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GIFT OF MICHAEL REESE
UNIVERSnY OP CALIFORNIA LIBRARY
110 WEEKS AFTER This book is DUE «a die last due stamped below.
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UNIVERSITY OP CALIFORNIA LIBRARY
110 WEEKS AFTER This book is DUE «a die last date scamped below.
Fine sdiedule: 25 cents on first day overdue
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IjD 21-10Oi»-12,'46(A2012s16)4120
A HANDBOOK
OF
COLLOQUIAL JAPANESE
BY
BASIL HALL CHAMBERLAIN,
PROFESSOR OF JAPANESE AND PHILOLOGY IN THE IMPERIAL UNIVERSITY OF JAPAN.
U N I ^^ 5e; t r. : X \^ J SittoM SDttton*
LONDON: TRUBNER & Co., 57 & 59, LUDGATE HILL. TOKYO: THE HAKURU|^HA, GINZA.
YOKOHAMAA
SHANGHAI^! j^£LLY & WALSH, LIMITED.
HONGKONG SINGAPORE]
1889.
iAll rights reserved.}
\\vv^
cs-sc^
^-c- -■•■--> PREFACE.
T N the preface to the first edition of this Handbook, -*" published seven months ago, readers were invited to favour the author with corrections and suggestions. This request has been promptly and widely responded to, and the author takes the present opportunity to thank each and all for their contributions. More particularly is he beholden to the minute and critical scholarship of Mr. Ernest Satow, C. M. G., Her Britannic Majesty's Minister at Montevideo, of Captain Brinkley, R. A., Editor of the "Japan Mail," and of Mr. J. H. Gubbins, Acting Japanese Secretary to Her Britannic Majesty's Legation in Japan. Scarcely less valuable, though from the opposite standpoint of a non-specialist, has been an elaborate criticism by Dr. E. Divers, F. R. S. Of Japanese critics, the most useful have been Messrs Y. Okakura and M. Ueda, both orna- ments of the younger school of Japanese philology. Mr. W. B. Mason, of the Imperial Department of Com- munications, and Mr. Walter Dening, of the Nobles' School, Tokyo, must be specially thanked for having
II PREFACE.
undertaken the labour of helping to correct each sheet as it came from the press, and for making numerous valuable suggestions. The first half of the work re- ceived similar kind offices from Mr. Percival Lowell, of Boston, U. S. A. Thanks are likewise due to Mr. J. Kuribayashi for permission to enrich the " Fragments of Conversation " from the pages of that excellent little book, the Tokyo Jijo Fude Shashin, or " Pen and Ink Sketches of Tokyo Life," to the Rev. T. Ise for his sermon, and to Professor L Nakasawa, Dr. H. Kato, and Dr. R. Mitsukuri, for the lectures by them, which occupy most of the latter portion of this volume.
The new grammatical matter of this edition has not been thrown into the shape of additional para- graphs. It has been absorbed into the old paragraphs, with as little disturbance as possible of the order of the first edition. This has been done with the object of rendering a work which the author has in view, and in which occasional reference may be made to the " Colloquial Handbook," as useful to students of the earlier edition as to those of the later. The same consideration does not apply to the " Practical Part " of the Handbook. Accordingly the numerous new phrases, conversations, extracts from lectures, etc., which it includes, have been separately numbered.
PREFACE. o Ul
To the lectures special attention is requested ; for the student desirous of learning how to address Japan- ese audiences cannot do better than form. his style on the compositions of such eminent speakers as Dr. Kato and the other authors quoted. Moreover these compositions have a more than merely lin- guistic interest. They exemplify some of the most strongly marked characteristics of the modern educated Japanese mind, — its indifferentism in matters theologi- cal, and its burning patriotic zeal. The sermon is given as a specimen of the new Christian literature, which is beginning to spring up under missionary influence. The concluding "Word about Poetry" shows the popular mind in another and older aspect, — an aspect which is scarcely affected by the many and great changes which the last twenty years have brought about in external things.
The literal interlinear translations, originally sug- gested by Dr. E. Baelz, of the Imperial University of Japan, and eagerly adopted by the author when en- gaged in the preparation of the first edition, have been the object of much and various criticism, some persons seeing in them the most useful feature of the work, others denouncing them as a premium on laziness in the beginner, and a hindrance to such as are more
iv PREFACE.
advanced. The author has not trusted his own judgment to decide this debated question either way. While, therefore, retaining the literal interlinear trans- lations in most places, he has endeavoured to con- ciliate all tastes by giving none but free translations of IF 447 — 8, IF 450, IF 454, and thence to the end of the volume.
With these few words of acknowledgment and ex- planation, the author leaves his work to the kind indulgence of students.
Imperial University of Japan. Tokyo, May, 1889.
C
TABLE OF CONTENTS.
(THEORETICAL PART,
OR
GRAMMAR.)
CHAPTER I. INTRODUCTORY REMARKS.
IF I. Method of Using this Handbook. — If 2. Necessity for Much Learning by Heart. — IT 3. Relationship of Japanese to Other Languages. — IT 4. Differences between Ancient and Modern Japan- ese.— IT 5, 6. Influence of Chinese on Japanese. — IT 7. Japanese Writing, the Kana Syllabaries. — %S. Colloquial Literature. — IT g. Parts of Speech. — IF 10. Errors into which European Speakers are Apt to Fall Page i— 12.
CHAPTER n. PRONUNCIATION AND LETTER-CHANGES.
IT II. Letters. — IF 12, 13. Vowels, Short and Long. — % 14 — 20. Vowel Peculiarities, Hi Mispronounced as Shi, Quiescent Vowels. — % 21 — 23. Diphthongs. — % 24 — 25. Consonants, Simple and Double. — IT 26. Final Letters. — IT 27. Accent. — IT 28 — 32. Letter- Changes, the Nigori, Reduplication of Consonants. — ^ 33. Change of ^ to a in Compounds. — IT 34. Japanese Inability to Pronounce Certain Combinations, of Letters, Changes hence Re- sulting in Imported European Words, — IF 35. Euphonic Con- tractions Page 13 — 25.
VI TABLE OF CONTENTS.
CHAPTER III.
THE NOUN.
^ 36 — 44. Number and Gender. — If 45 — 49^ Compound Nouns, Synthesis of Contradictories, Difference between Native and Chinese Compounds, Hyphens. — IF 50. Word-Building, Proper Names. — IF 51. Honorifics. — If 52. Nouns in ga and mi. — If 53 — 54. Koto and Mono. — If 55. Names of Shops. — IF 56. Names of Trees, Rivers, Islands, and Mountains. — IF 57. Aida^ Hazu, Toku — IF 58. TokorOf Dokoro, — IF 59. Verbs used as Nouns. — IF 60—63. Nouns Used as Adjectives. — IF 64. Nouns Used as Adverbs .. .. Page 26 — 43.
CHAPTER IV.
THE PRONOUN.
^ 65 — 71. Personal Pronouns. — IF 72. Reflexive Pronouns. — % 73 — 79. Demonstrative, Interrogative, and Indefinite Pronouns and Adverbs (IF 74. Table of Pronouns and Adverbs.). — IF 80 — 86. Relative Pronouns, Tokoro tio Page 44 — 59.
CHAPTER V.
THE POSTPOSITION.
IF 87, Postpositions Proper (including IF 88 — 90. De, — 91—94. Ga. — IF 95 — 98. Ka. — IF 99 — 100. Kara. — IF loi. Made. — IF 102. Mo. — IF 103. Motte — IF 104 — 109. Ni. — IF no — 114. jVo.— IF 115. Dano.--^\ 116. S/ti.- IF 117— 121. To, Tote.— IF 122 — 125. Wa. — IF 126—128. Difference between Wa and Gfl.— IF 129 — 132. Wo.—^ 133. Ya. — IF 134. Ye. — IF 135. Yori.) — IF 136 — 140. Postpositions Combined, No «t, Wobay To Wa. — IF 141 — 145. Quasi- Postpositions Page 60 — 97.
CHAPTER VI.
THE NUMERAL.
IF 146. General Considerations. — ^ 147 — 151. Native Numerals. — If 152. Chinese Numerals. — H 153. Letter-Changes of Chinese
TABLE OF CONTENTS. VII
Numerals. — IT 154 — 156. Sundry Peculiarities of Numerals* — IT 157 — 160. Chinese Auxiliary Numerals. — ^ 161. Native Auxiliary Numerals. — IT 162. Counting of Human Beings. — IT 163 — 165. Interrogative Numeral Words. — H 166. Ordinal and Fractional Numbers. — H 167 — 172. Counting of Time. — H 173 — 174. Miscellaneous Numeral Locutions Page g8 — 116.
CHAPTER VII.
THE ADJECTIVE.
IF 175 — 185. Primary Inflections in kiy shi^ ku (i, o, fi), Adjective Stems, Table of Primary Inflections. — % 186 — 190. Secondary or Tense and Mood Inflections, Tables of d^, Negative Adjective Naiy Negative Conjugation. — ir 191. Compound Adjectives. — IT 192. Beki. — H 193. Desiderative Adjectives in tai. — IT 194. Rashii, Reduplicated Stems. — IT 195. Gam and Tagaru. — IT 196— 210. Quasi- Adjectives (including IT 197. No, iVa, and Na No. — IF 198. So na, — IT 205 — 7. Verbs used as Adjectives. — IT 208 — g. Common Errors of Foreigners. — Diminutives in ko, and Aug- mentatives in o). — IT 211 — 214. Comparison of Adjectives. — IT 215 — 21 g. Miscellaneous Items Page 117 — 144.
CHAPTER VIII.
THE VERB.
IT 220. Fundamental Differences between Japanese and European Verbs. — IT 221 — 222. Analysis of Verbal Forms into Root, Stem, Base, and Agglutinated Suffix. — IF 223. Roots. — IF 224 — 225. Bases. — IF 226. Verbs how Named. — IF 227. Introductory Remarks on the Paradigms. — IF 228 — 230. Paradigms of the Three Regular Conjugations. — IF 231 — 233. Paradigms of the Irregular Verbs Kuru, Suruj And MasU, — ^ 234. Verbs for Practice. — IF 235 — 237. Peculiarities of First Conjugation (with Table). — IF 238. Kyoto Peculiarities. — ^ 239. Rationale of Phonetic Changes in Stems ending in s, t, or a Vowel. — IF 240 — 267. Analysis of the Formation of the Moods and Tenses. — IF 268 — 272. Irregular Verbs, viz., i4r», GozarUf IrasshatUy Kudasaru^ NasarUy OssharUf Iku, and Shinuru, — IF 273 — 291. Remarks on the Use of the Moods and
Vlll TABLE OF CONTENTS.
Tenses (including IT 273 — 276. Present, Past, and Future.— IT 277. Infinitive. — 11 278 — 279. Indefinite Form. — IT 280—282. Gerund. — If 283. Gerund of Adjectives. — If 284. Emphasised Gerund. — If 285. Desiderative Adjective and Adjective of Pro- bability.— If 286. Form in so, — If 287. Conditional Mood, Old Hypothetical Mood, Naraba^ Elliptical Idioms Corresponding to English Would, Should, Could, etc. — If 288. Concessive Mood and Idioms. — If 290. Frequentative Form. — If 291. Imperative Mood). — If 192 — 302. Auxiliary Verbs (including If 292. Stems Built up by Means of Auxiliaries. — If 293. Aru. — If 294. Iru and Oru. — If 295. Ktiru, Illative Tenses. — If 296. Miru, — If 297. Naraba. — If 298. Oku. — If 299. Shimau, — If 300. Suru^ Itasu. — If 301. Yaru. — ^ 302. -Auxiliaries make the Sentence Lifelike and Picturesque) Page 145 — 192.
CHAPTER IX. 1 HE VERB (CONCLUDED).
If 303. Passive Voice.-7-1f 304. Origin of Passive Explains Peculiarities of its Use. — If 305 — 308. Curious Examples, Wo in Passive Constructions, Aru. — If 309. Passive Passes into Poten- tial.— If 310. Dekiru, — If 311, Kaneru. — If 312. Morau^ Itadaku. —
313. English Passives Expressed by Japanese Intransitives. — If
314. Aversion of the Japanese Language to the Use of the Pas- sive.— If 315 — 316. Intransitives in eru. — If 317 — 318. Difference between Intransitives in eru^ Potentials in areru or rareru, and Passives in areru or rareru, — If 319. Second and Third Conju- gations how Treated. — If 320. Examples of Intransitives. — If 321 — 323. Transitive and Intransitive Pairs of Verbs. — If 324. Absence of Reflective Verbs. — If 325 — 333. Causative Verbs. — If 334 — 340. Compound Verbs. — If 341 — 349. Equivalents of the Verb To Be, Aru, Gozaru, Da, DesU, Iru, Oru, Irassharu, O ide nasaru, Ja, Naru, Suru. — If 350—358. Sum (If 353. Zuru, jiru). — If 359. — 361. Verbs Liable to be Mistaken for Each Other. — (If 361. Paradigm of Iru, Ireru, and Iru), — If 362 — 365. Verbs used as Other Parts of Speech. (If 364. Reduplication of Present Tense) Page 193—224.
TABLE OF CONTENTS. iX
CHAPTER X.
THE ADVERB, INTERJECTION, AND CONJUNCTION. SPECIAL PHRASEOLOGY.
IT 366. Absence of True Adverbs. — H 367. Adjective Forms in ku used Adverbially. — H 368 — 370. Nouns used as Adverbs. — IT 371. Phonetic Decay. — If 372. Gerunds used as Adverbs. — IT 373. List of Adverbs. — IT 374 — ^376. Yes and No. — IF 377. Adverbial Phrases. — H 378. Onomatopoetic Adverbs. — IT 379 — 384. Interjections (H 382. Naruhodo.—% 383. Ne),—M 385. Bad Language. — H 386. Baby Language. — IF 387. Women's Language. — H 388. Court Language. — 1[ 389 — 391. Conjunc- tions Page 225 — 237.
CHAPTER XI.
HONORIPICS.
IT 392 — 393. General Considerations. — IF 394. Honorifics only Partially Replace the Pronouns of other Languages. — IF 395 — 396. O and Go. — IF 397. Sama applied to Things or Acts. — IF 398. Honorifics used Objectively. — IF 399. O Saki, — IF 400. Meaningless Use of Honorifics. — IF 401. On, Mi, — IF 402 — ^404. Honorific Periphrases for Verbs. — IF 405 — 406. Special Honorific and Humble Verbs. — % 407 — 410. Honorific Imperatives. — IF 411. Please and Thank You. — IF 412 — 413. Special Honorific and Humble Nouns, Names of Relationship. — IF 414. Written Language Forms. — IF 415. Scantiness of Self- Depreciatory Forms. — IF 416, Sir, Madam, Mr. — IF 417. Mrs., Miss. — IF 418. Women's Names. — 419 IF Use of the Word Mr. .. Page 238 — 235.
CHAPTER Xn.
SYNTAX.
^ 420. The Fundamental Rule is that Qualifying Words Precede the Words they Qualify. — IF 421. Postpositions only an Apparent
: TABLE OF CONTENTS. .
Exception. — IT 422. Correlation of Sentences. — IT 423. Subjects of Sentences. — IT 424. Miscellaneous Examples. — IF 425 — 426. Examples of the Correlation of Clauses by the Indefinite Form and the Gerund. — H 427. General Subjectlessness of Sentences. — ir 428. Order of the Direct and Indirect Objects of the Verb. — ^ 429. Ellipsis, Final Verb often Omitted. — IF 430. Syntax of Postpositions. — H 431. Inversion Rare. — 1[ 432. Negatives Mutually Destructive. — IT 433-^434. Peculiarity of Japanese Negatives Owing to the Absence of Negative Pronouns, Adverbs, and Conjunctions. — IT 435 — ^436. Quotation generally Direct. IT 437. How to Avoid Quotations within Quotations, Peculiar Pleonastic Idiom. — H 438. Interrogation. — IT 439. Passives. — .IT 440 — ^441. Absence of Personification. — IT 442 — 444. Extreme Tendency to Synthesis as Shown in the Integration of Sentences Page 254 — 275.
(PRACTICAL PART,
OR
f
READER).
IT 445. Anglo-Japanese Vocabulary of over 1300 Useful Words Page 276 — 294.
U 446. Short Phrases in Constant Use „ 295 — ^309.
IT 447. Additional Useful Phrases „ 310—3x6.
U 448. Easy Questions and Answers „ 317 — 319.
. TABLE OF CONTENTS. XI
IT 449. Proverbs „ 320^425.
IF 450. Fragments of Conversation, including: i, The Post; 2, An Exhibition; 3, A Request; 4, Engaging a Teacher; 5, What Salary ? 6, Meal Hours ; 7, An Enquiry ; 8, Talking to a Child; g, Talking to a Father; 10, The Telegraph; 11, Speak- ing Japanese Well; 12, No Thoroughfare; 13, Compliments on Meeting a Friend ; 14, A Message ; 15, Feeling Unwell ; 16, On Board Ship; 17, A Picnic; 18, A Visitor; 19, Asking the Way; 20, Compliments on Fir^ Meeting; 21, Taking Leave of a Friend; 22, Thanks for Assistance Received; 23, New Year Congratulations ; 24, An Earthquake ; 25, Hiring a Jinrikisha ; 26, Letters for the Mail; 27, Nearing Yokohama; 28, A Christian Church; 29, A Fire; 30, The Theatre; 31, Early to Bed; 32, Difficulty of the Japanese Langnage ; 33, Asking the Way ; 34, The Way to the British Legation ; 35, A Toast ; 36, Keeping a Visitor Waiting; 37, Looking in on an Intimate Friend ; 38, Arriving at a Tea- House ; 39, A Meeting Dispersed ; 40, Shopping at Miyanoshita Page 326 — ^353.
IF 451 — ^459, Anecdotes, including: ^f 451, True Economy; IT 452, Thankful Kichibei; IF 453, If They Wait, Their Ages will Come Right; IF 454, An Illiterate Dog; ^F 455, Two Brothers who Planted Millet ; IF 456, A Dream of Liquor ; IF 457, The Pursuit of Fashion ; IF 458, Radishes ; ^F 459, An Eye on the Top of the Head Page 354 — ^377.
IF 460—461. Two Chapters from the " Botan-DOrO," a Novel by EnchO Page 378—415.
IF 462. A Newspaper Article, entitled " Why ?" . . „ 416—425.
IF 463 — 465. Lectures, including : IF 463, A Talk about Investiga- tion ; IF 464, A Warning against a Fashionable Mania ; IF 465, A Point of Moral Culture Page 426 — 445.
*[ 466. Extract from a Sermon ,, 446 — 451.
