Nichi

⽇⽈日曰 at Linux (two lines at top) and at Mac

Nichi is set of the following Unicode characters:

⽇ X2F47 , KanjiRadical

⽈ X2F48 , KanjiRadical

日 X65E5 , KanjiLiberal

曰 X66F0 , KanjiLiberal

Also, term Nichi may refer to each of these four characters.

Graphical representations of the Nichi characters depends on the software (See Figure at right) and is difficult for an universal description

Pronunciation and meaning of Nichi depends on the realization and on the context.

⽇, ⽈, 日, 曰

The four Unicode characters look similar at the screen and may be confused. Even the native Japanese speaker, looking at characters ⽇, ⽈, 日, 曰 cannot answer:
Which of them is KanjiRadical X2F47?
Which of them is KanjiRadical X2F48?
Which of them is KanjiLiberal X65E5?
Which of them is KanjiLiberal X66F0?

In order to avoid mistakes, some programming is necessary. The Utf8 encoding of these characters can be calculated with PHP program ud.t; file uni.t also should be loaded. Then, command

php ud.t 2F47 2F48 65E5 66F0

reveals the encoding:

2F47 12103 ⽇ ⽇
Unicode character number 12103 id est, X2F47
Picture: ⽇ ; uses 3 bytes. These bytes are:
XE2 XBD X87 in the hexadecimal representation and
226 189 135 in the decimal representation

2F48 12104 ⽈ ⽈
Unicode character number 12104 id est, X2F48
Picture: ⽈ ; uses 3 bytes. These bytes are:
XE2 XBD X88 in the hexadecimal representation and
226 189 136 in the decimal representation

65E5 26085 日 日
Unicode character number 26085 id est, X65E5
Picture: 日 ; uses 3 bytes. These bytes are:
XE6 X97 XA5 in the hexadecimal representation and
230 151 165 in the decimal representation

66F0 26352 曰 曰
Unicode character number 26352 id est, X66F0
Picture: 曰 ; uses 3 bytes. These bytes are:
XE6 X9B XB0 in the hexadecimal representation and
230 155 176 in the decimal representation

The same can be done with PHP program du.t; command

php du.t ⽇⽈日曰

provides the similar output, confirming, that characters ⽇,⽈,日,曰 are not confused with the software.

Graphics

All the Nichi characters appear as a rectangle divided by two parts by the horizontal line.

Nichi can be imagined as two (ni, 二) rectangular blocks, one (ichi, いち) standing on the other (sonata, その他). This graphical analogy is chosen to denote this subset of the Kanji characters. Word 二いちその他 happens to be too long for the English transliteration; so, term Nichi is used to denote the four Kanjis with similar graphic representations.

At Macintosh, all the Nichi characters have almost the same height, but this rectangle in characters
X2F47 ⽇ and X65E5 日 looks a little bit narrower than
X2F48 ⽈ and X66F0 曰.

At Linux, the height of the Nishi characters is not the same:
X2F47 ⽇ and X2F48 ⽈ look bigger than
X65E5 日 and X66F0 曰.

At the line, all the Nichi characters seem to occupy the same standard with (as the most of Kanjis characters).

However, at other operational systems, the graphical deviation of the Nichi characters from some "mean" Nichi may have different shapes; it depends on the preferences and fantasy of the font designers. Up to year 2021, no universal standard on the shape of the Unicode characters seem to be established.

Week

Nichi characters appear in names of day of a week, in combination 曜日, that is pronounced as ようび (joubi, йоуби):

Key	Kanji	Hiragana	Romanji	English	meaning/mnenonic
月	月曜日	げつようび	getsuyoubi	Monday	Beginning
火	火曜日	かようび	kayoubi	Tuesday	Fire
水	水曜日	すいようび	Suiyoubi	Wednesday	Water
木	木曜日	もくようび	mokuyoubi	Thursday	Tree
金	金曜日	きんようび	kinyoubi	Friday	Gold
土	土曜日	どようび	doyoubi	Saturday	Ground
日	日曜日	にちようび	nichiyoubi	Sunday	Enjoy, relax

According to Japanese version of Wikipedia , these names are typed with KanjiLiberal Unicode characters.

More examples

Subsections of this section collect links, describing each of characters of Nichi.

3.1: X2F47 ⽇

https://ja.wiktionary.org/wiki/⽇
⺜ も参照。
日（ニチ、ひ、日偏（ひへん、にちへん））
漢字の部首の一つ。「明」など偏である「⺜」の部分を指す名称。太陽や一日に関する意味の漢字を表し、日部を構成。常用漢字では四画。
参照[編集]
Wiktionary:漢字索引 部首 日。
文字情報[編集]
文字コード[編集]
Unicode
16進: 2F47 ⽇
10進: 12103 ⽇

3.2: X2F48 ⽈

https://ja.wiktionary.org/wiki/⽈ ⽈ ナビゲーションに移動検索に移動 目次 1 部首 1.1 参照 2 文字情報 2.1 文字コード 部首[編集] フリー百科事典ウィキペディアに 曰部 の記事があります。 曰（エツ、ひらび、いわく） 漢字の部首の一つ。発話に関する意味の漢字を表し、曰部を構成。常用漢字では四画。 参照[編集] Wiktionary:漢字索引 部首 曰。 ..

3.3: X65E5 日

https://ja.wiktionary.org/wiki/日 1 漢字 1.1 字源 1.2 意義 2 日本語 2.1 読み 2.2 名詞 ..

X65E5 日 is recognized by both Nihongomaster and Jisho.

