国会
こっかい · kokkai · JLPT N3 · noun
diet
🏛️ 国会 = country + meeting: the nation's assembly
国 (koku) means country and 会 (kai) means meeting or gathering, as in 会議. Koku+kai merge into kokkai, so the word is literally the country's meeting, which is Japan's parliament, the Diet.
国 — enclosure 囗 + jade 玉
国 is a simplified form of 國. The outer 囗 represents borders or an enclosed territory, while the inner 玉 (jade) suggests a treasured realm ruled by a sovereign. The traditional 國 used 或 inside, depicting a guarded region with a weapon, later simplified by replacing it with 玉.
会 — 人 person on top + 云 cloud/say below (simplified from 會)
The traditional form 會 showed a lid over a vessel with contents stacked inside, depicting things coming together — hence 'meet, gather, assemble.' From 'gathering' it extended to 'meeting,' then 'understand' (minds meeting) and 'be able to.' The simplified 会 keeps only a schematic top and bottom.