IF 467 — ^475. A Word about Poetry , 452 — 456.
Xll TABLE OF CONTENTS.
IT 476. Vocabulary of all the Japanese Words Contained in this Work Page 457—535.
H 477. Index OF SUBJECTS „ 537 — 541.
IT 478. Additions AND Corrections „ 542 — 543.
THEORETICAL PART.
/• ^■
•trrT
HANDBOOK
OF
COLLOQUIAL JAPANESE.
CHAPTER I. Introductory Remarks.
ir I. ** How can I learn to speak Japanese ?" — This question has been so often addressed to the present writer, that he has resolved to put his answer into a permanent shape. He is persuaded that no language was ever learnt solely from a grammar, — least of all a language like Japanese, whose structure and idioms are so alien from all that we are accustomed to in Europe. The student is therefore recommended only to glance through the Theoretical Part at first, in order to obtain a general idea of the territory he has to conquer. He can pick up by the way such of the examples as strike him, committing them to memory and seeking opportunities for using them to his servants and his native teacher. He should then go on to the Practi- cal Part, and attack the " Scraps of Conversations '* and the ** Anecdotes " as soon as possible, however baffling it may seem to be confronted with such long sentences. After all, as Japanese consists chiefly of long sentences, one cannot too early decide to face them. A little prac- tice will rob them of much of their terror. Every now and then the Theoretical Part should be consulted on
4 INTRODUCTORY REMARKS.
difficult points. It should be read through carefully, a little at a time, after a diligent study of the Practical Part and a committal of a few pages of the latter to memory shall have caused the student to make some way in the mastery of the language. . 1i 2. The necessity for memorising cannot be too strongly insisted upon. It is the sole means of escape from the pernicious habit of thinking in English, translating every sentence literally from a whispered English original, and therefore beginning and ending by speaking English Japanese instead of Japanese Japanese. It is not only that the words and idioms of Japanese differ from our English words and idioms, but that the same set of cir- cumstances does not always draw from Japanese speakers remarks similar to those which it would draw from European speakers. Japanese thoughts do not run in quite the same channels as ours. To take a very simple instance. If an Englishman wishes to make a polite remark to a friend about the latter's sick father, he will probably say ** I hope your father is better to-day." In French, German, Italian, etc., the phrase would be pretty nearly the same. In each of these languages the same kindly hope would be expressed. In Japanese it is differ- ent. The phrase would run thus :
Otottsan wa, do de gozaimasu?
or, more politely.
Go shimpu wa, ikaga de irasshaimasu ?
tMngUBi retUmfaiherofforf how deign§»io»bef
The idea of hoping or fearing, which to us is so famili- ar, does not present itself with the same vividness and frequency to the less anxious, less high-strung Oriental
RELATIONSHIP TO OTHER LANGUAGES. 5
mind. The characteristic phrase here is rather the ever- recurring
^,., , . ( "There is nothing
Shikata ga nai. ^^ ^e done ;" - There
:D0iMg»9i^^ (nommattve particle) i9''Moi, \ . , . r . »,
The student should endeavour to place himself from the outset at the Japanese point of view. This he can do only by dint of much learning by heart. The trouble thus taken will be of infinite advantage to him, even if his ultimate aim be the indoctrination of the Japanese with foreign ideas. It will put him in sympathy with his hearers. It is true that, of late, English idioms have begun to penetrate into the Japanese language. But it is chiefly into the language of the lecture-hall and the committee-room. The style of familiar every-day speech is as yet scarcely affected by this new influence.
ir 3. It is still doubtful under what family of languages Japan- ese should be classed. There is no relationship between it and Aino, the speech of the hairy aborigines whom the Japanese conquerors have gradually pushed eastwards and northwards. In structure, though not to any ap- preciable extent in vocabulary, Japanese closely resembles Korean ; and both it and Korean may possibly be related to Mongol and to Manchu, and therefore claim to be included in the Altaic group. Be this as it may, Japan- ese is what is generally termed an agglutinative language, that is to say that it builds up its words and grammatical forms by means of suffixes loosely soldered to the root or stem. It also shows faint traces of the ** law of vowel harmony" or " attraction,'* which characterises the Altaic languages. This manifests itself in a tendency to unifor- mity in the vowels of successive syllables; as ototoski, **the
6 INTRODUCTORY REMARKS.
year before last,*' for ato toshi. Similarly in several of the words recently adopted from English, such as mishin, "a (sewing-) machine;" Gotto, "the Christian God;" bukkuy " a European book."
II 4. The earliest Japanese literature that has come down to us. dates, in its present form, from the beginning of the eighth century after Christ. The general structure of the language at that time was nearly the same as it is now. But the changes of detail have been so nume- rous, that a page of eighth century Japanese is unintel- ligible to a modern native of Tokyo without special study. One of the chief factors in the alteration of the language has been the gradual infiltration of Chinese words and phrases, which naturally accompanied the borrowing of Buddhism, Confucianism, and the various arts and sciences of China. Chinese established itself, so to speak, as the Latin and Greek of Japan. It retains this position even at the present day, supplying names for almost all the new implements, sciences and ideas, which are being introduced from Europe and America. In this manner, one very curious and quite unexpected result pf the Europeanisation of Japan has been the flood- ing of the language with Chinese terms at a rate never known before. Thus we have :
jo'ki-sefif lit. " steam -vapour-ship," " a steamer." j6-ki-sha^ ,," steam -vapour-vehicle," ** a rail way train." min-ken, ,, " people-authority," " democracy."
sha-shin, „** copy-truth," "a photograph."
ron-ri'gakti, ff ** argue-reason-science," "logic." tetsu-dOf ,, " iron -road," " a railway."
ban-koku ko- „ j " myriad -countries | j " international hOy { public-law," j \ law."
revision.
chiWesb words.
j6-yaku hai' lit. ( " treaty amend- ) ,,
sei, I ment," J ^
., , ... f " set-up-law gov- ) ( << constitutional rtk'/ienset-jt,,,^ ernment," j 1 government."
yu-sho rep' „ ("superior-conquer ) f ** the survival of pai^ \ inferior-lose," ft* the fittest."
IT 5. The Japanese do not pronounce Chinese in a manner that would be intelligible to any Chinaman. They have two standards of pronunciation, both of which are corruptions of the Chinese pronunciation of over a thousand years ago. One of these is called the Go-on ^ the other the Kan-ofty from the names of certain ancient
• Chinese kingdoms. Usage decrees that the same word shall be pronounced according to the Go-on in some con- texts, and according to the Kan-on in others. Thus the myo of dai-tnyo, " a feudal noble " (lit. ** a great name "), is the same as the mei of mei-butsu, **the chief production of a locality" (lit. ** a name-thing" i.e, " a famous thing"). In this case myo is the Go-on, and mei the Kan-on, of the same Chinese character £» which in China itself is pro- nounced ming. The practical student will do best to learn words by rote, without troubling himself as to whether each term, if Chinese, be in the Go-on or in the Kan-on,
U 6. The effect of the steady influx of Chinese words during more than a millennium has been to discredit the native Japanese equivalents even when they exist. A foreigner who wishes to be considered an elegant speaker should, therefore, gradually accustom himself to employ Chinese words very freely, except when addressing uneducated persons. He should, for in- stance, prefer
/
8 INTRODUCTORY REMARKS.
CHINESE JAPANESE
jin-ryoku{suru), " to endeavour," to chikara wo tsukusu, ^ myo-chOf "to-morrow morning," to ashlta no asa. 0-Beiy " Europe and America," to Yoroppa to Amerika to. sak-kon/^ yesterdsiysindio-dsiy,'' to kin<i to kyd $^ Ch^ , f
tdi'bokUf ** a large treej" to oki na ki.
Wa-sei, "Japanese made," to Nihon-deki.
Some persons indeed, both Japanese and foreign, regret the fashionable preference for Chinese words. But the fashion exists, and to follow it is considered a mark of refinement ; neither is it possible, even were it desirable, for an outsider to set up a standard of his own, different from that acknowledged by the people themselves. The copi- ousness of the Chinese tongue, and the marvellous terse- ness which generally enables it to express in two or three syllables ideas which would require five or six in Japanese and indeed in almost any other language, form an argu- ^ment in favour of this species of Japanese Johnsonianism. On the other hand, much confusion is caused by the fact that numbers of Chinese words are pronounced alike.- The consequence of this is that it is often impossible to know what a term means, without reference to the Chinese characters with which it is written. In any case, whether he speak simply or learnedly, the student should at least avoid speaking vulgarly. Japanese resembles English in being full of slang and vulgarisms of every sort. But what should we say to a young Japanese, who, having been sent to London to learn our language, should return home with the haccent of 'Ighga'te and the diction of the street Arab ? Japanese has also many provincial dialects, some of which remain more faithful in certain respects to the traditions of the Classical language than does the dialect
SYSTEM OF WRITING. 9
of Tokyo. But the dialect of Tokyo (itself a slightly modified form of the Kyoto dialect, which was formerly con^sidered the standard Colloquial) has on its side an ever-increasing importance and preponderance, as the ge- neral medium of polite intercourse throughout the country. Practical students are strongly advised to devote them- selves to it alone. If they speak it well, they will be as generally understood as a man who speaks standard English is generally understood in England, that is to say that they will be understood everywhere by all but the peasantry, and in most provinces even by the peasantry.
7. Japanese writing consists of the Chinese characters, — ideographs, as they are sometimes styled, — mixed with a syllabic writing called the Kana, The meaning of the lat- ter term is *' borrowed jkari) names («a)." It has refer- ence to the borrowing, or, as we should say, adaptation, of characters originally ideographic for the purpose of phone- tic transcription. The Kana syllabary is a native Japan- ese invention, dating back over a thousand years. There are two principal forms of it. These are the Kata-kana, or ** Part Kana,'' so-called because the signs composing it consist of fragments of the square Chinese characters, and the Hira-gana, or ** Easy Kana,'' s6 called because consisting of entire Chinese characters written in the most sketchy cursive hand. We cannot, within the limits of the present work, treat any further of this subject. Stu- dents desirous of pursuing it are recommended to begin by the Hira-gana, and then pass on to a study of the most usual Chinese square characters, as given in Mr. Fukuzawa Yukichi's " Moji no Oshie " (three small vol- umes, to be obtained in Tokyo at the Chukindo, Ginza Ni-cho-me, or at Mita, Keio Gijiku). The whole subject
10 INTRODUCTORY REMARKS.
of the Kana and Chinese characters is minutely treated in several of the *^ Readers " recently compiled for use in the primary schools. One of the best is Mr. Kudo Seiichi's " Shin Tokuhon " (eight small volumes, to be obtained in T6ky6 at Okura Yasugor6's, No. i8, Nihon-bashi-d6ri, It-cho-me). The Kata-kana, though so much more simple- looking than the Hira-gana and the Chinese characters, is less understood by the people at large. At the present day there is a party in favour of the introduction of the Roman alphabet. Its organ, the " Romaji Zasshi,'' gives articles in various styles, romanised according to Dr. Hepburn's simple phonetic system, which is now general- ly followed by foreigners who write on Japanese subjects, and which has therefore been adopted in this Handbook.
If 8. It is possible to learn to speak Japanese quite correctly without studying the native system of writing. Unfor- tunately the acquirement of the Colloquial does not help much towards the comprehension of books, newspapers, and letters, even supposing the student to have them read aloud to him. The Japanese are still in the state in which we were during the Middle Ages. They donpt write as they speak, but use an antiquated and indeed partly artificial dialect whenever they put pen to paper. This is the so-called "Written Language." Of the few books published in the Colloquial, the best are the novels of a living author named Encho. The student, who does not wish to trouble about the characters, cannot do better than write out one of these books from his teacher's dic- tation. It should be added that they contain not a few passages to which lady students would take exception. This is the case with all Japanese fiction. It is not that the Japanese novelists love to wallow, Zola-like, in vice.
COLLOQUIAL LITERATURE. H
On the contrary, their sentiments mostly leave nothing to be desired. But they have a startlingly realistic way of calling a spade a spade. Here are the titles of EnchO's two best works : —
*^Botan-Ddrd,'' the story of a last century vendetta.
" EzO'Nishiki Kohyo no lezuto,*' a clever adaptation to moJern Japanese social conditions of Wilkie Collins' " New Magdalen." It appeared as a feuilleton to the ** YamatD Shimbun " newspaper in 1886-7.
Another amusing novel in Colloquial is the *- Ansei Mitsu-gumi Sakazuhiy' by Hakuen. It deals with middle and lower class life during the last days of the ShOgunate.
Occasionally, too, the newspapers, the ** Transactions " of the Educational, Geographical, and other learned Societies, and such collections of lectures and speeches as the " Taika Ronshu,'' the ^* Kodan Enzetsu-shu,*' etc., print a lecture exactly as taken down by the short-hand reporter from the mouth of the lecturer, though the more usual practice is to dress everything up in the Written Style before it is allowed to appear in print.
9. A word as to the parts of speech in Japanese. Strictly speaking, there are but two, the verb and the noun. The particles^ or "postpositions" and suffixes, which take the place of our prepositions, conjunctions and conjugational terminations, were themselves originally fragments of nouns and verbs. The pronoun and numeral are simply nouns. The true' adjective (including the adverb) is a sort of neuter verb. • But many words answering to our adjectives and adverbs are nouns in Japanese. There is no article. Altogether our grammatical categories do not fit the Japanese language well. They have only been
\
12 INTRODUCTORY REMARKS.
adhered to in this work in so far as they may serve as landmarks familiar to the student.
ir 10. In conclusion, the following warnings concerning errors into which European speakers of Japanese are apt to fall, may be found useful : —
Do not confound long and short vowels. (See ^13.) Do not use personal pronouns too freely. (See ^71.) Do not insert the postposition wo between a true adjec- tive and the noun to which it belongs. (See I1 208.)
Do not apply honorifics to yourself. For me to ask any one, for instance, to shinjo something to myself, or to haiken something belonging to myself, would be as if I should say : ** Have the honour to giwt it to me," or ** Have the honour to look at this thing belonging to me." As explained in Chap. XI, honorifics can only be applied to other people, and humble terms must be used in speaking of oneself. I shinjo (lit. ** respectfully lift up") something to you ; but I ask you to kudasai (lit. .** condescend") something to me. I haiken (lit. "ador- ingly look at ") something belonging to you ; but I ask you to goran nasai (lit. "august-glance deign") something be- longing to me. (See II 405.) If you hear beggars in the street shouting after you to shinjo a copper to them, it is only because, having learnt from experience that foreigners constantly misuse the honorifics, they think to ingratiate themselves and to be more easily under- stood by doing likewise. Were they addressing a Japan- ese, they would never dream of saying anything so rude and so absurd.
V *•
CHAPTER II.
Pronunciation and Letter -Changes.
PRONUNCIATION.
If II. Japanese, when written phonetically with the Roman alphabet, according to the phonetic spelling sanctioned by the Romanisation Society and Dr. Hepburn*s Dic- tionary, requires the same letters as English, with the exception of /, g, v and x. The letter c occurs only in the combination ch, which is sounded nearly like English ch in ** church," but a little more softly, as cha, " tea ;" chichiy ** milk."
IT 12. The vowels are sounded as in Spanish and Italian, but are always short, unless marked with the sign of long quantity. It is impossible to express the values of the Japanese vowels correctly in English ; but, speaking ap- proximately, we may say that
a resembles the a in ** father," but is shorter.
" men."
" machine," but is shorter.
"for" (not "four").
*^bush."
" bone," but is a purer o,
" food."
IT 13, Very great care must be taken to distinguish the short from the long vowels; for there are many words totally dis- tinct in meaning, but differing, so far as pronunciation is concerned, merely in the quantity of their vowels, thus :
|
e |
>j J |
, e |
|
i |
>» 3 |
, i |
|
0 |
y 0 |
|
|
u |
>> |
, « |
|
6 |
>) |
, 0 |
|
u |
nOO |
14
PRONUNCIATION AND LETTER- CHANGES.
dozOf " a mud godown ;*" koko, "here;" satOf " a village ; " toruy " to take ; " tsuji) " a cross-road ; "
dozo, ** please,"
kokOy " filial piety." XcTkt;
sato, " sugar."
torUf ** to pass through."
tsUjif ** an interpreter."
zutsi4y " [one, etc.] at a time ; " zutsil, *^ a headache."
The only long vowels of common occurence are 6 and u. Long a hardly occurs, excepting in the interjections a ! md ! nd ! and ! sd ! and in the words obdsan, ** an old lady," *' grandmamma," and okkdsan (but also okkasan), " mamma." Long c hardly occurs excepting in the inter- jection ne. Long £ does not occur, its place being taken by double n, as in yoroshiiy ** good," as it is considered that careful speakers sound the two Vs separately. IT 14. When preceded by another vowel or by «, the vowel e is sounded as ycy i as yiy and o as ivo. Thus ue "above;" kon-in, "marriage;" and shio, " salt," are respec- tively pronounced (and by many transliterators written) uye, konyitij and shiwo.
IT 15. / and it are often inaudible, or nearly so, in the mouths of natives of Tokyo after/, h, k, 5, sh, and is, as
pronounced {ff^'
„ hto,\
,, waiakshi.
' „ taxafi.
„ gozaimas,
,, shta,
,, ^s^£.
* "Godown" is Far-Eastern English for a store-house or ware- house. It comes from the Malay word gddong^ " a warehouse.'* t The h here has the sound of German ch.
futatsUy
' two, "
|
hito, |
" person," |
|
watakushi, |
" I, " |
|
takusan, |
" much," " many. |
|
gozazmasu, |
" there is, " |
|
shita, |
" below, " |
|
tsukiy |
" the moon, " |
VOWEL PECUUARITIES. I5
IT 16. Initial u is silent, and the following m doubled in the pronunciation of the four words / umUy ** a horse," pronounced mnta. ^
umaiy " nice," ,, mtnai.
iimarerUi ** to be born," „ mmareru,
umcy " a plum-tree," ,, mme.
