Hirame (olive flounder)

Japanese uses 鮃 for hirame; Chinese uses it for flatfish. The Japanese fish name is ヒラメ, the olive flounder; Chinese reads the character píng.

The left component marks fish. The right side's role is disputed: popular explanations connect 平 with “flat,” while character references treat it as a sound clue, a component that suggests pronunciation. “Fish plus flat” is a mnemonic, not a secure account of how the graph formed.

The Chinese dictionary 玉篇 glosses 鮃 as a fish name; a 2024 dictionary record notes that the earlier 說文 does not include it.

Is 鮃 the same in Chinese and Japanese?

The glyph is shared, but the readings and fish labels differ. In Chinese reference use, 鮃 is píng for a flatfish group; simplified Chinese writes 鲆. In Japanese, 鮃 names the fish ヒラメ, also written 平目 or 比目魚.

In earlier Japanese usage, hirame and karei were not always sharply separated. Japanese reference works distinguish 鮃 for ヒラメ from 鰈 for カレイ, so the names can point to different fish rather than interchangeable spellings.

How to type 鮃

Enter the fish name as its reading, then select the intended character. For a Japanese IME, enter ひらめ and choose 鮃. With Chinese Pinyin input, enter píng, switch to traditional Chinese if needed, then choose 鮃.

As of 2026, if a font draws 鮃 differently on another device, the receiving environment may be rendering the character differently; its meaning does not change.