What's the difference between どんぐりの実 and どんぐり? I read a passage where they
said どんぐりの実 in reference to just an acorn (I thought), in which case I don't
know why they wouldn't use just どんぐり. The passage was:

> 形声。白は、どんぐりの実を描いた象形文字で、 **どんぐりの実**
> の中みのあわく白い色を示す。泊は「水＋音符白」で、白の原義とは関係がない。水が浅くて舟底が水底にせまってとまること。また、水かさの少ない浅瀬のこと。
> 【泌】 会意兼形声。必は、棒を両側からしめつけるさまを描いた象形文字。泌は「水＋音符必」で、両側から締めつけて液体をいびり出すこと。
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2013-06-19T19:32:50.193
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nuances
どんぐりの実 versus どんぐり
First of all, you are right in thinking that どんぐり by itself is the default
choice for saying "acorn". I think that saying どんぐりの実 specifies that one is
talking about the nut/seed. どんぐり could in principle mean the whole fruit (i.e.
including the hull).
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2013-06-19T22:38:49.983
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The 実 here emphasizes that the writer isn't just talking about acorns, but
more specifically about the _meat_ inside the acorn. If you think about it
more, it makes more sense -- the text is describing the origins of the
character 白 as a symbolic rendering of the _meat_ of the acorn nut, in
reference to the off-white color. The text here **can't** be talking about the
outside of the acorn, since that's not white -- it's either green or brown,
sometimes even light tan, but certainly not off-white.

Looking up 実 ( _mi_ ) in both Shogakukan Kokugo Dai Jiten and
[Daijirin](http://www.weblio.jp/content/%E5%AE%9F) (scroll down for the み
reading), the first and second senses describe a plant's fruit or nut / seed,
but the fourth sense also notes:

  * 中身。内容。→み（身）

Since a どんぐり is already a nut, it doesn't make sense to parse どんぐりの実 as
"acorn's nut" -- what this phrase means instead is "acorn's content → the
inside or meat of an acorn".
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2014-05-13T07:15:40.300
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We native Japanese speakers sometimes say どんぐりの実 to mean どんぐり/acorn, probably
carelessly and incorrectly, especially in an informal context.

(Maybe because we use the broad term どんぐりの木 for ブナ(beech?), ナラ(Japanese oak?),
[樫]{かし}(evergreen oak?), クヌギ(sawtooth oak?), etc., and think mistakenly that
there should be どんぐりの実 vs どんぐりの木, just like there're ブナの木 vs ブナの実, 松の実 vs 松の木,
or 梅の実 vs 梅の木, etc...? or is it just me?)
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2014-05-13T15:17:15.587
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