IT 17. The quiescent vowels are distinguished in this work by the sign of short quantity, as hito, shlta, takusatiy uma. But it should be noted that the Japanese themselves are not conscious of failing to pronounce the t's and u's in question, and that these letters often recover their proper power for the sake of clearness or emphasis. They count in prosody, and are always sounded even in or- dinary conversation by the natives of many provinces. That is why they are allowed to remain in the translitera- tion, being generally written i and u without any diacritical mark. IT 18. The vowel «, when following sh or j, is often mis- pronounced as i by the Tokyo people, thus : teishi, for teishu, " a husband." They are also apt to mispronounce yu as i, thus : iki iox yukiy ** snow ;'* but this is distinctly vulgar. IT 19. Be very careful to discriminate final e from final i. Englishmen are often unintelligible owing to their con- founding such words as sake, ** rice-beer;" and saki, "front," "before." take, " a bamboo ; " ,, taki^ ** a waterfall." yumcy " a dream ; " ,, yumi, " a bow." H 20. The 'diphthongs acy ai, ao, au, eif oiy ui, call for no remark, each vowel retaining its own proper sound, as in Spanish or Italian. Thus the second syllable of kirei, " pretty," sounds nearly like the English word "ray (not
j6 pronunciation and letter-changes.
like *'rye");" kauy "to buy," sounds nearly like the English " cow." In the case of verbs ending in aw, such as kau, "to buy;" morau, "to receive;" shitagau, "to follow," it is indeed optional to pronounce the letter au like a long 6, But this is more characteristic of Western Japanese than of Tokyo usage. IT 21. The vulgar in Tokyo say ai for acy and oi for oe ; thus mai, instead of "wa^, "before;" koi (which means "love"), instead of koe, " voice." They also often contract ai into a long if as narane for naranai, " it won't do." But this is as bad as the dropping of the letter h by cockneys.
IT 22. lu is pronounced like yu^ e.g. tM, " to say." Om ,, ,, „ o, ,, owoM, " to think."
N. B. It is customary to write the present tense of certain verbs with a final on rather than with o, in order to show the original and theoretical conformity of these verbs to the general rule whereby the present tense must always end in u,
H 23. The consonants are pronounced approximately as in English, subject to the following remarks : —
F is a true labial, not the English labio-dental ; that is to say, it is formed by means of the lips alone, not, as our / is, by placing the upper teeth on the lower lips.
G never has the sound of j. At the beginning of a word it is pronounced hard, like the g in " give." In the middle of a word it has the sound of English ng in " longing." Thus Kiga, the name of a place near Mfya- noshita, rhymes almost exactly with "singer." (Not with ". finger," where the ng does double duty, first to render the sound o^ ngf and then the sound of ^ alone. This double sound is represented in Japanese by the combination ng, ^ ^..^^M as kin-gin, "gold and silver," pronounced king-gin), ^ ,^.. Foreigners often err in pronouncing such words as Kiga like King-ga, and kago, " a palanquin," like kang-go, etc.
CONSONANTS, IJ
N. B. In Western Japan, g retains its hard pronunciation in all situations. . .
Hi, or father the syllable hi, has a tendency to pass into shi, and even into simple 5//, especially in the mouths of the vulgar of Tokyo, who pronounce, for instance, the word hige, *'beard," asshige, and hito, ** person," as shto. Careful Japanese speakers attempt (not always success- fully) to avoid this errOr.
iV final is pronounced half-way between a true n and the French nasal «.
R is the very softest of English r's, and is never rolled or gargled as in French and German.
ir 24. W (pronounced exactly as in English) shows so strong a tendency to become obsolete after ^ and ^, not only in Tokyo, but in most parts of the country excepting the West, that it is optional to write, for instance, kwa- shi or kashi, " cake ;" Gwaimusho or Gaimusho, ** the Foreign Office." Even between two vowels, as in omo- (w)anai, ** I do not think ;" kama(w)anai, " it does not matter," many natives of Tokyo drop it. In the present work the w has been retained in all such cases, in order to conform to the usage of Dr. Hepburn's dictionary. Frenchmen, Germans, and other Continentals are apt to sound a v instead of a w. This bad habit should be carefully guarded against.
Y is always a consonant. Thus the syllable mya in myaku, " the pulse," is pronounced as one syllable, like mia in the English word ** amiable." Care must be taken not to confound it with the dissyllable fniya in such words as miyako {7ni-ya.-ko), " a capital city."
Zy when preceding the vowel w, has the sound of dz, and is accordingly so written by many transliterators,
X8 PRONUNCIATION AND LETTER-CHANGES.
as midzUf for mizu, ** water." We write z in this work, rather than dz^ somewhat against our personal preference, and merely in order to conform to the usage of the dictionary. (Conf. foot-note to p. 21.)
H 25. Double consonants must, as in Italian, be sharply distinguished from single ones, thus : amuy ** a nun ;" amma, . " a shampooer."
ichi, " one ;" itchif (for ichi-chi)^ ** union."
oto, *< a sound ;" ottOf ** a husband."
Where, however, no confusion is liable to ensue, the natives of Tokyo often pronounce as double a consonant which is properly single, thus :
ammarif - for antariy " too much."
minna, „ minaj "all."
sakki, „ saki, ** before."
But this is slightly vulgar.
^I. B. Notice that only the following consonants are liable to re- duplication : ch(tch), kf m, n, p, 5, sh{ssh)j and ts {tts),
f\ 26. All Japanese words theoretically end either in a vowel or in the consonant n. But the fact of the occasional quiescence of i and u produces the impression that there are words ending in other consonants. Thus the polite termination masu (e.g. in arimasuy " there is") mostly sounds like mas, excepting in the mouths of unusually careful or old-fashioned speakers. .In no other case is the clipping of final vowels to be recommended.
ACCENT.
If 27. Generally speaking, the Japanese pronunciation both of vowels and of consonants is less broad and heavy than that current in most European languages, and especially in English. Particularly noticeable is the manner in which
ACCENT. 19
chy jj shy and ts are minced. Tones, such as those of the Chinese, are entirely absent. There is little or no tonic accent, and only a very slight rhetorical accent ; that is to say that all the syllables of a word and all the words of a sentence are pronounced equally, or nearly so. Students must beware of importing into Japanese the strong and constantly recurring stress by which, in English and in mpst European languages, one syllable in every polysyl- labic word, and the chief words in every sentence, are sin- gled out for special notice. Thus, to quote the names of places familiar to every traveller in Japan, you must arti- culate HakonCy Miyanoshitaj Ashinoyu, with every sylla- ble equal (excepting the I of Miyanoshita, which quiesces), thus: Ha-ko-ne, Mi-ya-no-shtay A-shi-no-yu, all short and all without emphasis. Europeans excruciate Japanese ears when they say Hakdne, Miyanoshfa, and AsIiinSyu, Only occasionally, among the lower classes, does the desire for exceptional emphasis cause a word or syllable to be accented in a peculiarly declamatory manner, which Europeans find difficulty in imitating. The strength of the entire body seems to be concentrated on the production, on the laborious squeezing out, 'of the word in question.
N. B. The statement made in the above paragraph concerning the absence of accent in Japanese is intended rather for purposes of practical instruction than of scientific accuracy.' There is a slight tonic accent in Japanese. But so extremely slight is it, that it has never been marked in any dictionary whether native or foreign, it has no influence on prosody, it varies from province to province, and inhabitants of the same province contradict, not only each other but themselves, in their usage and in the explanations which they give concerning it. Most of the Tokyo people distinguish by a faint difference of stress such pairs of words as dm£t " rain ; " ame, •' a kind of sweetmeat."
hashif " chopsticks ; " hashiy " a bridge."
20 PRONUNCIATION AND LETTER-CHANGES.
kakif ** an oyster ; " kaki^ *' a persimmon."
koto, *' a sort of harp ; " koto, " a thing."
kumOj *' a spider ; " kumo, '• a cloud."
take, *• a mountain-peak ; " take, " a bamboo." The difference between such words may be compared, — not in kind, but in degree, — with that made by some English speakers between "morning" and "mourning," or between the verb "to advocate" and the substantive " an advocate." The interest of the question is rather for the theoretical than for the practical student. The tendency of Englishmen, and indeed of all Europeans excepting Frenchmen, is always to accentuate Japanese much too strongly. New-comers cannot do better, at least for the first few years, than endeavour not to accentuate it at alt.
LETTER-CHANGES.
1i 28. Nigori, i.e. " muddling,*' is the name given by the Japanese to the substitution of sonant consonants for ' surds.* The consonants affected change as follows : —
Surds. Sonants,
ch) sh\
H into y.+
* In contradistinction to the sonant letters, the surd letters are said to be sumi, i.e. " clear," — t, k, s, etc., sounding purer to the Japanese ear than d, g, z, etc. The two categories together are termed sei-daku by the native grammarians, sei being the Chinese word for " clear," and daku for " muddled."
t In Western Japan, where the rules and analogies of the ancient language have been more faithfully preserved than in the present capital, the nigori of ch is pronounced like English j, and the nigori olsh like the softer French j ; thus fuji, " the wistaria " (hard), but Fuji, "Fusiyama" (soft). The Tokyo pronunciation ignores this delicate distinction, and has English j (but just a trifle softer) for both alike.
THE NIGORI. 21
Surds. Sonants,
k into g.
t „ d.
N. B. F and H are almost certainly corruptions of an earlier/, the surd naturally corresponding to the sonant b.
The broad law governing the use of the nigori is that the initial surd (cA, shy /, h, k, s, ^5, or t) of an in- dependent word, — especially of a noun, — changes into the corresponding sonant (j, 6, g, z, or d) when the word is used as the second member of a compound. The law affects, n^t native words itoly, but likewise those borrowed from the Chinese, thus : —
rydri-iayUy ** an eating-house ; '* from ryori, ** cookery,"
and chaya, ** a tea-house." shima-iima, ** various islands;" from shfwa, "an is- land," repeated. yane-hune, ** a house-boat ; " from>'a«^, ** a roof," and
funCy "a vessel." hi'hachi, ** a brazier;" from /if, fire," and hachiy "a
pot." ki-gacj "a change of clothes; " from the indefinite forms
of the verbs kiru, ** to wear," and ImaerUf ** to
change." kaku-zatOj " loaf sugar ; " from kaku, *' an angle," and
satOf ** sugar."
* In the Western provinces (following ancient usage), the nigori of s is Zj while the nigori of ts is dz ; thus mizuj "not seeing," but midzu^ "water." In Tokyo these two sounds are confounded, both being alike prononced as dz, Conf. the end of % 24.
aa PRONUNCIATION AND LETTER-CHANGES.
tsuki-zue, ** the end of the month; " {romtsnki, "moon," "month," and sue, "end."
kwan-zume^ "tinned (provisions);" from kwan, a Chin- ese word meaning a "jar" or "gallipot," but not used, alone in Japanese, and the indefinite form of the verb tBumeru, " to pack."
6rai-dome, "no thoroughfare;" from orai^ "a thoroughfare," and the indefinite form of the verb tomerUy " to stop" (trans.).
H 2g. A rider to the above law is that/ and h in Chinese compounds sometimes change, not into b, but into p. This is called the han-nigori or "half-muddling." Thus — to take somewhat high-flown instances — jum-'pu, " a fair wind ; " from jw«, " to accord," and ftl, "wind." (These monosyllables are not used in- dependently in Japanese.) tetn-'pen, " a sign in the heavens ; " from ten, "heaven," and hen, " change.'' IF 30. In some words of native origin, the Tokyo people, led by the same love of reduplication which makes them say minna for mina, "all," tokkuri iov tokuri, "a bottle," etc. (see IF. 25), turn the letter h, which it would not be easy to double, into what appears to them to be the nearest approach to hh, viz, pp ; thus : yappari, for yahari, " also." yoppodoy ,, yohodo, " a lot," " very."
N.B. Perhaps it might be more correct to view this phenomenon as a relic of the old pronunciation of h as /. Conf. the N.B. near the top of ^. 21.
IT 31. The law regulating the use of the nigori is by no means an absolute one, euphony and sometimes the varying caprice of individuals deciding in each case
LESSER LETTER-CHANGES. 43
whether the change shall or shall not take place. Thus o, "great," and saka, ** a hill," compounded to form the name of a large town in Central Japan, may be pro- nounced either Ozaka or Osaka (never Osdrkur, as Englishmen are apt to say). F and A, however, always change either into b or into />, if the first member of the compound ends in a nasal consonant. Thus it would be inadmissible to say jum-/u for jum-pu.
It is considered harsh to have many 7iigori*ed letters in one word. Hence kaza-kamiy " windward," never kaza-gami, and similarly in innumerable like instances. Observe, too, that no nigorV ed letter is ever doubled.
IF 32. As shown by the examples of jum-pu and tem-peny n
changes to tn before a labial. To give another instance :
tem-mon-gaku" " astrology " ** astronomy ; " from ten,
" heaven ; " tnon, ** markings or letters " (not used alone) ;
and gakUy "science."
IT 33. Less important than the nigori affecting initial con- sonants, is a change which affects the final vowels in certain native Japanese words of one syllable and two syllables. In this class of words, e final often changes to a, when the word is used as the first member of a compound,* thus :
kazsk-kami, " windward ; '* from kaze, "wind," and kami,
"above." sak^k-yuy "a grog-shop;" from sake, " rice-beer," and
ya, " a house."
* Strictly speaking, it is a which is weakened into ^, a study of the older language showing that the forms in a are almost certainly the original ones. We state the rule as in the text simply for practical convenience.
24 PRONUNCIATION AND LETTER-CHANGES.
tQ,motsitf ** to keep ; " from ^e, " the hand," and motsu, to
hold." uw9k-gi, "an over-coat;" from t*e, ** top," and the in- definite form of kirUf " to put on," ** to wear." As an irregular member of the same class may be mentioned shira for shiroy the stem of the adjective shi- roi, "white," in such compounds as shirdk-gikti, " a white chrysanthemum." (fire^w = " chry- santhemum.") shirK-ga, *' white hair." {Ga here stands for ke, " hair." The language offers no other instance of so anoma- lous a change.) IT 34. All the Japanese consonants do not admit of being sounded before all the five Japanese vowels. F only occurs before the vowel w, the other four vowels taking h instead. S is replaced by sh, and z by j, before the vowel i, T is replaced by ch^ and d by j, before the vowel i ; t is replaced by <s, and d by z, before the vowel u. W occurs only before the vowel a ; y only before the vowels a, 0 and m. The only exceptions, according to the orthography adopted in this work, are those offered by the postpositions wo and j^. Compare, however, IF 14.
N. B. The phenomena mentioned in this paragraph seem to be of comparatively modern growth, though they can be traced back some three centuries. The archaic form of the language probably had only/ (or rather p), 5, and ^ but no 6, A, 5^,7, ch^ is or z.
To the practical student the peculiarity above noted is interesting only in so far as it affects the conjugation of verbs. He is therefore referred to Chapter VIII, I1 235 et, seq. It may, however, be worth while to instance in passing the strange alterations introduced into borrowed European words by this inability of the Japanese to
EUROPEAN y/GBLDS.
25
pronounce certain consonants before certain vowels, by their further inability to pronounce combinations of con- sonants or any final consonant except w, and by the absence from their language of some of the commonest European sounds, such as I and v. Hence such metamorphoses as the following : —
berumottOf from " ver- mouth."
chi/usu, from the Ger- man pronunciation of ** typhus."
garasu, from " glass." hoko, „ " fork." Igirisu, „ " English." kame, from " come here."
(Dogs^ of European race are so styled, because their masters constant- ly call out "come herel" to them.)
kara, from " collar."
kasuteirUy from " Castilla."
(Sponge-cake is so called, because introduced by the Spaniards.)
koppu, from the Dutch kop, "a cup," but used to signify " a glass."
penshirUy from ** pencil." rampu, „ **lamp."
ramune, „ " lemonade." shafsuy • „ " shirt." zentorumen, „ " gentlemen.'
There are also some quite anomalous cases, such as penkif from " paint," where we should have expected peinto, IF 35. Finally certain contractions are brought about by euphony and the desire for speedy elocution. Such are ip-pun for ichi fun, " one minute ; " jis-so, for ju so, " ten vessels." For these the student is referred to the Chapter on Numerals, ^ 153, as it is in the case of the numerals that these contractions most frequently occur, and that it is most necessary to commit them to memory.
CHAPTER III.
The Noun.
NUMBER AND GENDER.
H 36. The noun is indeclinable, distinctions of number and gender being left to be gathered from the context, and case relations being, as in English, indicated by separate words, which are, however, " postpositions," not preposi- tions. Thus
Uma /fti noru
lit, horge 4m ride
may mean, according to circumstances, to ride on one
horse or on several horses, on one mare or on several
mares.
Hito ga kimashtta
lit, per§p» {nominative particle) hm$-e0me
may mean either that one person has come, or that several people have come. Similarly the word yama may designate one mountain or many mountains, it being properly rather a kind of collective noun, like the German ** das Gebirg."
IF 37. In the extremely rare cases in which it is absolutely indispensable to mention the sex of an animal, this can be done by the use of the prefixes o, ** male," and me^ "female," the resulting compound being sometimes slightly modified by euphony. Thus :
ushiy ** any bovine animal."
O'Ushi, "a bull," **an ox."
me-tiskiy " a cow."
iima, **any equine animal."
|
GENDER. |
|
|
omma, |
•*a horse." |
|
memma^ |
"a mare." |
|
tori, |
"a bird/* "a fowl." |
|
ondorif |
"a cock." |
27
mendori, "a hen."^
The words 0/0^0, " man," and osu, " male ; " onna, " woman," and m^sw, ** female," subserve the same pur- pose, thus :
ko, <*a child ;"o^o^o no koy " a boy ;" o«na «o ko, ** a girl."
•MAM *M ehiid mmmaM. '« ehiid
osunoinu, l.^dog;" iuu, " any canine animal ; " ■ ^^^ ^^ ^^f' ^
,mw «o mesuy) Such a phrase as
V Osu desu ka, mesu desk ka ? \ " Is it a male or a •««#« o f femate u ? (female ? "
may mean " Is it a horse or a mare ?" ** Is it a gander or a goose?" "Is it a he or a she-ass ?" etc., etc., ac- cording to circumstances. The words osu and mesu are never applied to human beings, whereas the words otoko and onna are applied indifferently to human beings and to other living creatures.
IT 38. In a very few cases, chiefly the names of the degrees of relationship, the sexes are distinguished by the use of different words, thus :
chichi, "father;" haha, "mother."
otottsan, " papa ; " okkasan,*^ mamma."
ojiisan, "grandpapa," obdsan, "grandmamma,"
" an old gentleman ; " "an old lady."
oji, " uncle ; " aba, " aunt."
28 THE NOUN.
anif ** elder brother ; " anCt ** elder sister." ototo, " younger brother ; " imoto, " younger sister."
^ 39' What we call the singular number is occasionally indicated by the use of the word hitotsu ov4chiy " one," thus :
hako hitotsu J " one box."
^ ichi-netiy " one year."
H 40. The idea of plurality, universality, or variety is oc- casionally indicated by doubling the word, thus : ho-hoy ** everywhere ; " from ho, ** a side." iro-iro, "all sorts;" from irOy " a sort " (properly
" a colour "). kuni-gunif "various countries ;" from kunij "a country." tokorO'dokoro, **many places," **here and there;" from tokorOy "a place."
