総理大臣

Taken apart

1. 総

   そう

   general

2. +

3. 理

   り

   logic

4. +

5. 大

   だい

   large

6. +

7. 臣

   じん (from しん)

   retainer

Select a part to see every word so far that is taken apart with it.

Wiktionary's text doesn't split this word, so each part is one of its kanji (with the okurigana written after it), with the reading and the dictionary meaning KANJIDIC2 gives that character — a word doesn't always use every sense of its kanji.

Written with 総理大臣

In a sentence

• 総理(そうり)大臣(だいじん)が辞任(じにん)した。

  The Prime Minister has resigned.

  Tatoeba #140305, translation #274268

• 総理(そうり)大臣(だいじん)が昨日(きのう)辞職(じしょく)した。

  The Prime Minister resigned yesterday.

  Tatoeba #140306, translation #274267

Sentences are from Tatoeba (CC BY 2.0 FR), picked by fixed rules from a dated export and shown unchanged. Nobody has reviewed them one by one.

What Wiktionary says

Quoted line by line from Wiktionary's Etymology section for this reading, taken from one dated dump so it can't change underneath us. Nothing below is paraphrased.

• “総理 (“prime minister”, literally “leader”) + 大臣 (“(senior) minister”)”

Source: Wiktionary: 総理大臣 (dump of 2026-09-02), available under CC BY-SA 4.0. Reading, meaning and part of speech from JMdict, and kanji readings from KANJIDIC2 (EDRDG).

What the labels mean

漢語 Sino-Japanese

Words built from Chinese-derived morphemes — borrowed from Chinese or coined in Japan out of Chinese parts — read with on'yomi.

Compound

Two or more words or stems joined into one.

Rendaku

The first sound of the second part voices when two native words join (kami → -gami).