Explore each form from the oldest known stage to today.
The character 炊 is composed of the fire radical (火) and the phonetic component 吹 (to blow), though in its modern form, the right side is simplified. It originally depicted the action of blowing on a fire to cook or prepare food, thus its core meaning is 'to cook (rice/meals)' or 'to burn.' In ancient Liushutong, the variant forms show different stylistic representations of this fire-and-air cooking action, with L04477 being the one that most directly evolved into the modern 炊. Arrived in Japan: The character 炊, along with the broader Chinese writing system, is believed to have arrived in Japan around the 5th century AD, during the period of cultural transmission via the Korean Peninsula. It was formally adopted into the Japanese kanji system and is used in words like 炊く (taku - to cook/boil) and 炊事 (suiji - cooking).