As exemplified in these words, the second member of such compounds almost always takes the nigori, when it begins with a consonant capable of so doing.
IF 41. Another method of expressing plurality is by agglu- tinating certain particles, viz. gafUy tachiy shu (often pro- nounced shi)y domOy and ra, to the end of the word, thus : okusama-gafay "ladies;" from okusama, "a lady,"
" my lady." shikwan-tachiy "officials;" „ shikwatty " an official." onna-shUy "women;" ,, o««a, " a woman."
onna-domo, " women ; " ,, onnay " a woman." kuruma-ya-ray "jinrikisha-men; " irom ^^ kuruma-y a y
"a jinrikisha-man." The order in which the foregoing particles and examples are given is that of a gradually decreasing politeness. There is, indeed, no great difference between gata and
NUMBER. ag
tcu^ki, but both are decidedly more polite than the three that follow them. Onna-shu may be used in speaking of the female attendants of another ; onna-domo is better in speaking of the female attendants in one's own house- hold. The suffix ra is decidedly contemptuous.
H 42. Numerous as are the above p^irticles, the idea of plurality is not always very clearly expressed even by their help. Thus, whereas ko may mean ** children*' as well as ** child," the ostensibly plural form ko-domo may mean "child" as well as "children." In this particular instance, but scarcely in any others, we may, in order to get an undoubted plural, superadd one suffix to another, and say ko-domo-ra or ko-domo-shUy " children."
IT 43. We may also (chiefly in vocables borrowed from the . Chinese) prefix certain words in order to obtain a sort of plural ; thus : ban-koku, ** all countries," ** international ; " from 6a«,
"ten thousand," and koku, "a country." sho-kun, " gentlemen ; " from shOj " all," and kuftt
"prince," "Mr." su-nen, " many years ; " from sii, " number," and nen, "a year."
N. B. None of the Chinese words here given — ban^ koku^ sho, etc. — can be used alone. They occur only in compounds. ■ \
H 44. But though the ways of indicating sex and number are thus various, it cannot be sufficiently borne in mind that they are all more or less exceptional, and are scarce- ly found except in a comparatively small number of cases which are sanctioned by usage. Distinctions of sex and even of number are not dwelt on at every moment by the Japanese, as they are by the European, mind.
30 THE NOUN.
COMPOUND NOUNS.
IF 45. Compound nouns are very numerous and can be form- ed at will. They generally consist either of two nouns, or of a noun preceded or followed by the stem of an adjective or by the ** indefinite form*' (see H 221, and II 241) of a verb. As the indefinite forms of verbs are themselves constantly used as nouns, two such forms may combine to constitute a compound noun, or else one of them may be preceded by a noun or by an adjective stem for the same purpose. The following are specimens of the various sorts of compound nouns : — furO'ha, "a bath-room ; " iromfuro, " a bath," and ba
(used only in composition), " a place.** te-bukuro, ** gloves ; *' from te, " the hand,'* and fukuro,
"a bag.'* tetsudo'basha, " a street-car ; '* from tetsudo, ** a rail- way," and basha, **a carriage."
kuro-megane, " black goggles ; " from kuroi, ** black," and meganCf ** spectacles." (Megane is itself a compound of me, "eye," and kane, "metal.")
to-tnegane, " a telescope ; " from toi, " far," and megane, ** spectacles."
me-kurUf " a blind person," lit. " dark of eyes ; " from me, " the eye," and kurai, " dark.'*
kai-mono, " a purchase," " shopping; " from kau, " to
buy," and mono, *• a thing." kake-mono, "a hanging scroll," from kakeru, "to
hang" (trans.), and mono, " a thing." yake-do, " a burn ; '* from yakeru, " to burn *' (intrans.),
and to (for tokoro), " a place."
COMPOUND UOUNS. 3I
ki'Chigaiy " a lunatic ; " from ki, ** spirit," and chigaUy
** to differ." mono-okif **an out-house ; " from monoy ** a thing,*' and
oku, "to put,'*
te-nugui, «a towel ; " from te, " the hand," and nuguu^ "to wipe."
haki-dame, "a dust heap;" from haku, " to sweep," and tameru, " to collect together" (trans.).
hiki-dashiy "a drawer ; " from hiku, " to pull," and dasu, " to take out."
make-oshimi^ "reasons trumped up to excuse one's own failure " (as by the fox in the fable, who said that " the grapes were sour ") ; from makeru, " to be defeated," and oshimu, " to regret."
naga-iki, " longevity," from nagai, " long," and ikiru, " to live."
N. B. Observe the tendency of the second member of the com- pound to take the nigori (Conf. IT 28.)
ir 46. The forms indicating gender and some of those in- dicating number are really compounds, as will be seen by reference to If 37 and II 43. So are the augmentatives formed by prefixing 0, the root of okii, " big," and the diminutives formed by prefixing ko^ " child " (very rarely Of "small "), thus:
baka, " a fool ; " d-baka, " a great fool." ishif " a stone ; " ko-ishi, " a pebble." nezumij " a rat ; " o-nezumi, " a large rat ; "
ko-nezumi, " a small rat," " a mouse."
N. B. The names of the young of animals are formed by means of kOj not by prefixing it as a particle, but by using it as a separate word, thus:
32 THE NOUN.
mukade no ko^ \ . , .,
lit. eenHpede ', eMM,\ *' ^ y®""^ centipede."
^ 47. Sometimes, however, the two members of the com- pound are co-ordinated, thus : tsuki-hi, " months (and) days."
so-moku, ** herbs (and) trees..'* (This is a Chinese com- pound, the component parts of which are not used alone.) But though they are closely joined in pronunciation, there would be no harm in considering these as separate words, and in so writing them, especially if they are native Japanese terms, thus :
ani ototOy ** elder brother (and) younger brother," i.e., " brothers." ane imotOy "elder sister (and) younger sister," i.e., "^ ** sisters."
umi kawa, " (the) sea (and the) rivers."
hi tsuki hoshiy **(the) sun, moon, (and) stars."
IT 48. Such co-ordination sometimes assumes a peculiar form, which has been aptly jatamed "the synthesis of contradictories," because from two terms of opposite signification there> results a third abstract term giving the mean of the two, thus :
en-kiuy " far-near," i.e., " distance."
kan-datiy "cold-heat," i.e., "temperature."
nati'jiyoy " man-woman," i.e., " sex." sei'Suiy "prosperity-decline," i.e., " the ups and downs," " the fortunes," of a family, kingdom, &c.
The above are Chinese vocables. As Japanese examples,
though not nouns, we may take
PECULIARITIES OF COMPOUNDS. 33
. Yv M /
y aru^nashi, ** is-isnV' i-e., "the question of the ex- istence of a thing.'* yoshi-ashiy " good-bad," i.e., " quality," " degree of
excellence." The use of these convenient expressions, which is bor- rowed from Chinese graminar, is chiefly confined to per- sons of education.
^ 49. The student should note the difference in construction between genuine native compounds and those borrowed . from the Chinese, when one member of the compound is a verb governing the other. In genuine Japanese com- pounds the verb comes last, as in English, tlrus :
hara-kiri, "belly-cutting," the old form of legalised suicide. /
^awi-AasaAwe, "hair-cutting." (//a5awM=" to cut with scissors.")
In Chinese compounds, on the contrary, the verb comes • first. Take, for instance, the elegant Chinese synonyms for hara-kiri and kami-hasami, which are preferred by cultured speakers, viz. sep-pukuy from setsu, "to cut," and/fi^M, "belly." zani'patsuy ,, zatiy " to cut," „ /la/sM, " hair." N. B. Hyphens need not be used so freely as we, for etymological purposes, have here done. A hyphen is, however, indispensable be- tween the two members of such compounds as gen-an, ** the draft of a document," where a final n is followed by an initial vowel. In such examples as genan (from ge and »a«), " a man-servant," the hyphen should be omitted. The distinction between such pairs of words as gen-an and genan is strongly marked in pronunciation.
COMPOSITION A GREAT FACTOR IN WORD-BUILDING.
H 50. The student interested in etymology will gradually
34 THE NOUN.
discover that almost all long Japanese words and many short ones are really compounds, though their composite origin is often forgotten even by the Japanese themselves. Thus ntichi, ** a road," is from mi, an honorific prefix, and chi, the original word for " road." Mikado, " the Imperial Court," hence " the Emperor," is from the same mi, and kado, ** a gate*' (compare the " Sublime Porte " of Turkey). Yane ** a roof," is from 7a, the original word for house (which we also find in yashiki, " a mansion ; kutsu- ya, ** a boot-maker's shop," etc.), and mune, " the breast," hence ^* the ridge of a roof." Kagami, ** a mirror," is from kage, " shadow," " reflection," and miru, " to see." Place-names are almost always compounds that can be easily resolved into their constituent elements, as Yoko- hama, " cross strand ; " E-do (Yedo), ** inlet door ; " Ara- kawa, ** rough river ; " 0-shima, ** big island ; Fuji-san, " Fuji mountain," ** Fusiyama " (the etymology of Fuji is obscure, but probably the name is of Aino origin) ; Mi- ya^-fio^'ShUa,^ ** below^ of * Shint6-shrine\" i.e. ** beneath the shrine ; " E^-no^-shima^, " island^ of^ inlet^" Simi- larly in the case of surnames, most of which are of geo- graphical origin, being borrowed from the names of the lo- calities where the persons who first assumed them resided, thus Ko-bayashi, ** small forest ;" P-no^-ue^, " above^ of* (the) welP; " ra'-Ma^a% ** among' (the) rice-fields^;" Ya- ma-da, ^* mountain rice-field," etc. Men's personal names, answering to our Christian names, are also nearly always compounds. Unfortunately few of these personal names can be translated, founded, as they are, on allusions to texts in the Chinese Classics, to feudal functions now obsolete, to cyclical signs, and to other difficult matters. Such names as Ta-ro, "big male," i.e., "eldest son;"
WORD-BUILDING. 35
jfi-ro, " second son ; '* Saburo (for San-ro) ** third son," etc., are sufficiently clear.
N.B. For women's personal names, see IT 41^8. All Chinese words of more than one character are com- pounds, e.g. chawan, " a tea-cup," from cha, ** tea," and wan, ** a bowl ; " senddy ** a boatman," properly ** the master of a junk," from sen, "junk," "vessel," and ^0 (wf^ori'ed to do), "head," "chief;" Tokyo from to, " east," and kyo, " capital city," etc., etc. ^51. As shown in the foregoing examples oimichi, " road," and Mikado, " Emperor," honorific prefixes sometimes enter into the actual formation of words. Generally, however, they are felt to be distinct entities, and are therefore written separately, as • 0 cha, lit. " honourable tea," i.e., "tea."
go mottomo, lit. " augustly right," i.e., "you are quite right."
0 mi ashi, lit. " honourable august feet," i.e., " your feet."
For further information concerning the honorifics, which form so important and all-pervading an element of Japanese speech, see Chapter XI.
VARIOUS KINDS OF NOUNS.
I1 52. Abstract nouns expressing degree as well as quality are often derived from adjective stems by agglutinating the syllable sa, thus :
atsusa, " heat," " the degree of heat."
omoshirosa, " fun," " interest," " the degree of fun."
samusa, " cold," " the degree of cold." .
shirosa, "whiteness, "the degree of whiteness."
36 THE NOUN.
A tinge or soupgon of a quality, hence sometimes the actual quality itself, and even the object possessing the quality, may be denoted by the termination mi agglutinat- ed to an adjective stem, thus : akamiy - "a tinge of red." omoshiromiy " (a certain amount of) fun." shiromi, " a tinge of white," " the white of an egg.''
Atnami ga usu\
SweeiMeMM (nom.) ihin
gozaimasu,
It isn't quite sweet enough."
H 53. These nouns in sa and mi must be distinguished from
the periphrasis formed by means of an adjective or verb
and the word koto, <* (an abstract) thing," ** a fact," "an
act," " a state," as
atsui koto, " heat," ** the fact of being hot."
kitanai koto, ** dirtiness," ** the fact that something is
dirty."
shiroi koto, ** whiteness," ** the fact that something is
white."
machigatta koto, j**a mistake," ** the fact that some lit, miBiooh things (one has made a mistake."
shimpo sum koto, f ** progress " (the noun) ; also ** to
lit. progreak maUea thing, (progress " (the verb).
on wo shiranai koto, ] ,, :^^^^.u^a^ m
lit. UiHdueBB (accus. particle) ignore* thing, ] i"grdututic.
In speaking of the blade of a fine sword, one might say :
Sono kissaki no surudoi koto,\
lU point U aharp aiate, << So sharp is its
sono yaki no uruwashii koto,
itM anneaiing *§ heautifni state,
hito-me mite mo sugu samusa mnemeye seeing even, at^onee coldnesg WO oboeru kurai da. (accus.) feel amount is.
point, so fine its ^ edge, that the merest glance at it gives you a shiver."
KOTO AND MONO. J7
These periphrases in koto are often used exclamatorily, ' thus :
Atsiii koto ! " Oh ! how hot it is ! " Kusai koto ! " Oh ! what a horrid smell ! '*
IF 54. Parallel to the abstract nouns in koto^avQ concrete nouns in mono. While koto denotes " a thing of the mind," ** a fact," "an act,*' 7nono denotes a tangible, material thing or person, thus :
lit^e^ltTnTiM.,, ] "a b^^ Pl^ce," " an abscess."
kusai mono, " a smelly thing.*' shiroi mono, ** a white thing. shojiki-mono, ** an honest fellow."
This distinction between koto, *« an abstract thing," and mono, **a material thing," must be clearly kept in mind, if the student would avoid constant misapprehension. Thus onaji mono means ** the same thing," ** the identi- cal article," whereas onaji koto means **the same sort of thing," — the quality, pattern, etc., being the same, but the actual article a different one. For mono wo at the end of a sentence, see 1i 287.
Mono no, or to wa iu mono no, has a very curious use, whose origin is unknown, but which may most easily be parsed by assuming no to stand for nagara, " while,'* " whereas : " —
Rikutsu de wa ko iu mono v
Theortf #m indeed, thuB Bay thing *^ That is all very fine
no, jissai wa yohodo I in theory, but it is
tehereaBi practice UB' for, very [mighty hard in praC-
muzukashii. tice."
dimenti (is). I
38 THE NOUN.
Baku da to wa iu mono\
foot iB that iudeed^ay tMug
no, shkoshi no yd ni
triitfle, tittle *§ hn»iwe»» iu
wa ma ni aimasu.
indeed^ apace itt e^nfonmM,
**Fool as he is, he is capable of making him- "self useful in minor matters."
IT 55. The names of shops are denoted by the termination ya, " house/' as :
kon-ya, ** a book-store ; " from hon, ** a book." niku-ya ** a butcher's shop ; " from nikUf ** flesh." pan-ya, ** a bakery , " from pan, ** bread."
Kame-ya, lit. ** tortoise house" (or, as we might say, ** To the Sign of the Tortoise "), the name of a grocery in T5ky6 well-known to foreign residents.
Owing to the general Japanese habit of naming persons after places, such words as the above come to denote, not only the "book-store," the "butcher's shop," and the " bakery," but by extension the " bookseller," the " but- cher," and the "baker" themselves. Sometimes indeed the person only, and not the place, is thus designated,
as:
kuruma-ya, " a jinrikisha-man "
shimhun-ya, " a newspaper man."
H 56. Names of trees and plants often terminate in ki, " tree," or in its nigorVcd form gi, thus :
hagi, " the lespedeza." mugi, " wheat, " bar-
ley."
stigi, " the crypto- meria."
siisiiki, " the eulalia " (a kind of tall grass).
tsuhaki, "the camellia- tree."
yanagij "the willow- tree."
Names of rivers end in kawa (generally nigorVed to gawa), " river ; " names of stretches of sea in nada ; those
AIDA, HA2U, TOKI.
39
of islands in shima (often nigorVed to jima); those of mountains inyama or san {zan)f thus :
Okawa, lit. " Great River." Sumida-gaway ** the River
Sumida." Bungo-nada, the stretch of sea near the province of Bungo, separating the islands of Kyushu and ShTkoku.
Kojitna, lit, " Small Is- land," a name common
to several islands off the Japanese coast.
Ogasa war a -jima , * * the Bonin Islands;" named Ogasawara after their discoverer,
Asama-yamay ** Mount Asama."
Bandai'Zan, Bandai,''
" Mount
1^57. The nouns aida, ** interval;" hazu, "necessity;" toki, "time ; " and tokorOy " place," often assume, gram- matical functions perplexing to the beginner. Aida comes to correspond to our conjunction "while," hazu to our verbs " ought " or "should," ioki to our conjunction "v^rhen," thus:
So S0
suru
aida.
{ " While we were do- ling so."
Mo hum hazu da,
^iremdgf emamea ueeeaaiiy ia»
{byt
He ought to be here this time."
Areba, jiki ni kiku\
Wr-ihere^ere, immediaietv hear) a jf anything of that
hazu da ,£^'-^«^ff/^'»^lkind had happened, I koto wo kiki^sen. should have heard of it.
fa€i (accus,) (I)hear'Mot, J
N. B. Observe the suppressed negative which hazu sAmost always implies. Observe, too, that kaztt is often strengthened by a preceding beki, "should," "ought," thus : Areba, jiki ni kiku-beki hazu da ga, etc. (Conf. IF 178 and IF 192.)
40 THE NOUN.
Nochi nif yd no nai tokiy\ a j ^jj] ^gj] yQ^
To^i ni at the beginning of a sentence is a sort of ex- pletive corresponding more or less to our " by the way."
IT 58. More difficult than any of the above are the uses of tokoro, which, from the original concrete sense of ** place," has come to be used in various abstract meanings. Sometimes, like koto, it assumes the signification of ** a thing of the mind," " a matter," " a subject," " a quality," as in the following example :
\ ** Coming now to the matter of wages,
Kyukin no tokoro wa, tsuki ni
l^age *s tmaiier at' for 9 tnonikiu,
ju-efi tsukawashimasho.
ieiP-Omllmrt (I) ufill^robablygiife.
I may say that I will give you ten dollars a month."
A good instance of tokoro, as equivalent to our suffix
" ness" used to form abstract substantives, occurs
at the end of H 280.
In the middle of a sentence, tokoro, especially when followed by ye, is apt to assume the force of some such conjunction as "while," ** whereupon," "when," **just as," thus :
Chodo deru tokoro ye, kyaku
Bxaetly ga^ni tvheu, gueai
ga mieta, (nom.) appeared.
" A visitor came just as I was on the point of going out."
