Symbol meaning

[spatts]

My father brought this scarf back from WW2 in Burma. What does this symbol mean?

thanks

 

[Majestic]

By itself it usually means nothing in Japanese. Well, it is normally used as part of a compound word, or part of a name.
Seeing it by itself, it is more likely Chinese in origin.

康 - Wiktionary

en.wiktionary.org

 

[Buntaro]

康 (Kang) is listed as a family name on the Chinese-English translation webpage Baidu. The webpage says it also means health and well-being.

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fanyi.baidu.com

Here is another good webpage for translating Chinese-language 'kanji' into English.

MDBG English to Chinese dictionary

English to Chinese dictionary with Mandarin Pinyin & Handwriting Recognition - learn Chinese faster with MDBG!

www.mdbg.net

While researching this topic, I came across this webpage that allows looking up Japanese kanji by radical.

Find kanji by radical

kanji.sljfaq.org

 

[Toritoribe]

康 is a relatively common Japanese male given name, reading "Yasushi". It also can be the first kanji of a given name as an abbreviation, for example 康行 Yasuyuki, as Majestic-san wrote.

 

[spatts]

My father brought this scarf back from WW2 in Burma. What does this symbol mean?

View attachment 47075
thanks

Thanks for the information.