King's Kung-Fu& Tai Chi

Chinese symbol for “grotto”

岩穴
yán xué
grotto; cave

The closest CC-CEDICT match for grotto is 岩穴 (yán xué), defined as: grotto; cave.

Before using these characters for a tattoo, check them with a native speaker. Dictionary words often have several meanings, and the right choice depends on context.

Characters and stroke order

岩 yán
cliff; rocks; mountain
radical 46 ⼭ · 8 strokes
穴 xué
cave, den, hole
radical 116 ⽳ · 5 strokes

Other Chinese words for “grotto”

WordPinyinMeaning
石窟shí kūrock cave; grotto
小岩洞xiǎo yán dònggrotto

Related words

Other words that share a character with 岩穴.

WordPinyinMeaning
岩石yán shí(geology) rock
岩浆 (岩漿)yán jiāng(geology) magma
花岗岩 (花崗岩)huā gāng yángranite
熔岩róng yán(geology) lava
岩画 (巖畫)yán huàrock painting; picture or writing carved on rocks
石灰岩shí huī yánlimestone
洞穴dòng xuécave; cavern
巢穴cháo xuélair; nest

See also: Japanese symbol for “grotto”.

Data: CC-CEDICT (CC BY-SA 4.0); Unihan Database (Unicode License v3); Make Me a Hanzi (Arphic Public License (graphics.txt); LGPL-3.0-or-later (dictionary.txt)); wordfreq (CC BY-SA 4.0 (data)). Retrieved 2026-10-22.