掘

to dig, excavate

Kanji 1189

People use this kanji for digging up crops, excavating ruins, and mining; 掘 is quite grounded. But if you dig a little, you'll soon spot its figurative side. This essay will teach you to say "That old book is a real find" and "Someone rear-ended me." Through this kanji you’ll find out about hidden treasure, an animal shaped like a tusk, and heating systems submerged in pits in the floor. 

Revision history:

May 9, 2024: p. 14 caption: Improved some of the writing.

Sept. 10, 2022: p. 16: Added “with a trick” (to cover 策を弄する) to the translation of the sample sentence in the quiz answer.

May 19, 2022: pp. 11-12: Made several changes to the photo caption.

Feb. 24, 2022: p. 12: Changed "Ezo" to “Emishi.”

May 29, 2021: 

• p. 2: Updated the Henshall etymology.
• p. 4: Modified the sidebar text.
• p. 16: In the vocab. for the sample sentence, I defined 策を弄する (さくをろうする: to play a trick), instead of defining 策 and 弄する separately.
• p. 19: Added a link to the Kanshudo games.

Nov. 11, 2015: On pages 1, 9, and 15, I've fixed places where 堀 mistakenly appeared instead of 掘. 

May 8, 2015: Made several changes:

• p. 3: For the third definition of 芋掘り, I changed "looking down on rural people" (which sounded like the act of looking down on someone) to "derogatory term for rural people." 
• pp. 4-5, 11, 12, 14: For several keywords I changed the first part of the breakdown from "digging" to "to dig." That is, in compound verbs such as 掘り起こす, the 掘り is not a noun but rather the pre-masu form of the verb 掘る, so "to dig" is more accurate.

Nov. 8, 2013: Originally published.