tokyo: NHK Publishing, Inc., →ISBN