King's Kung-Fu& Tai Chi

Chinese symbol for “origin”

起源
qǐ yuán
origin; to originate; to come from

The closest CC-CEDICT match for origin is 起源 (qǐ yuán), defined as: origin; to originate; to come from.

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

起 qǐ
to begin, to initiate; to rise, to stand up
radical 156 ⾛ · 10 strokes
源 yuán
spring; source, root, head; surname
radical 85 ⽔ · 13 strokes

Other Chinese words for “origin”

WordPinyinMeaning
根源gēn yuánorigin; root (cause)
渊源 (淵源)yuān yuánorigin; source
本源běn yuánorigin; source
本běn(bound form) root; stem; (bound form) origin; source
原因yuán yīncause; origin

Related words

Other words that share a character with 起源.

WordPinyinMeaning
起来 (起來)qǐ laito stand up; to get up; also pr. [qi3lai2]
一起yī qǐ(in) the same place; together; in company (with)
引起yǐn qǐto give rise to; to lead to; to cause; to arouse
看起来 (看起來)kàn qǐ laiseemingly; apparently; looks as if; appears to be; gives the impression that; seems on the face of it to be
想起xiǎng qǐto recall; to think of
资源 (資源)zī yuánnatural resource (such as water or minerals); resource (such as manpower or tourism)
来源 (來源)lái yuánsource (of information etc); origin
能源néng yuánenergy sources; energy

See also: Japanese symbol for “origin”.

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.

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