Tokoro ga implies opposition, thus :
Ima-jibun irasshtta tokoro ga,
JTowP'Ome deigneO-iO'go even-if^
o msu desho.
hoH0Hrakiff abtCMi tPiil^robabiffke,
" Even if you do go now, you are not likely to find him at home."
TOKORO.
41
Similarly at the beginning of a sentence, where tokoro ga means " nevertheless," " still," ** all the same," some- times " it occurs to me that," while tokoro de means "thereupon" or " and so." Another grammatical use of tokoro is that in which it corresponds to some extent to the relative pronouns of European languages, as explained in II 86.
TnkoiPO is often, in familiar talk, nigori'ed to dokoro, and then expresses an almost scornfully strong degree of affirmation. For instance, a male visitor hazards the remark that his hostess's baby is old enough to creep abng the floor. The fond mother, indignant at having her offspring's powers rated so low, retorts :
Hau dokoro ja nai ; yoku Creep place i»H*tf wtell
arukimasii, (he) wtafkM.
" It is no case of creeping, I can assure you. Why! he walks beautifully."
Similarly :
Yomeru dokoro ka ? kdshaku\ n Able to read in- Mie^io^ead place f '«*'"'« I deed ! Why! he de-
l livers lectures. "
mo dekimasu, er€M eveuinaieBi
IT 59. Many nouns are simply the indefinite forms of verbs used substantively, somewhat like our English nouns in ing, such as ** the beginning," which is properly a part of the verb " to begin." Here are a few examples :
akinai, ** trade ; " from akinau, " to trade."
hori, " a canal ; " „ horu,
tatamif **amat; " ,, tatamu,
tsure, ** companions; " „ tsurerUy
warai, "laughter;" ,, warau.
** to excavate." " to pile up." "to take with one." "to laugh."
yorokobi, **joy ; "
„ yorokobUf*^ to rejoice."
42 THE NOUN.
NOUNS USED AS ADJECTIVES.
11 60. The Japanese parts of speech do not exactly coincide with ours (see I19), and nouns are much more extensiyely used in this language than in English. We shall see in the next chapter that the so-called pronouns are really nouns. True adjectives also are scarce, and are frequent- ly replaced by nouns, just as in English we say *' a gold chain," ** a sw^ar-plum," ** the Paris fashions,'* ** a thing of beauty,'' The chief ways in which a noun may do duty for an adjective are :
li^ 61. I. As first member of a compound, thus:
Ajnerika-jin, lit. " America person," i.e., " an American."
doro-ashiy ,, " mud feet,** „ ** muddy feet.**
Nihon-gOy ,, ** Japan words,** ,, "the Japanese
language.'*
H 62. II. Followed by the postposition ^^^ "of,** — the order of the words, it should be noted, being the reverse of that followed in English, thus :
atari^ no^ keishoku,^ lit. " scenery^ of* neighbourhood*, i.e., " the surrounding scenery.*'
kinjo no tobutsu-ya, lit. " Chinese-thing-shop of neigh- bourhood,'* i.e., " a neighbouring general shop."
mukashi no htto, lit. "people of antiquity," i.e., "the ancients." I1 63. III. Followed by the word na, which is a fragment of the present tense of the classical verb nam, "to be,** thus :
baka^ na^ yatsu^, " a foolish' (being*) fellow\'* choho na kikai, " a convenient machine.'* heta na e-kaki, " an unskilful painter."
NOUNS USED AS ADJECTIVES AND ADVERBS. 43
jozu na e-kaki, ** a skilful painter.*' kirei na musu7ne, ** a pretty girl." odayaka na nami, ** a calm sea *' (lit. ** calm waves"). Some of these words — kirei, for instance, — are so con- stantly used as adjectives, that their proper sense as nouns tends to pass out of remembrance. In the cases where it is preserved, the word takes «o after it when it is used as a noun, and na when it is used as an adjective, thus :
Heta^ no^ naga^-dangi^y ** The long' speech* of ^ an unskilful* (speaker)," a proverb signifying that bad speakers are apt to say more than the occasion requires.
y Heta^ na^'isha^ sama^, lit. " unskilful* physician^ Mr*., i.e. " an unskilful doctor." (yozu J:? corresponds almost literally to the English " a good hand at," and heta T¥ to " a bad hand at.") N. B. Conf. also If 197.
NOUNS USED AS ADVERBS.
IT 64. When followed by the postposition ni, ** in," or de, ** by," nouns such as those above instanced often cor- respond to European adverbs, thus ; baka ni, ** foolishly." gwaikoku ni.Qx.de, ** abroad" {gwaikoku=:^^outtt
countries," i.e., ^* foreign countries"). jozu 4if, ** skilfully." Sometimes they are taken adverbially, even though no postposition be suffixed, thus :
konnichi, ** this day," or ** to-day." mukashiy "antiquity," „ << anciently," "formerly." For nouns used as postpositions see H 141 et seq.
CHAPTER IV.
The Pronoun.
PERSONAL PRONOUNS.
1i 65. The Japanese words corresponding to the personal pronouns of European languages are simply nouns whose original significations are quite clear, and which are in- deed still often used with those significations. Except for the sake of convenience to foreign students, it would not be necessary to discuss them apart from nouns in general. They belong to the category of such descriptive expressions as ** your humble servant," " your ladyship," ** His Majesty." Self-depreciatory terms are naturally preferred in speaking of oneself (ist. person), and compli- mentary terms in speaking to or of other people (2nd. and 3rd. persons).
IT 66. The most usual equivalent for ** I " is watakushif lit. " selfishness." The vulgar often contract it to watashi and washi. Other nouns now current in the same sense are boku, ** servant," which is much affected by young men in familiarly addressing each other ; sessha, " the awkward person ; " shoseiy ** junior." Ore is a very vulgar corruption of ware, which is the commonest word for *' I " in the Written Language. Ora, which may often be heard from the mouths of coolies, is for ore wa.
It 67. The following equivalents for **you " are all in com- mon use : — Anata, a contraction oiano kata, *' that side," " beyond " (which meaning is still retained in poetr}', as kumo no anata, "beyond the clouds "). Anata is a polite
PERSONAL PRONOUNS. 45
expression ; with the addition of samUy ** Mr,'* ** Mrs," ** Miss," " Lord," " Lady," it is supremely polite. Omae, lit. ** honourably in front," was formerly polite, but is now only used in addressing inferiors, such as coolies, one's own servants, one's own children, etc. Omae san (san is short for sama) stands half-way between anaia and omae in politeness. It is much used by women. Sensei " senior," is used chiefly in addressing men or women of learning. Danna satp, " Mr. Master," is used by a ser- vant in addressing his master, and by inferiors generally. Kimi, ** prince," is chiefly used by young men in address- ing each other familiarly. Besides the above may be mentioned Heika, lit. *' beneath the steps of the throne," i.e. ** Your Majesty ; " Kakka ** beneath the council-cham- ber, " i.e. ** Your Excellency ; " sono ho, ** that side," the equivalent for " you " employed in the law-courts by legal oflicers ; kisama, an insulting term used in addressing an inferior with whom one is angry.
N. B. Etymologically khama means " exalted Sir ; " but, like many other words, it has fallen from its former high estate.
The word temae, lit. ** before the hand," is remarkable ; for it may be used either as a very humble and therefore polite equivalent for ** I," or as an insulting equivalent for "you." In the sense of "you," it formerly had the honorific o prefixed. The rude use of it came in through the dropping of the honorific.
H 68. Sensei f Danna san, Heika, and Kakka are as appro- priate for the third person (" he " or " she ") as for the second. Anata may also occasionally be heard in that sense. Much in use also for " he and " she " are awo hito, " that person," more politely ano o kata, lit. " that honourable side;" ano otoko, "that man ; " ano onna,
+6
THE PRONOUN.
** that woman ; " ano ojiisan, ** that old gentleman ; " ano obdsan, ** that old lady •/' etc. Muko^ lit. ** the other side/* i.e., **the other party," not infrequently represents ** he," "she," or "they." ArCy "that," is also sometimes • used for " he " and " she," but it is not at all polite, and more often refers to things, i.e., it means " it." The vague " 3'ou " or " one," which corresponds to the French on and German man, has no equivalent in Japanese. Thus " to clap one's hands " is simply te wo tataku, lit. " hands (accus.) clap." " You can't tell " (meaning " one has no means of knowing ") is simply shiremaseti, which might equally well stand for " / can't tell."
N.6. The word htto has been adduced by some as an equivalent off the French impersonal on. But it is not really so, as it always retains its proper sense of *' person," '* people," especially "o^A^r people."
IF 69. Like other nouns — indeed more frequently than other nouns — the so-called personal pronouns may take the plural suffixes mentioned on page 28. The following forms are sanctioned by usage :
watakHshi-domo boku-ra sessha-domo sessha-ra
oira (for ore-ra, very vulgar)
ano hito-tachi ano 0 kata-gata are-ra (rude)
"they.
anata-gata
omae- [san]gaia
omae- {san-'] tachi
sensei-gata
danna-shu
danna-gata
kimi'tachi
kisama-tachi
temae't{a)chi-ra
*you.
N. B. Observe, however, that ivatakushi-domo is often used for the singular, it being slightly humbler than watakushi. Oira, too, may be heard in the singular, the line between singular and plural, as already noticed in H 44, being less sharply drawn in Japanese than
PERSONAL PRONOUNS. 47
in European languages. Note, moreover, that the Japanese never use their words for "we," as we sometimes do ours, to signify " you and I." They only use them to signify "other people and I," or rather ♦• I and my fellows."
H 70. .Like other nouns, the so-called personal pronouns may be followed by postpositions. Thus, just as we say
ano ho no oya I u the parent of that child," .
that ekitd ofpatrewt^ ) '^ '
so also do we say
watakushi 710 oya, \** the parent of me," M •fj^artmi,] i,,e, " my parent."
omae no oya, ** the parent of you," i.e*., **your parent" (in addressing an inferior) ; ano htto no oya, ** the parent of that person," i.e. " his {or her) parent ;" etc.
Just as we say
i.e., *^He
treated that child very ibadly,"
Sono ko wo hidoi me ni awasemashita, What €hiM{accus.)har»h e^et to ean§ed»to'tme€t,
SO also may we say
Watakushi wo hidoi me ni ] " He treated me very awasemashita, j badly. "
There is, therefore, no such thing as a declension of pro- nouns or any special set of possessive pronouns.
ir 71. The chief thing to remember in connection with the Japanese nouns answering to our personal pronouns is the extremely rare use that is made of them. Except in cases of special emphasis or antithesis, the information concerning persons which is in European languages con- veyed by means of pronouns, is left to be gathered from the context. Thus the single word kaerimashita will mean ** I have come back," or ** he, she or they have come back," according to the previous drift of the conversation.
^8 THE PRONOUN.
Kore kara furo wo tsiikaimash6,]i.e,, **Will now
rtbis from, bath {accus.) wiii^nBe^ ) take a bath,"
naturally means **/ will now take my bath." For it is almost a matter of course that, in such personal things, each individual can speak only for himself. I can only, eat my own dinner, I probably only love my own country, and only work to support my own wife and children. To be, therefore, for ever reiterating and harping on the words **I," *<me," *< my," "you," "he," etc., seems to Japanese ears absurd and tedious tautology. A Japanese will often discourse for half-an-hour without using a single personal pronoun. The perpetual recurrence of watakushi and anata is one of the surest signs of a clumsy foreign speaker, who translates his own idiom into Japan- ese, instead of thinking impersonally as the Japanese do. These remarks will lead the intelligent student to observe that most of the examples scattered throughout the pre- sent work are susceptible of being variously rendered. Where, for instance, we have put " I," it would often be equally correct to insert " he," " she " or " they," in its stead. The use of " you," that is of the second person, in English generally necessitates some change in the Ja- panese phrase, especially if an equal or superior be ad- dressed. This point will be elucidated in the Chapter on Honorifics, IF 392 et seq., a chapter which the student would do well to read through in connection with what has here been said on the subject of personal pronouns.
REFLEXIVE PRONOUNS.
IT 72. The word " self" is expressed by jibun (less often by jishin), commonly followed by the postposition de, thus :
REFLEXIVE, DEMONSTRATIVE, ETC., PRONOUNS. 49
watakushi jibun, ) ,, j^ g^jf »
watakiishi jishin, i ^
omaejibun (not honorific), ) ,, gelf." go jtbun (honorific), ) -^
Another word for " self " is gnore^ which is also used as an insulting equivalent for " you."
Waga, a Classical form whose proper meaning is ** my," may still sometimes be heard in the sense of " my own," " our own,*' ** one's own," thus :
waga kuni, "my country," "one's country,'* "/a patrie.'' But its use is chiefly confined to set speeches and lectures. So is that of the phrase waga hai, " we," more lit. " my fellows."
DEMONSTRATIVE, INTERROGATIVE, AND INDEFINITE PRONOUNS AND ADVERBS.
H 73. The demonstrative, interrogative and indefinite pro- nouns, being marked by certain correspondences of sound and formation, may be best studied by means of the table which we give on the next page. The adverbs derived from the same roots are also given there, so that the learner may embrace all the kindred forms in one glance. He should note that Japanese, like Latin, distinguishes a nearer "that" {sore, Latin iste) from a further "that" {are, Latin ille), the former being used of things not very distant and of things connected with the person spoken to, while the latter is applied to things which are distant or have relation to the person spoken of. He must note furthermore that Japanese, like French, distinguishes substantive forms of these pronouns from adjective forms, e.g. kore^ " celui-ci,'' but" kono, " ceS'
5P
THE PRONOUN.
CO < •« — ' ■— c ■
J3 43
3 '-^
^ > ^ ^ ^
CO «-^
CO ^ -.
> S g - I - ^ -$ ^ ^
^ b '^ *^ "S *
►^ -W ,nj ctf ^ CO
2; 1< "S s rt '3 « o £ :2 ^ 5 S 5
w •-^.
< O
o
(^
H
*2
a .g ja ^ js nf S •« S « «
CO <
5 -^ -rr "o" rt ^ « ?, *- -a "t:
nil
5 5-
xn "S SJ rt "
fe 5
2 25;S'2SSS2
^ ^ ^ o o o J3 43 43
.•*« .■*5 ."S
S Q s J« ■*£ .>«e
IP o o »o o
■^ rfe ^ ^
« .2 o :
lO o o o o ^ rfe ja ^ *:
c S
^^O. ^ - ^ 43 ,
S
iS
8^ i§l§
. M
bb
CO .2 ^ g" bfl . .5
CQ ^ S C bfl ^
S
is
it ll
a ifc c
1-^ :
-§•§■
o ** -2 ''^
•*;*>■—'
a >>
•§-§-§
E o >, >»« o a a
to <d <B
^•^
s
5
DEMONSTRATIVE AND INTERROGATIVE PRONOUNS. 5 1
IF 75. Here are a few examples of the use of the substantive forms kore, **this;" sore^ "that" (near); are^ "that" (far) ; dore ? " which ? ** dare ? or more politely donata ? " who ? " ; nani ? " what ? "—
Kore wa omoshiroi. ii,e,f " As for this, it is amusing,'* Vhis aa-fm; amnting. \or more briefly^ " This is fun.'*
Sore wa^ nan desii ? j " What is that (which you have Vhat ms'for, mhai itfitjf 1^^ your hand, etc.) ? "
Are wa dare 710 uchi desii P {^' Whose is that house
IPhat aa-ror, ufko of hon»e U(ii)f |(over there) ?"
Dore ni shimasho ?)
Which shall I take?"
Nani wo sum ? ( " What are you doing ? "
V9»Mmi(ai:cus hart \ Oaf I (Said to an inferior. The polite equivalent ww^m§ \accus, part.) tto r y ^^^j^ ^ ^^^- ^saru ?)
Dare ga kimashUa ? f " Who has come ? "
--.. / _ °- . V _ a 1 {Donata ga fnatratemashtta ?
W»ho {nom. part) hat-eomef I would be mofe polite.)
IT 76. Here are some examples of the adjective forms kono, "this;" sono, "that" (near); ano, " that " (far) ; e/o«o ? " which ? " and of the forms in na and iu : —
Kono nedan. Konna nedan, Sono mama,
Sonna koto,) So iu koto.)
A no takai yama.
" This price." "This sort of price." ("That way."
i (E.g., the way you mention.)
"That sort of thing."
(" That high mountain 1 (over there)."
Anna tohojnonai kake-ne, f "Such an extravagant
rkat'like onirageona over-charge, \ price as that."
(Said in speaking to a third party. In addressing the shopkeeper who was guilty of the overcharge, one would say sonna^ not anna, because sonna corresponds to the second person, anna to^the third.)
Dono tsumori de?y< ^ith what intention ? "
52 THE PRONOUN.
Do iu tsumori de ? |"With what kind of Hmt «asr iHieniioH hyf \ intention ? "
IT 77. What we have here, for convenience' sake, termed adjective forms, are not adjectives properly so called. Kono was originally two words, viz. ko, **this " (substan- tive), and no, "of," so that kono meant ** of this." Similarly in the case of so«o, anOy and dono ?, which meant respec- tively " of that " (nearer) or ** of him," ** of that " (further) or " of him," and ** of which ? " Indeed they still preserve this their ancient sense in certain contexts, as :
sono tame, ** (for the) sake of that.*' sono oya, " his (or her) parent."
Konna^ " such," is a contraction of kono yd na, lit. " this manner being," i.e., ** being in this way," ** being thus." Similarly sonna is from sono yd wa, anna from ano yd na, and donna ? from dono yd na ? Kd iu, ** such," means literally ** thus (they) say," i.e. ** people call it thus." Sd iu, a iu, and dd iu ? have a similar etymology.
% 78. Before words of Chinese origin, the adjective-pronouns ** this " and " that " are often expressed by the syllable td CSr), a Chinese vocable properly signifying " the one in question," ** the actual one," as :
td-niny ** the person in question," " this {or that) person."
td'getsu no sw^,l<«the end of the month."
Some of the adverbs given in the paradigm on page 50 will be found exemplified in Chapter X, IF 368. IF 79. The indefinite pronouns are formed from the in- terrogative pronouns by the addition of the interrogative particle ka^ of the postpositions mo and de mo, " even,"
INDEFINITE PRONOUNS.
53
and of the emphatic particle jrc?. Thus dare^ de^ mo^^ "any body," "every body," is literally "even^ by* whom?*" Here are a few examples of the use of the indefinite pronouns :
O mocha ya nani ka, " Toys or something."
(The words nani ka here have the same vague meaningless application that " or something " often has in Colloquial English).
Mata donata ka miemashita. (Polite.)] " Somebody else
has come," or "Other guests have arrived."
,, dare ,, mieta, (Familiar.)
^gnim §aamebod§f ha§'apjp eared.
