Japanese symbol for “ruan”

阮咸

げんかん

Romaji: genkan

ruanxian (4 or 5-stringed Chinese lute); ruan

In Japanese, ruan is 阮咸, read げんかん (genkan).

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.

Meanings

n ruanxian (4 or 5-stringed Chinese lute); ruan

Kanji and stroke order

阮

place name

on: ゲン

7 strokes

咸

all, same

on: カン、ゲン

9 strokes

Related words

Words that share a kanji.

Word	Reading	Meaning
阮朝	げんちょう genchou	Nguyen dynasty (Vietnam; 1802-1945)
咸豊	かんぽう kanpou	Xianfeng era (of emperor Wenzong of Qing; 1850-1861)
沢山咸	たくざんかん takuzankan	xian (hexagram 31 of the I Ching: influence)

Data: JMdict (CC BY-SA 4.0); KANJIDIC2 (CC BY-SA 4.0); KanjiVG (CC BY-SA 3.0); wordfreq (CC BY-SA 4.0 (data)). Retrieved 2026-10-22.