sentence, literature, style, art, decoration, figures, plan, literary radical (no. 67)
文 centers on patterned expression: writing, literature, and style, but also decorative art and figures. The radical sense is the same visible pattern used as a component in other characters.
文 is a pictograph of a pattern or design, originally showing crossed lines or a tattoo-like mark. It came to mean writing, literature, and decoration.
The crossed strokes of 文 look like a decorative pattern or a written character. Picture it as a stylized design that represents both art and writing.
For ブン, imagine a bun decorated with intricate patterns: bun -> ブン, and the bun's design is a work of art.
culture; civilization; civilisation
letter (of an alphabet); character
sentence
letter; note; mail
order (for an item)
writing; composition; essay; article; passage; prose; (writing) style
complaint; grumbling; objection
document; writing; letter; papers; notes; records; archives
thesis; essay; treatise; paper; article
library; book collection
civilization; civilisation; culture
literature
text (of a book, document, etc.); body (of a letter)
English writing; English sentence; English text
literally; to the letter
grammar
literature; books (reference); document
cultural assets; cultural property
humanities, social sciences, and fine arts; liberal arts
humanities and social sciences; liberal arts
writing (an essay, prose, etc.); composition
straw-rope pattern pressed into earthenware
whole passage; full text; whole sentence; full paragraph
Ministry of Education, Science and Culture (1871-2001)
context (of a passage); line of thought
literature
emoji
official document; archives
original text
text (of a law, treaty, contract, etc.); provisions
first letter of a word; capital letter (at the start of a word or sentence)
tiny amount of money; a penny; a cent; a farthing
humanity; civilization; civilisation; culture
contents of a document (esp. of a letter)
astronomy
literary style
stationery
astronomy
uppercase letter; capital letter
in the sentence; in the text
stationery
example sentence; illustrative sentence; model sentence
Chinese classical writing; Chinese classics
Agency for Cultural Affairs
lowercase letter
pattern; design
ancient writing (Edo-period or older); classical literature
astronomical observatory
correspondence; exchange of letters
civilian
official document; archives
historical document; archives; old manuscript; paleograph
stipulation; stating clearly; documenting in writing; stating explicitly
the above sentence; the foregoing remark
Ministry of Education, Science and Culture (1871-2001)
preface; foreword; introduction
education; culture
horizontal script (esp. of a European language); European writing; Roman letters
pure literature; belles-lettres
love letter
Japanese text; sentence in Japanese
bunraku; Japanese puppet theatre (theater)
literary art; literary activity; writing
inscription; epitaph; epigraph
written language; literary language
prose
literary world; literary circles
Japanese literature
text of the law
French; French writing; French literature
unwritten law; common law
pre-order; advance order
humanities; arts
traditional culture
optical character recognition; OCR
popular literature
person of culture; cultured person
Order of Culture (Japan); Order of Cultural Merit (South Korea)
cultural
cultural heritage
undisputed; entirely; perfect
scholar of literature; literary person; man of letters
Minister of Education, Science and Culture
Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology; MEXT
intangible cultural asset
variant (in a manuscript or book); part of a text that differs from other versions
private document
introductory text; introductory essay
English(-language) literature
important cultural property; important cultural asset