Last night I was watching Demon Slayer, where they describe one of the character’s lightning attacks as いかづち, which made me curious about the difference between it and かみなり.
I found that いかづち is mostly just an antiquated term, but it turns out, 雷（かみなり – lightning/thunder) comes from 神（かみ）＋ 鳴り（なり）, literally *”God’s cry/roar,”* which is super cool and makes me wonder how I’ve never thought about that before. [Source](https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/%E9%9B%B7#Japanese)
19 comments
its pretty fun seeing the origin of words and it makes them easier to remember
On a related note, 雷 usually refers to the sound aspect, as in thunder. Lightning is usually 稲妻 「いなづま」, especially when it strikes the ground. The etymology of this one is interesting, literally “rice wife”. Lighting was thought to bring better harvests (which it does! By way of converting nitrogen in the air to useable forms for plants), so that association was made.
Etymology is great
Here’s a [link to an old comment](https://www.reddit.com/r/LearnJapanese/comments/a1xkjc/is_there_a_name_for_the_phenomenon_where_one_word/eatti2f/) listing about 100 words like this. Some of them are obvious but there are also many that I never would have picked up on on my own.
I heard that difference while listening to the Raiden Shogun lines.
she uses both when referring to her skill – of minor importance (雷)
or her burst – divine punishment as per description. ( 稲光) tough with this I think it means more divine light? iunno.
interesting.
might not be totally related but it’s similar.
Wait until you learn about 醜い, めしい or 閂.
I remember when I first started recognizing names as having meaning in anime… blew my mind how literal to the characters personality they were. lol
Omg you just blew my mind, also made the word much easier to remember from now on.
Good catch!
Nice find!
It’ll really blow your mind to learn that etymology like this exists in a lot of language. It’s nice to have these fundamental links to things.
I’m quite new to this sub and to learning Japanese, so excuse me if this question doesn’t make sense in some wider context I’ve not got yet. I find the etymology thing really interesting though and am trying to get my head round how kanji are ‘built’.
So, I recognise the right hand segment of the ‘cry’ kanji (鳴) as being 鳥 (とり – bird). Is ‘bird’ linked to the usage of this kanji in 神鳴 at all? And what is the other bit from? Is that another kanji in isolation?
ありがとうございます
Panda (くまねこ) = bear (くま）+ cat （ねこ)
The kanji even mirrors this (熊猫)
Another one with questionable folk linguistics but nonetheless useful for memorizing the word: 長(long) +目(eye)+る= 眺める(looking far)
How is づ pronounced again? I hardly ever encounter it and forgot how to pronounce it
銀 – しろがね
Probably has something similar to this, being shiro + kane, white gold.
I am a native Japanese but it wasn’t until recently that I learned けもの（beast）comes from 毛（hair）+物（stuff）
One thing I found interesting in Japan was that culturally Japanese people seemed less inclined to distinguish thunder and lightning. There is a strong tendency to use one word かみなり to cover both. While いなずま exists and means exactly “lightning” as described, it is used rather less often. So friends will refer to かみなりmeaning both phenomena.
いかづち is also interesting, though it’s less transparent: the いか is from 厳い, the つ is the old Japanese possessive particle also found in まつげ, and ち is 霊, so it literally means “stern spirit”.
I just noticed chicken is “garden bird”