ナルト – Naruto Character Names in Japanese
If you want to have a glimpse into Japanese culture, folklore, mythology and religion then the Naruto series is one of the best choices out there. This anime is filled with references to legendary or historic characters, references to Japanese mythology and more.
Especially the names of characters tell a lot about their abilities, personality and more. Though the meaning is often shrouded in mystery digging deep into the origins and inspiration of these characters will allow you to enjoy the series on a much deeper level. Simply watching Naruto in English is fun but no where as informative as the Japanese original. Though there are hundreds if no more characters, let take a look at some of the most iconic character’s and the meaning, and origins of their names.
INDEX
うずまきナルト – Naruto Uzumaki
Naruto Uzumaki is the main character of the Naruto series and his name has an interesting origin. Naruto loves ramen and so his name comes from the fish cakes that you seem in ramen. These are called 鳴門( naruto ) or 鳴門巻き ( naruto maki ) and have a small swirl in the center.
This also brings us to his last name, 渦巻き ( uzumaki ) which means spiral or swirl which of course comes from the swirl in the fish cakes. If be break down the name more 渦 ( uzu ) means whirlpool. This lines up well with the fact that the うずまき一族 ( uzumaki ichizoku: uzumaki clan ) come originally from 渦潮隠れの里 ( uzushio-gakure no sato: hidden village of whirling waves/tides).
うちはサスケ – Sasuke Uchiha
Sasuke Uchiha takes his first name, Sasuke from the legendary character, 猿飛佐助 ( Sarutobi Sasuke ). The last name Sarutobi was then used as the last name for the Sarutobi clan in Naruto.
Uchiha on the other hand, is not as clear. It is possible that it comes from the Japanese word 内輪 ( uchiwa ) which is a traditional Japanese fan. In old Japanese this would have been written as うちは and the は would have been pronounced as wa. It is also worth noting that the sharingan in the Naruto series is written as 写輪眼 and shares the same 輪 Kanji as in 内輪.
春野サクラ – Sakura Haruno
Sakura’s name is pretty easy. First her last name is 春野 which means spring field. However when her full name is said, it is a word play on 春の桜 which means spring cherry blossoms.
畑カカシ – Kakashi Hatake
Kakashi has one of the best names in the series. His, last name 畑 ( hatake ) means a crop field, or a farmers field. Kakashi then translates directly to scarecrow in Japanese. This name matches with ninja traditionally using things like scarecrow as decoys to escape.
日向ヒナタ – Hinata Hyuga
Most Naruto character’s names, first and last are not usually written in Kanji. These are the ideograms, or Chinese based characters in the Japanese language that can stand for concepts or have meaning just in the symbol. For that reason, some of the names can be obscured at first look.
In the case of Hinata Hyuga using the different writing systems in Japanese, we have a little word play involved. Usually Hinata Hyuga is written 日向ヒナタ ( Hyuga Hinata ). The word Hinata is a real word meaning something along the lines of, sunshine, a sunny place, or, direction of the sun. Although it is written in Katakana as ヒナタ in Hinata’s name, it would usually be written as 日なた or 日向 which is the exact same way to write here last name, Hyuga.
As for here last name itself, Hyuga is the name of an old province in Japan in the northeast of modern day Miyazaki and Kagoshima prefecture.
奈良シカマル – Shikamaru Nara
Shikamaru Nara is written 奈良シカマル in Japanese. The last name comes from the Nara prefecture in Japan. His first name, Shikamaru in Kanji would be written 鹿丸 and the 鹿 in the name means deer. This fits well with his last name since the deer in Nara are a famous tourist attraction since they walk around all over, and are not afraid of humans.
伝説の三忍 – The Legendary Three Ninja
The Legendary Three Ninja are called 伝説の三忍 （ densetsu no sannin ) in Japanese. Here, the word 三忍 is a wordplay on the word 三人 or three people in Japanese which is pronounced exactly the same. The character 忍 is the same as the character in Ninja in Japanese (忍者). When counting people 人 is used in Japanese and is pronounce as nin also.
The meaning of these three does not stop there however. The legendary three are all based on characters from 児雷也豪傑譚 ( Jiraiya gouketsu monogatari )which was published in the last Edo, early Meiji period in Japan. The name of this story can be translated as something like, The heroic tales of Jiraiya.
自来也 – Jiraiya
The Naruto character, Jiraiya takes root in fictional character Jiraiya (自来也) from the 児雷也豪傑譚. Actually the character comes from an older story written in the early 1800s, 自来也説話 ( Tales of Jiraiya ). Jiraiya is like a Robin Hood character who is a noble thief. He is said to be based off the real life person, Kanwatei Onitake.
Like in Naruto, Jiraiya in 児雷也豪傑譚 is also a wielder of frogs.
ツナデ – Tsunade
First, Tsunade which is the fifth Hokage in the Naruto world is written as 綱手 in Japanese which means a mooring rope or a rope used for boats. The meaning of the name is not as important as who she is modeled after. She is modeled after the character in the Jiraiya gouketsu monogatari also named Tsunade and like the character in Naruto also controls slugs.
大蛇丸 – Orochimaru
Orochimaru is the third Sannin and also the third character taken from Jiraiya gouketsu monogatari. Both the character in Naruto and who Orochimaru is modeled on share the same name and both are wielders of snakes.
大蛇丸 is how you write Orochimaru in Japanese. In the name 大蛇丸, the 丸 Kanji means, round but in names the meaning does not make any difference and it just a suffix. The 大蛇 part on the other hand means big snake or even giant snake.
うちはマダラ – Madara Uchiha
Madara in the Japanese series has his name like most others, written in Katakana as マダラ. So, again it is hard to find exactly what his name means. It is possible that it comes from the word 曼荼羅 ( madara, mandara ) or Mandala in English.
These are just a few of the Naruto characters. There are many, many more along with other references to Japanese mythology, culture and so on. If there is anything else you are curious about just let me know!
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