Counting the strokes of a name — the four numbers and how they are taken
updated · 7 min read
Name divination reads tendencies of fortune from the stroke counts of the characters in a name. The form it takes in Japan today was settled between the 1910s and the 1930s, and the system set out by Kumasaki Ken'o is the best known.
The idea is simple enough. Count the strokes, divide them into groups, and assign a meaning to each group's number. What is difficult is that the counting is full of traps.
The four numbers
Take the name Yamada Taro as an example. The characters run three, five, four and nine strokes.
| Number | How it is worked out | In this example | What it is taken to show |
|---|---|---|---|
| Heaven | All strokes of the family name | 3+5 = 8 | What comes down the family line. Not judged on its own |
| Personality | Last character of the family name plus first of the given name | 5+4 = 9 | The centre of character. Given the most weight |
| Earth | All strokes of the given name | 4+9 = 13 | What you were born with. Strongest in youth |
| Total | All strokes of the whole name | 3+5+4+9 = 21 | The whole of a life, and later years in particular |
Some schools add a fifth, the outer number — heaven plus earth — for reading dealings with other people. This service works with four.
The heaven number is fixed by the family name alone, so everyone with the same surname shares it. That is why it is not usually judged on its own.
Where the counting gets difficult
Old forms or modern forms?
This is the largest fork. The system was built in the era of the older character forms, so some schools count by the original older form and others by the form the person actually uses.
The modern form of one common character in surnames runs to seven strokes; its older form runs to sixteen. Which you count changes the number by nine. There is no settled resolution between the two.
This service counts by the form actually used on documents and in daily life. The reasoning is that a person is called by that name and writes those characters every day.
Some schools count radicals specially
There are schools that count the three-stroke water radical as the four strokes of the full character for water, and the heart radical as the four strokes of the full character for heart. The hand and flesh radicals are treated the same way.
This service does not use those special counts; it uses the dictionary stroke count as it stands. Mixing methods destroys any chance of reproducing a result.
The repeat mark
A repetition mark, as in the surname Sasaki, inherits the stroke count of the character before it. The first character runs seven, so the mark also counts seven: seven plus seven plus four gives eighteen. The mark is not given a stroke count of its own.
Variant characters
Certain characters used in surnames are variants treated as separate characters from the standard ones. They are frequently missing from stroke dictionaries, and some systems simply drop them.
This service counts them by the stroke count of the standard character they correspond to, and always shows a note saying that a variant was counted that way. It never silently substitutes one character for another.
What the numbers are taken to mean
Each number carries an assigned meaning. Some of the main ones:
| Number | The usual reading |
|---|---|
| 1, 3, 5, 6, 8 | Taken as numbers that build up steadily |
| 11, 13, 15, 16 | Taken as numbers blessed with people, and a role holding things together |
| 21, 23, 24 | Taken as numbers that open a road by their own effort |
| 31, 32, 33 | Numbers of large force. How it is used is what is asked |
| 9, 10, 19, 20 | Taken as numbers with a large swing. Many schools read them as unfavourable |
These assignments also differ between schools, though. There are books that call the same number favourable and books that call it unfavourable. It is healthier not to take any single interpretation as absolute.
Names written in the Latin alphabet
This is worth saying plainly. Name divination counts the strokes of Japanese characters, so it does not apply to a name written in the Latin alphabet. A name like Smith John has no stroke count to take.
Some systems produce a number anyway by counting nothing, which shows all four numbers as zero. This service does not do that. Where a name has no Japanese characters, the reading is left out and your result covers ten methods rather than eleven, with a note saying so.
The decision is made on the characters you type, not on the language of the page. Anyone who enters a name in kanji or kana gets the name reading, whichever language they are reading the site in.
How to hold a name reading
An unfavourable number is no reason to change a name. Name divination is not a tool for passing judgement on a name; it is one way of putting your own tendencies into words. Marriage or a change of name alters the numbers, and it does not alter the person.
Common questions
- How are names in hiragana or katakana counted?
- By the strokes of the character shape as written. Schools differ on the details of how some of these are counted.
- Can it read a middle name or a name in another language?
- Name divination is built on the strokes of Japanese characters, so it does not transfer well to a name in the Latin alphabet. This service applies it to kanji and kana only.
- If my surname changes on marriage, does my fortune change?
- A change of surname changes the heaven, personality and total numbers, so the figures in a name reading change. The earth number, taken from the given name alone, does not.