"Beloved Son"

I want to get a kanji tattoo in remembrance of my son who recently passed away. I found this combination for 'Beloved Son' online

Kanji matches for "beloved son" (Ideogear)

However, my brother says that the use of the word 'beloved' is not appropriate when used for a boy, and that the symbol for 'son' here is wrong, and I should be using the second symbol for son found in the link below if I want to use 'son' at all. Is he correct?

He suggests 'Eldest Son' instead...

Kanji combination - eldest son (Ideogear)

However, my boy who died is not my eldest... yet my brother says that the symbol for eldest can also mean 'favorite'.

Thank you for your help.

The first one is only used towards other people's sons:

あいそく 0 【愛息】


かわいがっている息子。他人の息子についていう。

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I can't really translate the first part too well, but basically it means "beloved son."

If you were simply told to replace 長 with 愛 in the second one, I would say that that wouldn't make sense to any Japanese person (but I could be wrong). The reason I say that is because 愛男 is not in the dictionary.

As far as 長 meaning favorite is concerned, at the very least that isn't corroborated by Jim Breen's online kanji lookup:

長...チョウ なが.い おさ T1 お おしゃ たかし たけ な は ひさ long; leader

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The findings in Jim Breen's page, though, are corroborated by the dictionary at goo. The closest thing I can find to it meaning favorite is that it can mean "excellent" or "fine":

ちょう ちやう 1 【長】


(1)集団の最高の地位にある人。かしら。
「一家の―」「人の―たる器(うつわ)」
(2)すぐれていること。
⇔短
「一日(いちじつ)の―がある」

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You may, however, want to wait on a native speaker to clear this up.

長男 (chou nan) is a fairly common word for the oldest son. I've never heard it used to mean "beloved" for a non-eldest son though.

My dictionary says 愛息 (aisoku) is normally used for other people's sons. There is nothing else wrong with it. You are going to find it difficult finding a term in japanese because normally you don't speak respectfully about family members unless they "rank higher" than you and you are addressing them directly.

One possibility is 愛し子 (itoshigo) or literally 最愛の息子 (saiai no musuko)

What you will notice in all these is the character for love "愛" which you could use by itself just as a reminder.

Sorry for your loss by the way.