塚

Alternative forms

 * There are two Unicode z-variants, at code points U+585A and U+FA10. The latter form (U+FA10) has the next to last stroke of connected to the top horizontal stroke (similar to ).
 * The Japanese form of the character is written with instead of  as its bottom right component. However both 塚 (Japanese) and 塚 (traditional Chinese) forms are encoded under the same codepoint.

Usage notes
The Kangxi dictionary lists 塚 as the unorthodox form (俗字) of 冢. The usage of 塚 persists in Japan with one stroke removed. 冢 is the prescribed form in simplified Chinese, but 塚 is also used occasionally. Both 塚 and 冢 are used in traditional Chinese, with the former being more common.

Glyph origin
– an earthen mound, a tomb of earth.

Definitions

 * 1) tomb; burial mound

Kanji

 * 1) mound, hillock, tumulus

Etymology
Cognate with 🇨🇬 verb.

The ending may indicate that tsuka developed as the nominalization of the  of the verb, suggesting an original meaning of "that which is being built up into an earthworks (but isn't finished yet)". The irrealis is also the root form for constructing the passive form of all Japanese verbs, so the original meaning might instead have been just the passive sense of "that which is built up into an earthworks".

Noun

 * 1) a mound or hillock, generally manmade
 * 2) a grave, a tumulus or burial mound

Derived terms

 * , : anthill
 * : a milestone
 * : the kabuki play, Mukashigatari Uguisuzuka
 * : a shell mound or midden
 * : foxhole
 * : foxhole

Hanja

 * 1) cemetery
 * 2) tomb, burial mound