Nan de mo yoroshii kara, \ "Anything will do.
"'^Mpihimg (i5)go0a hecanae Just give US SOme-
nani ka tegarui mono ^^ |?^^"?or ^ther which
MomeihiMg-or^ther ea»y thing (accus.) \^^ Will take nO trouble
dashite kudasai,
puiiiug'forih coude§eeud.
to get ready."
(Said, for instance, by a hungry traveller arriving late at a hotel.)
Dochira ga yoroshiu pozaimasho ? , \i.- i i-i
WMeh{nom.) good «.*«^ri»*«*lir-*«f ^^ yOU thmk Will
Sore wa, dochira de mo yoroshii.
T7hai as-ror, either (is) good,
Donata ka o ide ni
Somehodtf'or^ther houonrmble exit to
natte orimasu ka ?
hmviug'b eeoame i» f
le, donata mo o ide ni natte orimasen.
"Which (of the two) do you be best ? "
"Oh! {sore TE^a) either will do quite well."
"Has some one arrived ? "
"No, no one has arrived."
(More lit. " Everybody has unarrived ". — Conf. II 433.)
Nan^ no^ sewa^ de^ mo^ shite^
kuremasu', lit, atveai
hetp^ of^ everythimg,^.^,^
doiHg^
"He will help you in every way."
54 THE PRONOUN.
• Dare^ mo^ s6^ iimasu*. "Everybody''* says*
RELATIVE PRONOUNS.
IF 80. The Japanese language has neither relative pronouns nor relative words of any kind. Their absence is general- ly made good by the use of a construction in which the verb is prefixed to the noun attributively, just as an adjec- tive might be. Thus the Japanese not only say *' a good man/' **a bad man," etc.; but they say "a comes man," ** a goes man," ** the went man," instead of ** a man who comes," '* a man who goes," ** the man who went." This is shown in the following examples : —
Kuru hiio. \
Coa»€» pertoM*
Kita hito.
Catne per torn.
** The person who comes."
{Or " The people who come.")
"The person who came."
{Or " The people who came.")
Kind kita hito. \ "The person (or persons) who
^egterday came pert^n. j Came yesterday.
Ano yama no zetcho ni haete iru oki na
OH growing it large
matsu,
pine.
"The large pine-tree which stands on the top of that mountain over there."
Shinakucha naran "It is a thing which it won't
^^ror^nouaoing.hecomet^i ^^ not tO do," i.^., "It is a
koto desu, ,. .
iMug{it)it. thmg which must be done."
11 81. As shown in the foregoing examples, the English relative and verb are represented in Japanese by a verb alone, which is used participially, or, as it is more usual to say in Japanese grammar, attributively, prefixed to the noun. In English this construction is allowable only in
RELATIVE PRONOUNS. 55
the case of participles, as " the shipwrecked sailors/' ** the shrieking women and children." In Japanese it is the actual tense-forms of the verb that are thus employed. Properly speaking, all the tenses are capable of being thus used attributively in relative constructions. In the Book Language they are all constantly so used. But the Colloquial exhibits a strong tendency to limit this way of speaking to the " certain past " and the " certain present or future," the merely ** probable " tenses (e.g. koyOj kitaro) being hardly ever now heard in such contexts. — Observe that, as the Japanese language, generally speaking, abhors the use of the passive, the verbs employed in relative sentences are almost always neuter or active ones, thus :
Hansen ni aimashita sui/u-ra, ( " The shipwrecked
Shipwrech to tnet §ailor§. jsailors."
Haruka oki ni mieru fune. ( " The vessel that is to •Mfar 0Mug in appear » ve§§€t, (be seen far away at sea."
Hepburn sensei no koshiraeta ( " The dictionary which MMepkwm weui^r 'M{he)prepared\y^2iS written by Dr. Hep-
jiten. i burn," i.e., " Dr. Hepburn's
Metiomary. (dictionary."
^^kichi to iu annai no mono.] " The guide called Oto-
LU. "thc€uiderfl»»ai»o»noHO, i.e. person Lkichi," Or " Otokichi the of Guidance ^ of whom people say (iu) that • •% n
ftoJheisOtokichi." J guide.
Arashi to iu mono. ] " What is called a
•typhoon," i.e. simply^ ** a typhoon."
Amerika to iu kuni. I • " T^^ •^"""Ijy P?°P'^ *=?" ^™«- (rica, I.e. simply, *' America.
N. B. This impersonal but active construction with to iu and other synonymous verbs, corresponding to the English passive, must be thoroughly mastered, as it is constantly in the mouths of the people. It is often used for making general assertions, such as
Lit. " the thing (mono) of which ^ople say (iu) that (to) it is a typhoon (arashi)."
56 THE PRONOUN.
"Dogs are faithful creatures/' or t Inn to iu mono wa^ chitgi no aru "The dog is a faithful creature." I mono desu.
Lit. As-for (wa) the thing (mono) of which people say (lu) that (to) it is a dog (inu), it is (desu) a thing ftnono) which is (aru) of (no) faithfulness (chugi). Here our single word " dog" or " dogs " is rendered by the five words inu to iu mono wa.
If 82. This use of the active where a European would expect the passive sometimes causes an appearance of ambiguity. Thus shiranai hito may signify either " a person who does not know " or "a person who is not known (to me)," i.e. " a person whom I do not know." But the context generally sufficiently indicates which way the phrase should be taken. For instance, yonde^ shimatta^ hon^ cannot possibly mean " the book which has finished reading," as such a collocation of words would have no sense. It can only mean ** the book^ which (I, they, etc.) have finished* reading^" Sumau^ tochi*- cannot mean **the locality* which resides*." It must mean " the locality* in which (so-and-so) ^esides^" The following are similar instances :
Tochaku shlta toki. f "The time when (I, they, ^rrivai aid time, ietc.) arrived."
Wakaranai koto, f " Something which I don't f^ WTrndertianthMot J thing. \ understand."
Te ni motteru mono, f " That which he is holding Maud in U'hoidiug thing, (in his hand."
IT 83. The example just given of sumau tochi, signifying " the locality in which so and so resides," exemplifies the remarkable Japanese idiom according to which the preposition that frequently accompanies an English rela- tive pronoun is always omitted, thus :
RELATIVE PRONOUNS WITH PREPOSITIONS.
57
Toji no furukii natta
Binding of old hat'keeoi
hon.
imel "A book of which the I binding has become old.
Sore^ wa^ anata^ ga^ saku^- nen^ o^ tomari^ nastta^ yado-
\ "Is" that* the hoteP" in which you' staid^***' (lit. honourably o, deign- ed nastta, to stay totnari) last' year^ ?"
" No, / did not stay there ; but (ga) it is the
le ; watakushi wa totna-
J^'0f u»€ ma- for, Miaif
rimasen ^a— , saku-nen
noi mfhereat—' laai-year
tomodachi ga tomarimashite, \ hotel in which a friend friemd {nom.) kao4§tg»ttm4d, j
taiso ni ki ni irimashita
greaiiy wpirii to entered
yadoya desu. Uoiei it*
of mine staid last year, and with which he was much pleased."
Dono yama kara kono\
Vn^ieh utonuiaiH froan, thia
hen no meibutsu
neighbourhood *a famouaHprodneiiou
no suisho wa demasu ka ?
'« ery§itU§ mffor, iatue t
** From which of these mountains come the crystals, /or which this locality is noted ?"
Watakushi ga Yokohama no
M (nom.) l^ohohauaa *g
ni-jU ban yetanomimashttara,
imeniw nnanber io mhenmhm^appiiedt
achira kara uke-atte
there from gnaranteeing
yokoshimashita boy desu,
tent boy it.
" He is a servant whom I got by applying to the Grand Hotel at ^Yokohama, and for whose good behaviour the hotel -keeper is guarantee."
/
N. B. The English word '• boy " has been largely adopted by the Japanese in the sense of " servant."
Closely similar are such cases as warui rikutsu, signi- fying, not **a bad reason," but " the reason why (so-and- so) is bad."
S8 THE PRONOUN.
II 84. The terseness of the Japanese expressiona s compared with ours should not occasion any insuperable difficulty to the careful student. After all, we use a somewhat similar idiom in English when we speak of " a shaving- brush," meaning " a brush with which a man helps him- self to shave ; " of ** a smoking-room,** meaning " a room in which people smoke;" of **a stepping-stone," meaning " a stone ow which one may step," &c., &c.
IF 85. Several ** who's " or ** which's " are often attached in English to the same noun. In such cases the Japanese language uses the gerund (in set speeches the indefinite form) for the verbs of every clause, excepting that im- mediately preceding the noun qualified (see II 278 et seq, and U 422 et seq.). An instance of this construction is given in the example on the foregoing page, where totna- rimashlte is a gerund and irimashtta a past tense, both qualifying the word yadoya. But this idiom — the referring of several relative clauses to one noun — is not a favourite one in Colloquial Japanese. The last example on the foregoing page, viz. that mentioning the boy engaged at the Grand Hotel, Yokohama, shows, in the case of the word tanomimashitara, the avoidance of such a construc- tion. Indeed a great number of relative phrases — even single relative phrases — are turned in some other way. Take, for instance :
Mune^ no^ waruku^ naru^ hanashi^, " A story which it makes one feel sick to listen to;" lit. "Chest* 's* bad^ becoming* story 5."
Musume^ ga^ hitori^ atte^, O Haru^ to^ moshimasu^, " He has one daughter whose name is O Haru, " lit. *< Daughter^ one-person' being,* (people) say' that* (she is) O Harus."
RELATIVE PRONOUNS HOW AVOIDED. 59
Senjitsu^ o* hanashp no^ doguya^ wa^^ tsui^ shindai- kagiri^ nP narimashita^^ so^^ desii^*, i.e., " It seems that the curio -dealer 0/ whom you spoke the other day has become bankrupt;" more lit. "As-for^ the curio-dealer^ of* the honourable* speaking^ former-day^ it is** ap- pearance" that he at-last^ has-become" to' bank- ruptcy*."
Kesa^ no^ yosu^ de^ wa^,furu^ ka^ to^ omottara^, suk- kari^^ haremashita^^f i.e. " The weather, which looked like rain this morning, has cleared up beautifully ; " more lit. ** By* appearance^ of* this-morning* when-(I) had-thought' that* **Will-(it) rain ?M," quite" (it) has- cleared".*'
Kono^ kuruma^ moto^ wa^ jobu^ de^, taihen' ni^ yo^ go- zaimashtta^^ ga^^, — twa" wa^^furuku^^ natte^^y sapparV^ yaku^'' np^ fatanaku^^ narimashtta^'^, i.e. ** This jinrikT- sha, which used to be such a good solid one, is now quite old and useless ; " more lit. „ This* jinrikisha*, whereas" originally^, being^ solid, ^ it was" extraordinarily^*^ good', now" having-become'5 old^*, (it) has-become*° quite** rising-not*' to*^ usefulness*'." H 86. The words tokoro nOy lit. " of place," are often used by the upper classes in relative phrases as a sort of substitute for the relative pronouns " who," "which," and "that." But these words really add nothing to the sense, and only encumber the construction. They owe their origin to the slavish imitation of a Chinese idiom. Thus : Kuru tokoro no hito^ for Kuru hito.
Kino kita tokoro no hito, „ Kino kita hito. Shinakucha naran tokoro ,, Shinakucha naran
no koto desuy koto desii.
(For the translation of these phrases see p. 54.)
CHAPTER V.
TJie Postposition.
THE POSTPOSITION PROPER.
IF 87. Japanese postpositions correspond for the most part to English prepositions, serving like them to indicate those relations of words which Latin, German, and other Aryan languages of the older type denote by the use of case inflections.
There are two kinds of postpositions, viz. postpositions proper and quasi-postpositions (H 141 et seq,).
The postpositions proper, with their most usual significations, are as follows :
DE.
f, 88. De has two widely different uses. One is to render the sense of "by," whence also "with," "by means of," less often " in." This its first acceptation offers no difficulty. In its second acceptation, de seems at first sight to mean, nothing at all, and thus puzzles the foreign student who is desirous of accounting for its presence in the sentence. De is here etymologically a corruption of nite, itself the gerund of an obsolete substantive verb. Its proper sense is therefore " being." But in most contexts this de has sunk so completely to the level of a mere grammatical par- ticle, as not to need translating into English. It is a moot point whether what was originally one word has branched out into these two significations, or whether two words ori- ginally distinct have coalesced into a single particle. Here are a few examples oi de meaning " by," "with," ** in:"
DE.
6l
Nawa^ de* shibaru^, Hasami^ de* kiru^,
Inu wo kusari de WMog {accus,)y chain ^y* tsunaide oke !
fm§t€uiug pnt !
"To tie3 by means oP a rope'." **To cut3 with* scissors*."
"Chain up the dog!" (Said to a coolie.)
Kore de gatnan wasat /f" Please be contented with
rhia Mtithy pmii€Hee ^iW^M /jthis."
Kono kawa de^ at
Vhia river iut iront
tsuremasu ka ?
0tr^e€it€k€ibie f
ga \
(nom.j['*ATe there any trout to be. I caught in this stream ? "
)'
"What is this called in
Kono mono wa, arw, tiding -it-for. [Japanese?" Nthon-go de nan to {'' \ ,. . ,.
^mpi^m^immgnagB *y, ^i^i ihmi f (^^''^ ^»^- " ^8 for this thing. moshimasu ka ? in Japanese, what do people say
««y f / that it is ? *')
It will be gathered from these examples that de has its first signification ("by," "with," "in") chiefly when construed with transitive verbs.
De has its second signification, i.e., it properly means " being," in such cases as the following: —
I ma no kuruma-ya wa,
JVow *t JimriltiBigatnitH aa^for,
dajaku de, yaku ni,
iminteHi keiHgt 9§gefnlHe»» to
tatanai,
aitu^wmoi*
Yoppodo heppin de
Very exirafualittf beimg
aru,
ia.
" My present jinrikisha- man is no good, — he is so indolent."
(More lit, ** The present jinri- klsha-man, being indolent, is of no use.")
" She is an uncommonly pretty girl."
(More lit, ** She is being a very extra quality.")
San-ji han de
Vhree'httra itaif beiug
masu.
gozat'^ uj^ is (being) half-
ia.
\ past three."
62 THE POSTPOSITION.
The first of these phrases illustrates a construction with what are called " quasi-adjectives," which will be touched on again in H 200, and exemplified in H 201 (examples 9 and 10). The second and third phrases are much more impor- tant, showing, as they do, the most usual manner of expres- sing our verb ** to be," viz, by means cide aru, de arimasuj de gozaitnasu (see also IF 341 et seq,), De aru is com- monly contracted to da, de gozaitnasu to desu, less often and somewhat vulgarly to de gozansu, de gesU, or de gasu ; similarly in the other tenses, for instance datta for de atta, deshUa for de gozaimashlta, and so on (see also HIT 233, 270, 343, and 344). The foregoing examples would therefore generally become Yoppodo heppin da, San-ji han desu. The following is a very common phrase illustrating this idiom :
Sayo de gozaitnasu. \ ,, ^, . „ . ,, ^ „ Sodesu. (Less formal.)) ^^^^^isso, i.e., Yes.
IF 8g. It happens not infrequently that de, in both its accep- tations, is strengthened by means of the postposition wa, especially in phrases expressing interrogation, negation, or something disagreeable. De wa, in familiar talk, is apt to be contracted into^a. Thus:
Yoppodo heppin de
V*«r|f exira^quaHiy being
wa nai ka ?
ia-HOt f
Kore de wa oki ni ko-
VhU bff indeed greaity «mm-
tnarimasu,
iu^a-quoHdarff,
** Isn't she very pretty ?*'
(Or, Yoppodo heppin j a nai ka '
** I am greatly bothered by this.'* (Or, Kore ja oki ni komarifnasU,)
ir 90. When the substantive verb has a qualifying word or phrase along with it after de, the noun followed by de often corresponds to an English nominative, — not that de has
DE AND GA. 63
any nominative force properly so called, but because the word which we treat as a nominative is conceived of by the Japanese as the means whereby, or the place in which, the action or state denoted by the verb takes place, for instance :
Mizu de taku' \ u QqI^ ^^ter will do perfectly cota^aierbw, (it will be) .^^j, » ( j^^ ..you need not trouble ^^'^ ) to bring hot water as well)."
N. B. The Japanese sentence should, properly speaking, have daUy *' it is," stuck on to the end of it; but, as will be further illustrated in IT 429, the final verb is often omitted when no ambiguity is likely to ensue.
Hitotsu de yoroshii, (More politely Hitotsu de yoroskiu gozaimasu,)
*' One will be enough.'*
Seifu de o /"The Government has
Gpverumeui *y, hou^mrtibte pnr» ] bought it," or " It has
kai-age ni narimashita, Ibeen purchased by the
ehoMe to *fl«-ft««#iM«. I Government."
GA. IT 91. The original sense of ga is " of," now only preserved in names of places and in a few locutions, such as Hoshi- ga-oka, " The Mound of the Stars " (the name of a part of
Kamakura); ga suki^ "fond of," "liking;" ga
Atrai, " not fond of," "disliking;" ga hoshii^
"desirous of."
Watakushi wa tahako ga dai-
suki (desu). r»Hd (mm).
Sake ga kirai desu.
Sake •fi uot'f^nd mm*
Mizu ga hoshiU gozaimasu.
I
am very of smok-
fond ing."
" I am not fond of sake.**
" I want some water.*'
64 THE POSTPOSITION.
If 92. Ga is used as a sign of the nominative case, as :
Kane ga nai, ( ** There is no money;"
•Vo»«y («om.) iMn'i. [hence^ "I have no money."
Ame ga futte kimashlta. ** It has come on to rain."
Mmim (nom,) fmitimg hat'
Kono kuruma ga furU'\
rhiwjittrihiMhm (mm.) being'] *^ This jifirikisha won't kute ikemasen. f do ; it is too old."
Isha ni mite morau \ «<You had better consult
FkwieiaH bff, teeiug io'-reeeive I the doCtOr about it."
g^ yokaro. I ^3^0^^ in^ u It „^y be well to get (it)
(nom,) wiUmprobabtirbe'good. ) seen by the doctor.")
c _« • . r v^ ( ** The teacher has ap-
Senset ga mumashtta. { ^^^^^^„ .^^ ^^^ ^^^^ ^
Observe that the nominative use has developed out of the genitive. For instance, the etymological significa- tion oiKane ga nai is ** The not-being of money ; " that of Sensei ga miem^ashita is " The having- apppeared of the teacher." Originally none of these sentences with ga were predicative. Modern usage alone has made them so, just as, to borrow an apt illustration from Mr. Aston, the incomplete sentences of an English telegram or advertisement convey a predicative sense to the mind of the reader. Observe too, from the example Isha ni mite morau ga yokaro, that postpositions may be sufExed to verbs as readily as to substantives, and that verbs, and indeed whole phrases, may form the subject or object of other verbs.
