きれい

• 読み: きれい
• ローマ字: kirei
• 漢字の分解: 綺 (ki) — figured cloth, beautiful; 麗 (rei) — lovely, elegant, gracious
• 発音: /ki.ɾe.i/

意味

Pretty; beautiful; clean; neat. Describes something that is visually pleasing or tidy.

A na-adjective with two main meanings: beautiful/pretty (きれいな花, a beautiful flower) and clean/tidy (部屋がきれいです, the room is clean). Despite having the kanji form 綺麗, it is almost always written in hiragana. Important: although it ends in い, it is a na-adjective, not an i-adjective — it takes な, not く: きれいな (not きれいく).

例文

1. この花はとてもきれいです。
2. 部屋をきれいにしてください。
3. きれいな海で泳ぎたいです。

使い方ガイド

場面: appearance, cleanliness, nature

トーン: positive

起源と歴史

Written in kanji as 綺麗, where 綺 means beautiful cloth/textile and 麗 means lovely or elegant. The compound originally described fine, beautiful fabrics before generalizing to beauty and cleanliness.

文化的背景

時代: Medieval

世代: All ages

社会的背景: Universal