The Unicode character number 26085 (X65E5 日) at site Nihongomaster has number 2160 (and is supplied with description):

https://www.nihongomaster.com/dictionary/kanji/2160/日 日 4 Strokes JLPT Level 5 Definition of 日 day sun Japan counter for days Readings On'Yomi (音読み) Kun'yomi (訓読み) ニチ ジツ ひ -び -か Popular Words With This Kanji 日, 陽, ひ day, days, sun, sunshine, sunlight, case (esp. unfortunate), event

日本, にほん, にっぽん Japan

日本人, にほんじん, にっぽんじん Japanese person, Japanese people

日米, にちべい Japan-America

同日, どうじつ the same day

毎日, まいにち every day

一日, １日, いちにち, いちじつ, ひとひ, ひとえ first day of the month, one day

一日, １日, いちにち, いちじつ, ひとひ, ひとえ first day of the month, one day

日夜, にちや day and night, always

来日, らいにち

No description for other Nichi (X2F47,X2F47 nor X66F0)
is found at the Nihongomaster site.

Jisho :

https://jisho.org/search/日%20%23kanji
日
4 strokes
Radical: sun, day 日
Parts: 日
day, sun, Japan, counter for days
Kun: ひ、 -び、 -か
On: ニチ、 ジツ
Jōyō kanji, taught in grade 1
JLPT level N5
1 of 2500 most used kanji in newspapers
Words starting with 日
Words ending with 日
Words containing 日
External links
Stroke order
On reading compounds
日 【ニチ】 Sunday, day (of the month), counter for days, Japan
日時 【ニチジ】 date and time
抗日 【コウニチ】 resistance against Japanese aggression, anti-Japanese (campaign, movement, etc.)
在日 【ザイニチ】 resident in Japan (of a foreigner), situated in Japan (e.g. of an embassy), Korean living in Japan
日月 【ジツゲツ】 sun and moon, time, days and months, years, Sunday and Monday
日外 【ジツガイ】 at one time, some time ago, once
両日 【リョウジツ】 both days, two days
三十日 【ミソカ】 last day of the month
Kun reading compounds
日 【ひ】 day, days, sun, sunshine, sunlight, (the) day, daytime, daylight, date, deadline, (past) days, time (e.g. of one's childhood), case (esp. unfortunate), event
日陰 【ひかげ】 shade, shadow, sunshine
在りし日 【ありしひ】 past days, bygone days, days of yore, the olden days, while still alive, during one's lifetime
あくる日 【あくるひ】 next day, following day
Readings
Japanese names: あ、 あき、 いる、 く、 くさ、 こう、 す、 たち、 に、 にっ、 につ、 へ

At the same server jisho, characters X2F47 ⽇, X2F48 ⽈ and X66F0 曰 are not recognized, pages
https://jisho.org/search/⽇%20%23kanji
https://jisho.org/search/⽈%20%23kanji
https://jisho.org/search/曰%20%23kanji
gives no explanation about the characters mentioned.

3.4: X66F0 曰

https://ja.wiktionary.org/wiki/曰 このページはスタブ（書きかけ）です。このページを加筆して下さる協力者を求めています。

https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/曰 See also: 日, 臼 and 白 Translingual[edit] Stroke order 曰-order.gif Han character[edit] Commons-logo.svg See images of Radical 73 曰 曰 (radical 73, 曰+0, 4 strokes, cangjie input 日 (A) or X日 (XA), four-corner 60100, composition ⿴囗一) Kangxi radical #73, ⽈. Derived characters[edit] Index:Chinese radical/曰 抇, 汩, 昌, 勗, 㑹, 暜, 䖜, 𠐔, 𣊫 Usage notes[edit] Not to be confused with 日, which is generally slimmer and taller, and has a middle stroke that often extends to both sides in non-regular script fonts. .. Japanese[edit] Kanji[edit] See also: Category:Japanese terms spelled with 曰 曰 (uncommon “Hyōgai” kanji) say Readings[edit] (Can we verify(+) this pronunciation?) Go-on: おち (ochi)←をち (woti, historical) Kan-on: えつ (etsu)←ゑつ (wetu, historical) Kun: いう (iu, 曰う)←いふ (ifu, historical); いわく (iwaku, 曰く)←いはく (ifaku, historical); のたばく (notabaku, 曰ばく); のたまう (notamau, 曰う)←のたまふ (notamafu, historical); のたもう (notamou, 曰う)←のたまふ (notamafu, historical); のたまわく (notamawaku, 曰く)←のたまはく (notamafaku, historical); のたまわす (notamawasu, 曰わす)←のたまはす (notamafasu, historical); のとうぶ (notōbu, 曰ぶ)←のたうぶ (notaubu, historical) ..

Confusion

Nichi are highly confused characters (although they are not presented in KanjiConfudal). Perhaps, the description of Nichi characters had been planned for Sunday (日曜日, nichiyoubi), and the designers had relaxed (and perhaps, vodked) a lot that day.

The English version of Wictionary, id est, https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/曰
mention this confusion and provide certain hints about the similar characters.

Many sites, including Jisho and Nihongomaster just ignore such confusions, forcing their students to investigate the problem by themselves.

The native Japanese speakers do not recognize this problem, as they can guess the meaning of the character from the context; they have no need to guess the meaning of the context analyzing the characters.

References

Keywords

Confusion, du.t, Japanese, Kanji, KanjiLiberal, KanjiRadical, PHP, Unicode, Utf8, X2F47 ⽇ , X2F48 ⽈ , X65E5 日 , X66F0 曰