II 93. When found at the end of a clause, ga has an adver- sative force, of which "whereas" is the most literal English equivalent, but which is generally best rendered
GA.
65
in practice by prefixing "yet" or "but" to the following clause. Sometimes the adversative force is softened down to a mere intimation of discontinuity between two successive states or actions, and then ga must be trans- lated by ** and so ** or " and."
N. B. The final u of tnasii revives pretty distinctly before ^a, for which reason we write it masu in all such examples.
Shina wa yoroshiu gozaimasu\
tMriiete aff^r^ go9d i§
V ga, — nedan ga osoroshii tako
vpherea»% price fnom.J. frigkiful high
gozaimasu, i§.
"The article is a good one, but the price is frightfully hi^h.'*
N. B. Osoroshiu takd, ** frightful/y high," would be more gram- matical. But custom has almost sanctioned such expressions as osoroshii takai^ at least in familiar conversation.
Yama-michi de hi wa ^
Jlf«wMlaiM-r0«4# iut daff mM'^ar^
kuremashita ga, — tsure ga
darkened tvheremt, e»»npaui0ut {nam.)
ozei datta kara, ki-johu
ermwd wgere beeaujte, apirii^Miurd^
deshita, (we) mere* .
" It got dark while we were on the mountain side ; hut, as' we were several of us together, we felt no alarm."
Watakushi wa kon-do de \
JVLe at'for, thit tiane hff,
Fuji ye tosan wa san- J^MMiffama §0 titeeui mB'fort third
dO'tne desu ga, — shi-awase to
iUme it wghereaM, imehilp
itsu mo tenki-tsugo ga
mtm^Wa wemther^eirenrnttiaHceM {nom,) yd gozaimasu. go»d mre»
II 94. Sometimes ga with this adversative force is repeated in two consecutive clauses, as :
"This is the third time I have made the ascent of Fusi- yama, and I have each time been lucky enough to have fine weather."
66
THE POSTPOSITION.
Bankoku-koho ga aro \
iHiemaUoHomawt (nom.) amm§fexi$i
ga, nani ga aro though^'-aomeihiuig (nom.) amajf^xiMi
ga, — mada mada dori bakari
ihanghj'atiii bMB Hghi ^uiff
de wa katsu koto ga hff^ conquer aeiion (nom.) dekimasen.
"We may have inter- national law, and we may have all sorts of fine things ; but we ^are still very very far from having arrived at a social state in which right always
triumphs."
Sometimes ga occurs elliptically at the end of an un- finished sentence. See, for examples, those given about the middle of ^ 287.
KA. i
IT 95. Ka serves to ask a question, as :
Arimasu. Arimasu ka ?
Furo^ wa^ dekimashita^.
" There is." " Is there ? "
"The bath is ready." (More lit, " As-for* the bath.i it is done."3)
Furo wa dekimashita ka ? " Is the bath ready ? "
If the sentence already contains some other interro- gative word — an interrogative pronoun or adverb, — ka is often omitted, and it is generally best to omit it, thus :
Nan-doki ni mairimasho ka ?
"WhaUhoHr mi »hail'Come f
or Nati'doki ni mairimasho ? Itsu shinimashtta (ka) P f«
Vf*ken died t \
" At what o'clock shall I come ? "
When did he die ? "
Do iu wake de konna ^ ^ why do you do such
baka na koto wo sum? f"y^*^^"^^^^ ^^^^•
fooiUh ihiHgM (accus.) Oo 9 ] {^""'^ ^^ «» tnferzor.)
KA. 67
^ 96. Sometimes ka expresses a merely rhetorical or ironi- cal question, sometimes nothing beyond a mere shade of doubt. In the latter case it corresponds to such English words as ** may," *' might," ** perhaps : "
Aru mono ka?\ "Who in his senses would ever jBxuu thiMg f ) believe that such a thing exists ? "
Mata yuki ga . furimasho
•Mgain tuotv {nom.) wtiii-pr^babt^fati
to omoimasu, that tMmk,
Mata yuki ga furimasho ka to omowaremasu,
f thai ean'thiuU*
"I think it will snow again."
" I am inclined to think ^ that it may snow again."
Su'uki to iu hUo. << A man called Suzuki." SMznki thmi (they) emit per§0M.
Suzuki to ka iu hito, i "A man called, if I.
SnsuM thai f (they) eaii per9»H.\miS\,ake not, Suzuki."
IF 97. iiTa ka means "or," ** either or,"
"whether or : "
(i.
Goodt had P, i9^Hk»omabie.\\t is gOOd or bad."
Muku desu ka, mekki desu [ u jg it all gold or only WT^m^ioyedi. f piaied u J gilt ?" (Or, " Is it all silver
(or only plated ? ")
" I am considering whether to go or not ? "
Iko ka, do shiyo ka
**Shali'g0 f, how thaii'do f **
to omotte imasu, , thai thinking am*
IF 98. Ka helps to form certain indefinite pronouns and adverbs, such as " somebody," " something," *' some- where." See the paradigm on page 50.
68 THE POSTPOSITION.
KARA. H 99. Kara means " from, " ** since, " " because, '* ** after : "
Koko kara toge made wa,
MMere frotm^ patM io iudeedt
mo dono kurai arimasho ?
atUt WBhai mm0Mnt probabl^it f )
**Howfarmay it be from here to the top of the pass ? "
/ "For the last two Ni-san-nen-zen kara hito or three years
Vwrn-ihree-yemr^efcre BiH€e,p€opie people have been ga fu-ketkt da to ttmasu ] • ^^^^ ^^^
ga.^honto desuka? ^^"^^^ are bad. Is
Jiereaa^^ime 4a ? thlS really the
\case ?
Kutabiremashita kara, chotto
MMnve'goi'tired beeaiwae, a^Uiiie
yasumtmasho.
wtiti-prohaihift^eai.
" I am tired ; (so) let us rest a minute."
N. B. Many speakers say kara shite (shtte is the gerund of suru^ "to do") for kara\ others say kara ni. The phrase mono desu kara or mon* desU kara^ lit. " because (it) is thing," is another favourite circumlocution having the meaning of " because." The noun yue^ lit. "cause," or yue nif almost lit. "because," is also in use, though perhaps sounding just a trifle old-fashioned and stiff.
H 100. Kara only has the sense of ** after " when suffixed
to the gerund in te, and in a few special locutions, as :
Itte karay " After going," ** after having gone."
Mimashite kara, " After seeing," " after having seen."
Kore kara, ** After this," ** henceforward."
Sore kara, " After that," " and then," " next."
N. B. The past itta kara means " because he has gone ; " mimashita
kara means " because I have seen. " Be very careful not to confuse
these two locutions, which differ only by the use of the gerund in e
when " after " is meant, and of the past tense in a when " because "
is meant.
KARA, MADE, AND MO.
69
does the lecture begin to-morrow ? — At two o'clock in the after- noon."
N. B, The Japanese often use *' from " fkara^ sometimes yorij,
when " at " or •• by *' would come more naturally to English lips, as :
Myonichi no enzetsu wa, nan-ji ( ** At what o'clock
kara hajimarimasu ? — Go-go ni-ji
from hegiuB f JVoon^mfier iwo'MourM kara desU, from (ii) 49.
The idea is that the lecture, beginning as it does at two o'clock, will last from two to some other hour not named. — Observe how the Japanese idiom retains ' the verb ** it is *' (desu) at the end of the sentence, while English dispenses with it. A siitiilar instance octlirs in the second example given under made.
MADE.
ir loi. Made means " till, " " as far as, " " down to, " " to : " Kore made. " Thus far," " hitherto," " till now."
Tetsudo wa, doko made>^
XaHwmff aa^foTf where to
dekite orimasu, ? — Sendai
done i$ f Sendai
made desu,
aa^far'aB 4s.
Watakushi no kuru made
JfTe . of eome iittf
matte ite kudasai.
waiiiHg heimg eoMdeBeend.
How far is the railway -finished ? — As far as Sen- dai."
" Please wait till I come." {More lit. till my coming.)
Itsu^ made^ mo^.
("Ever so long," ** forever." {(Lit, even' tilP when.")
(** Even so far," "for any dis- (tance." (Lit. even3 till* where.')
t
Doko^ made* mo^.
N. B. For made ni in the sense of *• by," see N. B. at end of IT 136. MO,-
IF 102. Mo means "even," "also," "and," "too." When repeated, mo mo means " both and : " —
* Not to be confounded with the adverb md, for which see U 373.
70 THE POSTPOSITION^.
J. , f lit. " Even till when," ue.,
Itsumademo. {..forever."
Watakishi mo mairimasH. " I will go too."
Kore mo, wasurecha w. And you mustn't forget
this either;" or "Nor must you forget this."
ikemasen.
Ka mo nomi mo ("it is a place where there
Mcvrtue, «t,„ nem. «*".lare plenty both of mos-
o» tohoro desu. (quitoes and of fleas."
Nat koto mo gozaimasen.
JY'0i'being fact aito it'HOi.
" It cannot be said that there are none," or " There are certainly some."
(This is a very common idiom.)
Construed with a negative verb, mo mo means
** neither nor," thus:
Yoku mo waruku mo nai. j**It is neither good nor
Oo9d aitOt bad ai»Q ia'uoi* (bad."
Mo is sometimes placed after ka, when the latter means "perhaps" (see IF 96). It retains in Japanese some- thing of its proper force of " even," but can hardly be represented in the English translation, thus :
Mata rai-nen kuru ka (
^gaiH eomiug^ew come f ] " Perhaps I may come mo shir ema sen, - 1 again next year."
evcM canu^i'kuom, \
N. B. For mo serving to form expressions analogous to the con- cessive mood, see H 289.
MOTTE.
IT 103. Motte, properly the gerund of the verb motsu, ** to
hold," is in Written Japanese the usual word for " by,"
** thereby." In the Colloquial it survives only as a sort
of emphatic particle, which is moreover little used except
MOTTE AND NI. 7 1
/
by old-fashioned speakers. Thus hanahada motte is the same as hanahada^ " very," but emphasised ; ima motte may be rendered by " even now," or by the help of some such word as " very," thus :
Mukashi kara ima motte r "It is a shop which
^Hciemi'iime rr0m, now indeed, j^^g carried On a gOOd
at^hawarazn yoku J trade from old times
mninaUf^eUmnging^noi ^ell K ^
ureru mise desu. rj ,, -^
M€lls{intrans.) $hop 4s. Vday.
N. B. Ait the equivalent of our word *' mutually,^' is often thus prefixed to verbs by pedantic speakers. It is a relic of the Book Language, and has little or no meaning now. This sentence is a good example of the apparent ambiguity of relative constructions in Japanese, which was pointed out in H 82. The speaker of course means to say that the thingi in the shop sell well ; but he seems to say that it is the shop itself which sells well.
When de is used in the sense of " by " or " with,*' motte is often suffixed to it by all classes of speakers, thus :
Hocho de (motte) kiru. ^ « To cut with a knife."
SLnire hff io'cui. j
Nawa de (motte) shibaru. \ a -po tie with a rope."
Mt0pe b9 to'iie. '
Kaze de (motte) to ga
lUfMdf *y, doer (nom,)
aotte imasu.
BiaamtmiHg ia,
(For NA see H 197.)
" The door keeps slamming on account of the wind."
NI. I1 104. The original sense of ni is ''in," "into," *'to ": Kono hen ni kiji . u^re there no
wa tmasen ka? j neighbourhood ? "
72 THE POSTPOSITION.
Kono kamo wo ryori-nin \ " please give this
rhUy^iil§^eh(accus,),e00k^er.0H\^^^^^^^^^ tO the
m watashite kuaasat, ^ „
f9, hmndiHg e0Hde»eemilL ^
{" This is the first time I have had the honour to meet vou." (A phrase which it is considered polite to use when introduced to some one.)
IT 105. Ni has many other idiomatic uses, of which the
following are the chief, viz.
With a passive verb, ni corresponds to "by," thus:
Osoroshiku domo ka
Frightfmtitg reailfff tmQ§qm4t0es
ni sasaremashita.
by hare-been^tiumg.
"}Oh! I have been ■frightfully stung by the mosquitoes."
Ante ni furi-komeraremashitaA " We were kept in JBaiM by merchept-in. "[by the rain."
A kindred idiom is found in the ni corresponding to our " by " or " with," in such phrases as :
Me ni tniru mono,
Xye§ by, »ee ihirnggf
mimi ni kiku mono.
eoTM by, hear ihingB.
"What one sees with one's eyes, and hears with one's ears."
H 106. With a causative verb, ni denotes the person who is caused to perform the action, thus :
^ I will make the boy look
( 1 fo 't
If 107. Suffixed to the indefinite form of a verb, ni means " (in order) to " thus :
Ueno no ^ sakura ^ .. j ^^^^ ^^ ^^ ^^ ^^^
wo^^mi 'ni "Ikitai"^' \^^^ cherry-blossoms at (accus.) Bee §0 mpaHi-icgQ. J ^^no.
NI AND NO. 73
N. B, It 18 only with the indefinite fonn of the verb that ni has this meaning. When, as often happens, it follows the present tense used as an infinitive, it preserves its original force, thus :
Michi ga warukute, aruku ni . .. ^. ,
hone ga oremasu. I walking"
b0meM (nom.) hreuk (intrans). ' waiKing.
Mada neru ni wa hayai. \ /'It is still too early
SiUi49'Bteep to ma^for^ (}*i^) 0«rly.) to go to bed."
IT 108. Ni suffixed to nouns serves to form expressions corresponding to European adverbs, as :
daiji, " importance," " care ; " daiji ni, " carefully." hetUy " a bad hand (at) ; " heta nty " unskilfully."
itnay ** the present moment," ima ni^ " presently." " now ; " jozu, " a good hand (at) ; " jozu ni, " skilfully." rippa, " splendour ; " rippa ni, " splendidly. "
(See also II 64.)
IF 109. When several things are enumerated, ni often means " besides the foregoing," " and : "
(Lit. Besides* beer^, be- sides* wine', we -will -go' carrying^ gun-water', i.e., "We will take beer, claret, and soda-water."
Hana^ wa^ sakura^ ni^, f " The cherry is the king of hito^ wa^ 6w5/tf'. (A proverb.H flowers, and the warrior the
(king of men."
Lit. As-for* flowers*, (the best is) the cherry-blos- som3 ; and-to-the-foregoing-it-may-be-added-that*, as-for* human-beings^ (the best are) warriors^.
NO.
IT no. No means " of," or denotes the possessive case:
74 THE POSTPOSITION.
Amerikd^ no* Daiioryd^. i "The President^ oP
(the United States*."
Neko^ no* tsume^. " A cat''s* claws^."
Ari^ no* mama^. (Ari is) Lit. "Way of be
the indefinite form of the verb aru, " to be.")
Katta hakari no '
shina. article.
ing," i.e,f "Just as it is."
" Something I have only just bought." (More lit. "An article of quite recent buying.")
We have already noticed, when treating of the post- position ga^ the genitive origin of many apparently nomi- native expressions in Japanese. The same tendency is exemplified by wo, though less frequently in the Colloquial than in the Written Language, thus :
' "It is dangerous to cross the line when the train is passing."
Kisha no tsuko sum tokiy senro
Vraim *» pma»mge doe» iim^e^ Hue
wo yokogitcha abunai. . ^ o-
(accus.) a$'rmr'€r0t$iHg,{is) dMHirer&usMMore lit. "at the (It would be more polite to say abuno go- 1 time of the passing '^i»^^^') iof the train ").
IT HI. No is used in attributive phrases either in lieu of, or suffixed to, the other postpositions, it being a rule that none of the postpositions excepting no can show the relation between two nouns in such phrases. An example or two will make this clearer :
(i) Konoura niike ga gozaimasu.i "There is a pond rkiB hmeh in,p0Hd (nom.) 4: |at the back of this."
(2) Kono ura no ike wa aso gozai-i " The pond at the masu. {back of this is shallow.
(3) Kuni kara dempo ga kitnashita.
Country fromt ieiegrmm (nom.) tuU'C&tme.
" I have re- ceived a telegram from home."
NO. 7S
{^) Kuni kara no dempo. " A telegram from home."
In the above predicative phrases (the first and third), each English preposition is rendered by the Japanese post- position properly corresponding to it. But turn the phrase attributively (the second and fourth), and no either supplants, or is suffixed to, that postposition {no for ni in the second, kara no for kara in the fourth).
In this manner no, "of," comes to express almost every idea of relation ; or rather all the various ideas of relation come to be summed up by the Japanese mind under the one idea of " of; " thus :
Atami no onsen. "The hot springs at Atami.*'
Fuji no yuki, " The snow on Fuji."
*^ Nichi-Nichi'' no sAa- J " The leading article in the setsu. ("Daily News.'"
Oya no mo. " The mourning/or a parent."
Wahoku no dampan. "Deliberations about peace."
Korera-hyo no yoho. **Precautionsfl^a/ns^ cholera."
Even the idea of apposition finds its place under this
heading, for instance : Kerai no Tosuke. " His retainer T6suke."
Indeed apposition is often expressed in English by a
similar idiom with " of," as when we say
" The province of Yamato." Yamato no kuni. IF 112. No is used substantively with the meaning of the English word "one" or "ones" (see also H 137), thus :
Warui no. "A bad one." yohu na no. "A solid one."
N. B. Fojr the na otjohu na^ see If 197.
■**.
76 THE POSTPOSITION.
Kore wa ii ^ no da. 1 « This is a good one." rt ^ ,. .^ J ^ ( *' It is a thing I have
Bow'jmanM Utme§ eren^ mow 9me 4m. .. ,, "^
^times. Under this heading, note the following specimens of a curious idiom :
Inshi^ no^ furui^ no^y as lit. as possible, "old' ones* of* stamps"," i.e., "stamps that are old," hence "some old stamps."
KwashP no*- shinki^ ni^ yaita^ no^y as lit. as possible, "in* newness' have-burnt^ one^ of* cake% i.e., "a cake that has been freshly baked," or more simply, "a freshly baked cake."
There is just the shadow of a shade of difference in intention between these circumlocutions and the simpler expressions
Furui insht. " Old stamps."
