蟹座 – Cancer: The Western Zodiac in Japanese

Published on Keith
image of a small red crab

The fourth astrological symbol of the Western Zodiac is Cancer. This is the sign for people’s birthdays between around June 21 to 22 until July 21 to 22. Let’s take a look at what to call this sign in Japanese.

The word for Cancer in Japanese is 蟹座かにざ. We can split this word into かに and . First, 座 is a suffix added after the names of words in the zodiac or after constellations. 蟹 is the Japanese word for a crab.

The third astrological sign of the Zodiac is Gemini. This is the sign for people's birthdays between...Japanese Universe

蟹座 is the common way to refer to Cancer in Japanese. However, there is also another word for Cancer in Japanese. That is 巨蟹宮きょかいきゅう and this is the more formal name for Cancer. 巨蟹 by itself is not a word. However, the Kanji 巨 means huge or giant. So, 巨蟹 would mean a really big crab if it was a word.

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