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Kanji for Kyoto
The kanji most commonly used for "Kyoto" are 京、洛、都.
京
Kanji that mean Kyoto
京 is the character for a capital, and 京都 is literally ‘capital city’ — the emperor’s seat for over a thousand years. The same 京 is the second half of 東京, the eastern capital, and appears in 上京, to go up to the capital. It is the character a reader connects with Kyoto first.
洛 is the literary name. It was taken from 洛陽, the Chinese capital Luoyang, and applied to Kyoto by analogy: 上洛 meant to travel up to Kyoto, a word familiar from warring-states history, and the city’s quarters are still called 洛中 (the center), along with 洛北, 洛東, 洛西 and 洛南 in guidebooks and shop names.
都 is the capital as a city rather than as an idea: 都市 (city), 首都 (a national capital), and the administrative 東京都. Set beside 京 it makes the name itself, and on its own it is read miyako, the old word for the imperial capital.
Words using Kyoto kanji
Everyday Japanese vocabulary built from the characters above.
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京都
きょうと
Kyoto (city, prefecture)
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北京
ペキン
Beijing (China); Peking
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都内
とない
within the (Tokyo) metropolitan area
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東京証券取引所
とうきょうしょうけんとりひきじょ
Tokyo Stock Exchange; TSE
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都市
とし
town; city; municipal
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中京
ちゅうきょう
Nagoya (city); Chūkyō metropolitan area (most of Aichi, and parts of Gifu and Mie prefectures; centered around Nagoya); Chūkyō region
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首都
しゅと
(national) capital (city); metropolis
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在京
ざいきょう
being in the capital (i.e. Tokyo, or formerly Kyoto)
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首都圏
しゅとけん
Greater Tokyo Metropolitan area; metropolitan area (of a capital)
Before you use Kyoto kanji
洛 is a specialist's character: alone it says Kyoto only to someone who knows the 洛中 convention, and otherwise reads as a Chinese place name. 京 is the recognizable one, though by itself it means 'capital', which today is as likely to suggest Tokyo.