The Top Part of 左、右、有る, etc and stroke order

Is the only oddball, with the horizontal line written first, 左 with all the other ones always written vertical first? Are there others that do the vertical first other than 左 (and of course character built with it like 楕円, 惰 etc?)

[Katsuo]

Vertical first: 右有布
Horizontal first: 左友雄(&宏肱紘)

There's a long thread about this somewhere along with suggested reasons for the difference. I remember which is which by memorizing "You have the right to possess linen", and all others are horizontal first.

Also the first stroke of left 左 starts from the left and the first stroke of right 右 starts from the right.

Horizontal First
存.拵荐栫
在.恠
左佐惰.隋隨膸髓
友暖緩.爰湲煖
宏雄紘.肱浤
.拔祓秡跋

Vertical First
右若諾佑祐.惹慝醢
布怖希稀.唏晞欷鯑
有堕随賄髄郁.侑宥肴囿陏淆鮪
楕.橢 -- Mistake?

This is just something I did real quick with http://pyrosphere.net/japanese/ The stroke orders are from the stroke order font (?)
Anything after the '.' in the row has no frequency according to Rikaichan (kanjidic).
Those "Mistake?" kanji use the 左 primitive, but write it with the vertical stroke first.

Long story short: don't worry about it too much. Use Katsuo's mnemonic and you won't ever have to worry about it again

I've always just written it horizontal first. I think that's better anyway--more consistent, which is the only useful, initial aspect of 'stroke order' while first learning kanji.

My preferred mnemonic is that the first and third strokes are always in the same direction: I don't know of any kanji with the first two strokes like 右 where this isn't true. I don't count 存 et al as they're clearly a different radical anyway.

pm215 Wrote:My preferred mnemonic is that the first and third strokes are always in the same direction: I don't know of any kanji with the first two strokes like 右 where this isn't true.

You should have a look at Asriel's post two posts above yours. Any character with 厷 in it breaks that rule, but if you can remember that exception, it's a useful rule of thumb.

賄 starts horizontal but 有 starts vertical X_X

@patrickrl - I disagree and so does wiktionary. No, we're not too authoritative, but usually the primitives are written the same way

JimmySeal Wrote:

pm215 Wrote:My preferred mnemonic is that the first and third strokes are always in the same direction: I don't know of any kanji with the first two strokes like 右 where this isn't true.

You should have a look at Asriel's post two posts above yours. Any character with 厷 in it breaks that rule, but if you can remember that exception, it's a useful rule of thumb.

So it does. It's quite a nice mnemonic apart from being wrong :-)

Seems like a good rule of thumb despite those exceptions. Any magic tricks for dealing with the cliff primitive?

I always have trouble with that one, sometimes horizontal stroke first, sometimes vertical, and sometimes the horizontal stroke even goes from right to left.

The plain cliff primitive is horizontal stroke first, left-to-right. It's vertical stroke first if something is cutting through it or it has extra hooks on. I think the right-to-left one is the drag primitive. I'm puzzled about 反 though - in some fonts it looks like the plain cliff, and in others it looks like drag...

http://www.yamasa.cc/members/ocjs/kanjid...enDocument

So is this not reliable...? I've been using it for a while

Well this is where we get into the whole "how important is stroke order?" argument. We've got 2 sources that say 2 different things, neither of which I'd say is the "leading authority" in stroke order.

I'd stick with convention and draw it the way the primitive is written, but unless you're doing some sort of calligraphy, I don't think it really matters.

The Obunsha 標準漢和辞典 agrees with Asriel, and I think that's at least more authoritative than Yamasa's stroke order GIFs.

bladethecoder Wrote:The plain cliff primitive is horizontal stroke first, left-to-right. It's vertical stroke first if something is cutting through it or it has extra hooks on. I think the right-to-left one is the drag primitive. I'm puzzled about 反 though - in some fonts it looks like the plain cliff, and in others it looks like drag...

Chances are you've got a Chinese font thing going on there. My browser shows a drag stroke on 反 but it also shows the 毎 primitive with two dots even in Joyo kanji like 海 and 悔. It may be allowable to have these variants in some non-standardized kanji, but it's definitely [not] a drag stroke in Joyo kanji.

I'm normally a stickler for stroke order, but this is one of those cases where i say "who cares". I write them all horizontal stroke first. Writing 右 vertical stroke first just feels clumsy. I think this is also one of those cases where handwriting recognition doesn't care. Writing it the "wrong" way is too common a variant for them to not support it. If i have problems having a character recognized, writing it again with the other stroke order is pretty simple. I don't think i've ever had to actually do that though.

zigmonty Wrote:I'm normally a stickler for stroke order, but this is one of those cases where i say "who cares". I write them all horizontal stroke first. Writing 右 vertical stroke first just feels clumsy. I think this is also one of those cases where handwriting recognition doesn't care. Writing it the "wrong" way is too common a variant for them to not support it. If i have problems having a character recognized, writing it again with the other stroke order is pretty simple. I don't think i've ever had to actually do that though.

I would tend to agree with you, since just like with 可 no japanese person actually gets them right.

I was hoping that I could remember one outlier and the rest would all be the other way, but if they are mixed, then I would probably will just not actually bother, except:

My Nintendo DS game though demands I right them in its stroke order so I end up having to write the way they say

なぞって覚える　

JimmySeal Wrote:反 : it's definitely a drag stroke in Joyo kanji.

Are you sure this is right? None of the games sources I use write han in the drag stroke order. In the original, or in any Kanji it is used in.

For that matter they do not even write the drag in 励む as a drag. It seems like part of the Japanese simplification has been to eliminate the drag stroke order and direction in as many cases as they can. I am curious about what the official writing of 栃木 will be since it has been added to the Joyo. Only actual 栃木 people write it as drag AFAICT. The rest of the people write it like it is written 励む IME.

Asriel Wrote:Horizontal First

楕.橢 -- Mistake?

There is no stroke order for Kanji outside of the Joyo anyway. There are lots of opinions but without government enforcement it is moot, since there is no final answer.

(I will ever be handwriting the word ellipse anyway. I think until I studied that kanji I had not written the word ellipse in ten years. Even when you study math or physics you read "elllipse" and say "ellipse" but do not ever write it.

kapalama Wrote:

JimmySeal Wrote:反 : it's definitely a drag stroke in Joyo kanji.

Are you sure this is right? None of the games sources I use write han in the drag stroke order. In the original, or in any Kanji it is used in.

It's definitely not a drag stroke, is what I meant to say. Original post fixed.

Did anyone mention it here? I think I read it in another thread and it seems to fit:

The "by one's side" primitive's first stroke direction is mostly dictated by direction of the first stroke what's inside that primitive. So 右有布　 have 口月巾 so the first stroke is top to bottom. These　左友 have　工又　so it's obviously left to right. As this 雄　has 厶 it's a toss up, but in all cases it's left to right in all the variants.