"残酷" Etymology

[Daruqe]

I HAVE BEEN TRYING TO WRAP MY BRAIN AROUND THIS FOREVER.

Okay, so "残酷"【ざんこく】 means "cruelty." Simple enough. The keywords I've found for the second 漢字, "酷," are "cruel," "atrocious," "severe," "unjust," and the like. Makes sense. But "残" mean "remainder" or "leftover," as in "残る"【のこる】 and "残す"【のこす】. I don't understand why this 漢字 is in the word for "cruelty." Is there an explanation at all?

 

[Toritoribe]

残 also means "cruel".

ざん【残〔殘〕】
３ むごい。「残虐・残酷・残忍」

ざん【残〔殘〕】［漢字項目］の意味 - 国語辞書 - goo辞書

According to a kanji dictionary 新字源, 残 is a compound ideograph. 残's traditonal form is 殘. The radical 歹 [kabane-hen/gatsu-hen] is from the shape of a piece of broken bone, and refers to "death" or "large injury" as a radical (you can see the same radical in the kanji 死 "death"), and 戔 indicates "spoil/ruin". Thus, 残 originally means "to spoil / kill / injure", and later, has another meaning "to be left / remain".

Kanji usually don't indicate a single meaning. For instance, the most common meaning of 明 is "bright" and 日 means "day", but 明日 means "tomorrow", not "bright day".

How do you know... ON/KUN and beyond

 

[FinancialWar]

大辞泉's kanji entry is poor.

広辞苑's entry for 残

〔歹部8画/12画/6144･5d4c〕
〔音〕ザン(呉)
〔訓〕のこる･のこす･そこなう
[意味]
①あとにのこる｡のこす｡あまり｡｢残留･残金･残念･敗残兵｣
②そこなう｡傷つける｡そこなわれる｡｢残害･残欠･廃残｣
③情け容赦もない｡むごい｡｢残忍･残酷｣
[解字]
形声｡｢歹｣(=ばらばらになった骨)+音符｢戔｣(=二つのほこ)｡刃物で欠きとったあとにのこる骨片の意｡また､欠きとる意｡
[下ﾂｷ
衰残･廃残･敗残･無残･老残

 

[Toritoribe]

Just copying without any English translation or explanation?
不親切というか手抜きというか、少なくともOPにとってはあまりありがたくないような。。。

 

[Morphling]

"残酷" Etymology

As toritoribe has indicated, some characters have multiple meanings. In Chinese derived words, these are indicated by different compounds.

残酷 means cruel
残留 means remain

In Chinese, 残 cannot be used by itself. It must be used as a compound. In Japanese, The native Japanese word のこす・のこる to remain is mapped to this character. It is derived from 残酷'a meaning. With Japanese native words, usually it is mapped to a single character.

I'll give you another example. When 好 came to Japan, it probably came in forms of:

好天気 こうてんき good weather
嗜好 しこう Liking

They figured there are 2 words in Japanese, よい and すき that means something like the way 好 is used, they mapped the character to these 2 native words and called it a day. 2 completely different Japanese words but same character in Chinese.

 

[FinancialWar]

Just copying without any English translation or explanation?
不親切というか手抜きというか、少なくともOPにとってはあまりありがたくないような。。。

yep. Another dummy thread by one post newbie.

 

[Daruqe]

yep. Another dummy thread by one post newbie.

Pardon?