屋根
やね · yane · JLPT N3 · noun
roof
🏠 屋根 = house (屋 ya) + 根 (ne): yane, the roof keeps the rain off
屋 (ya) means house or building, as in 本屋 hon'ya, bookshop. 根 (ne) normally means root, but here it is read for its sound. Sound hook: yane, as in yay, no rain, because the roof keeps you dry.
屋 — corpse 尸 + reach/arrive 至
屋 originally depicted a place where one arrives (至) to rest under a roof, with 尸 here representing a covering or dwelling rather than a corpse. The character came to mean 'house' or 'room'. Today it commonly refers to a house or a room within a building.
根 — tree radical 木 + 艮 (phonetic)
根 is a semantic-phonetic compound. The left side 木 ('tree') gives the meaning, since the character originally referred to the roots of a tree. The right side 艮 supplies the sound. From 'tree root' it extended to mean 'root, base, foundation' in general.