Etymology

shakuhachi

sha·ku·ha·chi
S1H4A1K5U1H4A1C3H4I1

Today it means: A Japanese flute which is tuned to a pentatonic scale and is end-blown like a recorder instead of being held transversely like the Western transverse flute. Full definition →

Japanese 尺八
Ask AI about its historyChatGPTClaudePerplexityGoogle AIGrok

The story

  1. Japanese · borrowed from尺八
  2. English todayshakuhachi

Borrowed from Japanese 尺八 (しゃくはち, shakuhachi), from 尺 (tsyhek, an archaic measure of length approximately equal to 30 centimeters) + 八 (peat, “eight”), corresponding to the standard length of the instrument (approximately 55 centimeters).

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.