一昨年
いっさくねん · issakunen · JLPT N2 · noun
stopping point
📅 一昨年 = one + yesterday/past + year: one step behind last year
昨年 (sakunen) already means last year. Putting 一 in front moves it one more year back. 一昨日 works the same way and means the day before yesterday. In casual speech, 一昨年 is often read おととし (ototoshi).
一 — single horizontal stroke
一 is one of the simplest pictographs in Chinese, depicting a single horizontal line to represent the number one. It has retained essentially the same form since oracle bone script over 3,000 years ago. By extension it also means 'first,' 'whole,' or 'same.'
年 — grain 禾 over person 人 (oracle bone)
Originally a pictograph of a person carrying a bundle of harvested grain on their back, representing the yearly grain harvest. Because harvests came once a year, the character shifted from meaning 'harvest' to meaning 'year.' The modern form 年 obscures the original 禾 (grain) + 人 (person) structure.