再来月
さらいげつ · saraigetsu · JLPT N4 · noun
the month after next
📅 再来月 = again + coming + month: the next month, once more
来月 (raigetsu) is next month: coming + month. Prefix 再 (sa, again) pushes it one step further, giving the month after next. Same pattern as 再来週 (saraishuu, the week after next) and 再来年 (sarainen, the year after next).
再 — top 一 + 冂 frame + 土-like inner strokes
再 originally depicted a stack of fish or piled objects, suggesting accumulation or repetition. Over time it came to mean 'again' or 'once more,' emphasizing a second occurrence of an action. The modern form is stylized and no longer clearly pictographic.
来 — pictograph of a wheat plant with grain heads
来 originally depicted a stalk of wheat with drooping grain heads, and meant 'wheat' in oracle bone script. It was later borrowed phonetically to write the unrelated verb 'to come,' which became its dominant meaning. The original 'wheat' sense was taken over by 麥 (now 麦).
月 — pictograph of crescent moon
月 is a pictograph of a crescent moon, chosen over a full circle to distinguish it from 日 (sun). The inner strokes originally depicted the moon's shadow or markings. As a radical it often relates to the moon, time, or (via a lookalike form of 肉 'flesh') body parts.