日孁

Japanese

Kanji in this term
日	孁
ひ(る) Grade: 1	め Hyōgaiji
kun’yomi

Alternative spellings
日霊日女

Etymology

日 (“sun”) +‎ る +‎ 女 (“female”). One theory is that me was specifically 妻 (“wife”), referring to a 巫女 (miko, “shrine maiden”) who served the sun, but it eventually shifted to "goddess". Ru is possibly a variant of ろ, an archaic genitive particle that predates Old Japanese, and it was no longer productive (like の (no) and が (ga)), but became fossilized (like つ (tsu)) in words like 神漏伎 (kamuroki) and 神漏美 (kamuromi), and possibly also 大蛇 (orochi). The male equivalent of this name is possibly ひるこ (Hiruko, literally “Sun Child”), a deformed child resulted from an improper courtship ritual between 伊弉諾 (Izanagi) and 伊弉冉 (Izanami) (女 (-me) was used for females, as in 姫 (hime, “lady”), 乙女 (otome, “maiden”) and 娘 (musume, “daughter”); 子 (-ko) was used for males, as in 彦 (hiko, “lord”), 男 (otoko, “lad”) and 息子 (musuko, “son”)). However, his association with the sun was never clearly stated, and given his deformation, his name is usually interpreted as 蛭子 (literally “Leech Child”).

Proper noun

日(ひる)孁(め) • (Hirume) ^{←ひるめ (firume)^?}

(Japanese mythology) Synonym of 天照 (Amaterasu)