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TheKangxi radicals (Chinese:康熙部首;pinyin:Kāngxī bùshǒu), also known asZihui radicals, are a set of 214radicals that were collated in the 18th-centuryKangxi Dictionary to aid categorization ofChinese characters. They are primarily sorted bystroke count. They are the most popular system of radicals for dictionaries that order characters by radical and stroke count. They are encoded in Unicode alongside otherCJK characters, under theblock "Kangxi radicals", while graphical variants are included in the block "CJK Radicals Supplement".

Originally introduced in the 1615Zihui, they are more commonly referred to in relation to the 1716Kangxi Dictionary—Kangxi being the commissioning emperor'sera name. The 1915 encyclopedic word dictionaryCiyuan also used this system. In modern times, many dictionaries that list Traditional Chinese head characters continue to use this system, for example theWang Li Character Dictionary of Ancient Chinese (2000). The system of 214 Kangxi radicals is based on the older system of540 radicals used in the Han-eraShuowen Jiezi. Since 2009, the Chinese Government has promoted a 201-radical system (Table of Han Character Radicals) called theTable of Indexing Chinese Character Components, as a national standard for use withsimplified character forms.

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The Kangxi dictionary lists a total of 47,035 characters divided among the 214 radicals, for an average of 220 characters per radical; however, the distribution is unequal, with the median number of characters per radical being 64, the maximum number being 1,902 (forradical 140艸), and the minimum being 5 (forradical 138艮). The radicals have between one and 17 strokes, with a median of 5 strokes and an average of slightly below 5.7 strokes.

The ten radicals with the largest number of characters account for 10,665 characters (or 23% of the dictionary). The same ten radicals account for 7,141 out of the 20,992 characters (34%) in the UnicodeCJK Unified Ideographs block as it was introduced in 1992, as follows:

Modern Chinese dictionaries continue to use the Kangxi radical-stroke order, both in traditionalzìdiǎn (字典, lit. "character/logograph dictionary") for writtenChinese characters and moderncídiǎn (詞典 "word/phrase dictionary") for spoken expressions. The 214 Kangxi radicals act as a de facto standard, which may not be duplicated exactly in every Chinese dictionary, but which few dictionary compilers can afford to completely ignore. The number of radicals may be reduced in modern practical dictionaries, as some of the more obscure Kangxi radicals do not form any characters that remain in frequent use. Thus, theOxford Concise English–Chinese Dictionary, for example, has 188 radicals. TheXinhua Zidian, a pocket-sized character dictionary containing about 13,000 characters, uses 189 radicals, later increased to 201 in its tenth edition to conform to the national standard. A few dictionaries also introduce new radicals, treating groups of radicals that are used together in many different characters as a kind of radical. For example,Hanyu Da Cidian, the most inclusive availableChinese dictionary (published in 1993) has 23,000 head character entries organized by a novel system of 200 radicals.

In Unicode version 3.0 (1999), a separate Kangxi Radicals block was introduced which encodes the 214 radicals in sequence, at U+2F00–2FD5. These are specific code points intended to represent the radicalqua radical, as opposed to the character consisting of the unaugmented radical; thus, U+2F00 representsradical 1 while U+4E00 represents the characteryī meaning "one". In addition, theCJK Radicals Supplement block (2E80–2EFF) was introduced, encoding alternative (often positional) forms taken by Kangxi radicals as they appear within specific characters. For example, ⺁ "CJK RADICAL CLIFF" (U+2E81) is a variant of ⼚radical 27 (U+2F1A), itself identical in shape to the character consisting of unaugmented radical 27, 厂 "cliff" (U+5382).

Wikimedia Commons has media related toKangxi radicals.

Wikimedia Commons has media related toChinese radicals.

• List of Shuowen Jiezi radicals
• List of radicals in Unicode
  • Unicode chart – Kangxi Radicals (above)
  • Unicode chart – CJK Radicals Supplement
• Table of Indexing Chinese Character Components (akaList of Xinhua Zidian radicals) – 189 radicals
• List of Japanese radicals
• Section headers of a Chinese dictionary
• CJK Unified Ideographs
• Ideographic Description Sequences

• An Analysis of the Two Chinese Radical Systems, Journal of the Chinese Language Teachers Association, 13, 2, 95–109, May 78

Look upIndex:Chinese radical in Wiktionary, the free dictionary.

• Simplified Chinese characters with English definitions, grouped by radicals
• Table of the 214 radicals in the unicode project
• List of radicals in home-printable A4 layout (archived copy at theWayback Machine)
• List of 214 Japanese radicals and exceptions to Kangxi, searchable and grouped by stroke number
• Tangorin, search Japanese kanji using the 214 Kangxi radicals (archived copy at theWayback Machine)
• Chinese characters by radical
• List of Radicals, meaning and naming with Japanese.
• Chinese etymology search radicals and receive the meaning as well as illustrations of radicals in history

• Kangxi radicals
• Kangxi Emperor
• Chinese character components

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