KANJI: NIKU (meat, flesh)

ASCII Art Representation:

                    ,%%%%,
                     "%%%%%
                      %%%%
    %%,               %%%%              ,%%%,
    %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%
    %%%%            %%%%%               %%%%
    %%%%            %%%%                %%%%
    %%%%           ,%%%"%%,,            %%%%
    %%%%          ,%%%   "%%%%,         %%%%
    %%%%         %%%"      "%%%%,       %%%%
    %%%%      ,%%%",,,       "%%%%      %%%%
    %%%%    %%""   %%%%,      "%%"      %%%%
    %%%%            %%%%%               %%%%
    %%%%            %%%%                %%%%
    %%%%           %%%%"%%,,            %%%%
    %%%%          ,%%"   "%%%%,         %%%%
    %%%%        ,%%%"      "%%%%,       %%%%
    %%%%      ,%%%"          "%%%%      %%%%
    %%%%    %%""              "%%"      %%%%
    %%%%                                %%%%
    %%%%                                %%%%
    %%%%                                %%%%
    %%%%                           "%%%%%%%%
    "%%"                             "%%%%"

Character Etymology:

An split-open animal carcass, showing its ribs.

A Listing of All On-Yomi and Kun-Yomi Readings:

on-yomi: NIKU
kun-yomi: none

Nanori Readings:

Nanori: none

English Definitions:

1. NIKU: meat, flesh

Character Index Numbers:

New Nelson: 4753
Henshall: 365

Unicode Encoded Version:

肉

Unicode Encoded Compound Examples:

牛肉 (gyuuniku): beef
人肉 (jinniku): human flesh
肉桂 (nikkei): cinnamon
皮肉 (hiniku): sarcasm, cynicism
歯肉 (shiniku): gums (literally, "tooth meat")

Previous: inside | Japanese Kanji | Next: agriculture

On the farm, we ate animals we had raised ourselves.

While I waited for my death, my body and I fought. It began to reject the food I tried to feed it. I ate more and it rejected more. I fell asleep on the bathroom floor, my body tired from vomiting and dry-heaving for hours.

Behind Grandma’s house, there was a clothesline between the power pole and the chicken coop with smaller strings attached, for hanging chickens to slit their throats. We’d already hung and chopped and boiled and plucked the hens this year. While my younger sister in her room smashed a pillow over her head to keep out the cries that carried up the hill to our house, the wives and mothers, my older sister and I, had ripped the feathers from the new-dead flesh.

Past the power line, across from the Brown House, a new cow hung on an old hook, dripping blood onto the dusty ground, waiting to be flayed. My uncle knew the places to cut, the names for the parts when they ceased to be animal and became, under the sawblade, meat: round, shank, sirloin, flank, ribs, brisket. Parts would be divided, wrapped in butcher paper, distributed among our families and even to the Guys from the Brown House. There were more cows to butcher, but this one had the privilege of a public dismemberment.

Still, I ate him, knowing that my body was, like his, just meat.

from The Book of Revelation

previous chapter - next chapter

Meat (?), n. [OE. mete, AS. mete; akin to OS. mat, meti, D. met hashed meat, G. mettwurst sausage, OHG. maz food, Icel. matr, Sw. mat, Dan. mad, Goth. mats. Cf. Mast fruit, Mush.]

1.

Food, in general; anything eaten for nourishment, either by man or beast. Hence, the edible part of anything; as, the meat of a lobster, a nut, or an egg.

Chaucer.

And God said, Behold, I have given you every herb bearing seed, . . . to you it shall be for meat. Gen. i. 29.

Every moving thing that liveth shall be meat for you. Gen. ix. 3.

2.

The flesh of animals used as food; esp., animal muscle; as, a breakfast of bread and fruit without meat.

3.

Specifically, dinner; the chief meal.

[Obs.]

Chaucer.

Meat biscuit. See under Biscuit. -- Meat earth Mining, vegetable mold. Raymond. -- Meat fly. Zool. See Flesh fly, under Flesh. -- Meat offering Script., an offering of food, esp. of a cake made of flour with salt and oil. -- To go to meat, to go to a meal. [Obs.] -- To sit at meat, to sit at the table in taking food.

 

© Webster 1913.

---

Meat, v. t.

To supply with food.

[Obs.]

Tusser.

His shield well lined, his horses meated well. Chapman.

 

© Webster 1913.