Shinki niyaita kwashu " A freshly baked cake." IT 113. No often serves to form expressions corresponding to English adjectives, as Nikon no, "of Japan," i.e., "Japanese" (see IT 62, and IT 197 et seq,). Sometimes, in quite familiar talk, it occurs as a final particle with a certain emphatic force, corresponding to that of the Colloquial English phrase " and so there ! " or " and what do you think of that I " A good example of this occurs towards the end of this Handbook, in Chap. II of the " Botan-dorOy* in the conversation between O Yone and ShijO, where attention is drawn to it by a foot-note. ir 114. At other times, — and this is a very favourite idiom, — no is employed as a kind of equivalent for the word koto meaning "act," "fact." This construction is specially apt to occur in conjunction with the substan-
NO AND DANO. 77
tive verb da or desu, and is generally best rendered in English by the phrase " it is that," or " is it that ? " For instance, a man has made an appointment, but a note comes from him about the time he is ex- pected to arrive. One of the bystanders, observing this, says :
Konai no daro, f " I suppose it is that he
'MW*iii^H0i-e0me /Vief f9r«*adlflr-<«. | isn't Coming."
In such contexts, the word no may be, and in familiar conversation generally is, clipped of its vowel, so that it sinks into the single letter n\ Thus the above example might equally well be Konai «' daro, or more politely Konai n'desho (conf. H 343-4).
Nani wo sum n' desii?' '*What is it that you Whai (accus.) do faei M a^e domg ? Massugu ni iku n' desu J "^"^ ^ ^^ P straight
SiraighMw g. act if |On? ^^^^ ^^^- " Is it
]ia ? that I am to go straight
? Ion?"
Aru nop t "Is there?" "Do you mean to Im raei^ I say that there is." N* B, As shown in this last example, no cannot be clipped of its vowel when standing at the very end of a sentence.
The exact force of no preceding the verb da or desu^ may be practically exemplified by comparing, say, Nani wo shitnasu ? " What are you doing ? " with Na- ni wo sum n* desu? "What is it that you are doing?"
ir 115. The verb da, "is," and the postposition no combine to form the word dano, which serves for pur- poses of enumeration. Dano must, like the Latin que, be repeated after each of the items enumerated, thus :
Shishi dano, tora dano,) "Lions, tigers, elephants z6 dano, rakuda dano. jand camels."
78 THP POSTPOSITION.
There is a difference between dano and ni (see IT 109) used enumeratively. Ni is simply copulative, dano conveys the idea of a multiplicity of objects. Thys, when a Japanese says sake dano, sakana dano, kwa$hi dano, he means to convey to his hearers the idea of a variously assorted feast, including possibly other good things besides the liquor, fish, and cakes enumerated. But when he says sake ni, sakana ni, kwashi, he speaks of just those three and no more. Observe, moreover, that the word dano is somewhat vulgar. The polite equivalent is de gozaimasu no, but this is less often used. No sometimes serves as an enumerative after other than the substantive verbs. Thus : —
Kimi gd warukatta no,
JWeatiai'feetiHgM (nom.) were'bad and,
nan no to, osoroshii me ni
wphai and thait fearfui effe$ #•
atte kita. (Famil.)
haviHg'tmei (I) have'come*
" Talk of feel-
ing frightened and so forth, I have had a rough time of it, I can tell you."
N, B. NOf in its proper sense of "of," is sometimes replaced in the higher style by the Chinese word teki. Sometimes the two are used together, as Seiji teki kakumei^ or seiji teki no kakumeif '* a revolution of politics," i. e., *• a political revolution."
SHI. IT 1x6. Shi, a postposition which is not capable of translation into English, has a sort of enumerative force, and serves as a kind of pause, thus :
Kono nikai wa, Fuji \ " From the
second story here you can see Fu-
Vh49 •ecoHd'Btory ai-fort Fngipatna
mo mieru shi, umi mo
mieru keshiki desu. — truly a beauti
9iew 4,. yfulview.
M: makoto ni ii y^iyama and you imiM *.. ^c* h^an f « *e sea,
SHI AND TO. 79
Shi is frequently appended to the verbal form in mai (the " probable present or future "). Thus, when bandying words with a jinrikisha-man who should attempt to make an overcharge, one might say :
Hajimete kuruma wo \ '* You don't ima-
Fmrmthe'MrBi'Ume vehieie (accus.) \ gine, do yOU ? that
tanomi ya shimai this is the first time
ash oM-rmr^fl) ps^bakim'do-HQt f \i j^^ve hired a jin-
rikisha, and that I
don't know the pro- per fare ! "
shif taigai sdba
for^thetmoMtfpart tmarhet^riee
mo shitte iru wa I
aia0 ttmmwimg a§m* {emph.)
Occasionally shi seems to terminate a sentence ; but this is only because the speaker, after finishing the first clause, finds himself at a loss concerning the second, and so perforce leaves the sentence unfinished.
N. B. Do not confound the postposition shi with shi the inde- finite form of the verb suru^ ** to do," which appears in such idioms as mi mo shiy kiki mo suru, ** one both sees it and hears it."
TO.
IT 117. To originally had the sense of our demonstrative
pronoun " that," but it now has the sense of our
conjunction " that : "
Uso da to iimasu. \ ,, „ ., .. • ,. „
Mde u ihai f«y«. J ne says mat It isa lie.
Honto da to omoimasu.) ^ t ^u- k 4.1,^^ ;. • ^^^^ »
N. B. Originally therefore the sense was : '' It is a lie. He says that ." *' It is truth. I think that." The conversion of the demon- strative pronoun into the conjunction came about gradually in the case of tOy as in the case of its English equivalent *' that."
In the above, and in most similar phrases, English idiom generally prefers to omit the word ** that ; " but to cannot so be omitted in Japanese. The following are
8o THE POSTPOSITION.
instances of ^0* meaning literally " that," but not lending itself to expression in idiomatic English :
Omae san no na wa,
nan to iu ka? (Said to acorn- mphaiihattatf f mon person,)
" What is your name ?" more lit, " As for the name of Mr. you, what do .people say that it is ? "
ccT-u - Tijr " ^ / " A vessel called the * Tokyo JA S«::«iLW--' "---^^•^- -Avesselof mosti fune. 1 ^hich people say that it is the
•a9 resMei. M Tokyo Mar u.
■ \ (Conf. p. 55 for this important idiom.)
Similarly in the case of such onomatopoetic adverbs as hatto, kittOj patattOj etc., where the to (strengthened into tto) is, properly speaking, a separate word, thus :
HaHto^ omoimashita^, ** I started," more lit. " I
thoughts that* it is Afl * ! "
Nochi'hodo^ kitto^ mairi- " I will certainly* come^ mas0. later-on^"
PeUaHto* ochimashitaK '' It fell* flop^"
Under this heading, too, comes the idiomatic use of to at the end of a sentence ; for some verb must always be mentally supplied after it. Take, for instance, the com- mon Colloquial phrase Nan to ? ** What did you {or he) say ? " standing for Nan to osshatta ? (polite), or Nan to itta ? (familiar).
H ii8. To itte, ** saying that ; " to omotte, " thinking that ; ** to kiite, " asking (lit. hearing) whether, " and similar gerundial phrases, are often contracted to tote (vulgarly tte). Tote frequently has a sort of oppositive force, as in the following examples, where it may be best parsed as standing for to itte mo, *' even saying that," i.e., " even supposing that." (Conf. also 11*289.)
TO. . 8s
Ikura gakumon shlta ( "However much a
M0m'mH€h Mt^dw *«*^*,«e man may study {more
tote, okonai ga %va']l^i-i saying that a man
eveu-Batfiusr^hai^ c^nduci (nom.) itA may Study how much),
rukereba, nanni mo narimasen, I nothing will come of it
it'bad, auffihiug hee0me»'Mi. \[{ he is badly behaved."
Zohei-kyoku wa, muyami ni
' * You cannot get shown over the Mint simply by "going there and asking to see it."
JffiMt at-foft reckiettiff
itta kara tote,
meeut heeanae ewen^Maiflug'lkai,
haiken wa dekimasen,
adoriug^look as'for, eweuinate§'ttot»J
N. B. Women and the lower classes often end a sentence by ttej when they should say to iimasu or to iimashlta,
ir 119. To sometimes means "and." When it has this sense, it is, like the Latin que, generally repeated after each noun. Even when not so repeated, it always be- longs to the word immediately preceding it, not to the word following it. Europeans often make the mistake of commencing a clause by to, in imitation of the European idiom which introduces clauses by the conjunc- tion " and." But this sounds ludicrous in Japanese : Anata to, watakushi to, ** You and I." Furansu to, Doitsii to. " France and Germany."
Certain idiomatic uses of to may best be classed under this head, thus :
Musuko to f atari. ] ,,fr^ .• »»
Son and Lo.per»ou.. \ " Two countmg my son.
Am hito to ikimashlta.y, j ^^^^ ^j^j^ j^j^ „
Tkat pertQH and {l)we$9i* )
Okiru to sufTu ni. ] ,, a t ^ »>
Mi,e and ^mmediaieiy. J ^S SOOn as I got up.
Kore to wa chigaimasu.) ,, ,, . ..rr ^ r ., • ,, Tku and aM.Ur, (it)diirer,. \ ^^ ^^ different from this.
8l THE POSTPOSITION.
Observe also such adverbial phrases as shi-awase to,
" luckily."
IT 120. To sometimes comes to mean "if" or "when."
It has this sense only after the present tense of verbs and
adjectives, thus :
SosurutOyShtkararemasu.i "You will get scolded Sq «r« if, gei-9€0tded. (if you do that."
Sugii ikdnai to A
Immeaiaieiy gO'noi if A " YoU will be toO late
okuremasu. [if you don't go at once."
arciaie. '
So moshimasu to, sugux <*When I said so, he So Maid whem, im- .immediately gave me a
mediaieiy goi..eoided. J SCOlding.
II 121. Observe the use of to in such phrases as the following, where it is not susceptible of any English rendering :
Chiri tstimotte, ya-
M9w§t accnu»nlati»g^9 §Honw
ma to naru. iai» beeotneB,
" Dust accumulating becomes a mountain."
(A proverb used to inculcate the importance of little things.)
Mizu ga dete, niwa \ ufhe garden has be-
Waterinom.)i.,ning,gmrde^\ ^^^^ ^ ^^viQCt sea through
ga umt to natte shtmatma- \ ^^^ overflowing " (of the ' \lilla. ) neighbouring stream, etc.).
Observe the strong affirmative force of to (generally followed by mo) at the end of an assertion, thus :
" Are there any ? — Of
Arimasu kap — Arimasu to mo /
course there are V or, "I should just think there were !"
To wa or tote sometimes replaces to mo in such strong- ly affirmative phrases. — For to mo and to wa iedomo in concessive phrases, see IF 288 and H 289.
WA. 83
WA.
I1 122. Wa was originally a noun signifying " thing, " hence "that which," "he, she, or they who ";. but it is now used as a separative or isolating particle, corresponding in some measure to the French quant a, or, when repeat- ed antithetically, to the Greek fdv and di, " As for, "
"with regard to," " so far as is concerned," are
its most explicit English equivalents, and it has been rendered by " as for " in most of the literal translations of the examples scattered throughout the present work. But in practice its force is generally sufficiently indicated in an English translation by an emphasis on the equivalent of the word to which wa is suffixed, or by placing that word in a prominent position in the sentence. A slight pause, which may sometimes be indicated by a comma, is usually made after wa :
Budo-shu wo sukoshi atatamete^
TVijie {accus.) a»l4ttie tvaramiHg,
biiru wa sono mania de
beer aB^for, tkai eouMtiOH in
yoroshii,
(is) g09dL
"Warm the claret a little ; but so far as the beer is con- cerned, that will do as it is."
Konnichi wa, yoi
tenki de gozaimasu, weather (it) it.
" To-day it is fine weather." (/.^., "Whatever it may have been other days, to-day at least it is fine.")
Oki wa, yohodo nami ga
OifiHg at'f^rtpteniifnUtf tvawet (notn.) arai yd desu kara, ftine
r^mgh appearance i» hecauBet wetMet wa demasumai,
aff^r^ probakt9fwon*t'go'0ni.
" Out at sea the waves seem pretty rough; so probably the vessel will not sail.
Ima wa te-sUki de gozaimasuA " Now I am at
jr^w affoTtUand'empiff am. (leisure."
84 THE POSTPOSITION.
Koko no ido way ( '' '^® water in this well comes
Bere^M «r*« «,-#jpr, J ^0"^ the aqueduct.
suido desk 1 (-'Vor" The well here is an aqueduct,*' (!)
wter^mad U. ' f« ^^^ beginner might suppose, if he mis-
Vtook wa for a sign of the nominative case.)
"This being so, I am in a quandary." (The de wa may be contracted jnto ja ; see H 89.)
** I don't smoke." {More lit. "As for tobacco, I don't smoke it.")
Kore de wa komarima-
SU,
Tahako wa, nomimasen.
Yoku wa zonjimasen ) » j don't know «;««.
Kore wa wasei, are
rhis ma'fmTf jr^poMmmmhef thmt
wa hakurai [de gozaimasu)
«*-#•«•, im^mrimi40H (is).
''This (is) of native make, that is an im- ported article."
Nishi wa Fuji, kita Iva Tsukuba de gozaimasu.
mB'fpTf rgnknbm {it)i»m
" To the west stands Fusiyama, to the north Mount Tsukuba."
If 123. In an interrogative sentence, wa would sometimes seem to be the means of asking a question ; but an ellipsis must always be supplied. For instance Inn wa ? pronounced in an interrogative tone of voice, practically signifies " Where is the dog ? " But literally it is, " As for the dog, (where is he ?)"
Wa also sometimes occurs at the end of a sentence with a certain interjectional, exclamatory, or emphatic force. This idiom is heard only in quite familiar talk, and especially from the lips of women ; thus :
Watashi wa, kono ho ga ii wa! 1 "I like this
Jffe mt^fmrt thia bMc (nom,){is) (g^md 4i$t§ee4! \ one, / do. \
WA. 85
IT 124. The peculiar power of "wa to separate or limit ideas
is well-shown in some of the negative phrases given in
the Chapter on Syntax, 11 433, and also in such favourite
verbal idioms as the following :
Am ni %va arimasu ga, sikuno^ "There ar^ some,
it is true, but* they are scarce.
Wa 4u mB^f^r, ia wherema, aearee
gozaimasu, (Or Aru koto wa, etc.)
it.
A me wa, futte imasiika? — Furu ni
" Is it rain-
ing ? — Yes, it is raining, but it is not rain-
JEtaim aB'fot»9 faiHug 4b f WmliB *u
wa futte imasu ga, hidoi koto mB'fmr, f^iiiiHjf U wtherenB^ intenBe fmei
wa frozaimasen, . i , „
«#-##r, 4B^9t. /mghard.
Kotowatte okimashlta. " I refused."
MtefwBing (/)jMfl.
Kotowatte wa okima- ( ** I re/used, but... " (the sen- shita ga,., (tence remaining unfinished.)
The former of these two phrases states the fact of the refusal, and nothing more. The latter emphasises it; but the emphasis is the emphasis of hesitation, as if one should say, " I did indeed refuse, but my refusal was tempered by politeness ; it was not communicated abrupt- ly, neither was it unreasonable in itself."
"Oh! yes; a
Tsukai wa kita ga, tonin
^fMeBBeMger as^fmr, eaute mithmnght persow
wa ki wa shinai,
4ai^neBt40M mB'fpTf e0am4ttff twfmr, 4f#tf«-M«#«
messenger came, but the man him- self didn't." \:
Very often we hear ki wa shinai (and similar construc- tions with other verbs), where simple konai, etc., would seem sufficiently clear according to European ideas. But >: the Japanese prefer the more emphatic form with wa, whenever any mental reservation or allusion implies the . existence somewhere or other of contradiction or opposition
86 -THE POSTPOSITION.
to the idea which is actually expressed, as illustrated in the two foregoing examples.
N. B, When thus suffixed to the indefinite form of a verb (ki is the indefinite form of the irregular verb kuruj *• to come *'), wa is often pronounced ya ; thus ki ya sTiinai for ki wa shinai. t 125. A consideration of the foregoing examples, and in- deed of those which any page of Japanese affords, will con- vince the student that wa is not, as some European writers have erroneously imagined, a sign of the nominative case. The following example, which is the last we will quote, illustrates this fact almost to the point of absurdity. It is race-day, let us suppose. You meet a friend walking in the direction of the race-course, and you say to him : Anata wa, keiha de$u ka ?
i.e., if interpreted on the hypothesis of wa being a sign of the nominative case, "Are you a horse-race?" (!) The proper meaning of course is ** As for you, is it the races (that you are going to)?" or more simply ** Off to the races, he?" The most that can be said with regard to the so-called nominative force of wa is that the word followed by wa must, in not a few instances, be rendered by a nomi- native in English, though it is never properly a nomina- tive in the Japanese construction. The nearest approach made by the Colloquial Japanese Language to the posses- sion of a nominative particle is in the particle ga (see p. 64). But even this, as has been there explained, origin- ally meant " of," that is to say, was a sign of the geni- tive, not of the nominative. IF 126. Europeans often find it hard to decide whether to say wa or ga ; and it is true that two Japanese phrases, one with wa, the other with ga, must often be rendered
DIFFERENCE BETWEEN WA AND GA. 87
by the same English words. There is, however, a differ- ence of stress. When ga is used in any such phrase, we must emphasise the subject in the English translation ; when iva is used, we must emphasise the predicate. The Japanese themselves, as stated in IT 27, are not much given to the use of such emphasis. They prefer a change in the actual words. Thus Kore ga it means " This is good ; " whereas Kore wa ii means " This is good.'' The distinc- tion flows naturally from the original force of the two parti- cles, Kore ga ii being properly " The goodness of this," while Kore wa ii is properly "As for this, it is good."
To take another example : — if you are expecting your Japanese teacher, the servant will probably inform you of his arrival by ssiy ing Sensei wa miemashita, ** The teacher has come'* {lit, appeared). The etymological sense is, ** As for the teacher, he has come." But should the same personage arrive .in the middle of the night or at some other unusual hour, the servant will say Sensei ga mie- mashlta ; i.e., " The teacher has come," — more properly and etymologically, ** The coming of the teacher." So too of an unexpected death one would say, for instance, ^* Hayashi San ga shinimashltaj " Mr. Hayashi is dead." But if he had long been known to be past recovery, the phrase would be Hayashi San wa shinimashita, Mr. Ha- yashi is dead,''
tin comparative sentences the rule is very simple. The bject takes ga, while the word denoting the thing with ivhich the subject is compared is generally separated off by means of wa : thus : Kore yori wa, are ga ii, " This is better than //w/."| IT 127. The student,) who has followed this explanation with due regard to the original genitive force of ^a, will
88 THE POSTPOSITION.
perceive that there is nothing specially emphatic about ga in the Japanese idiom, though an emphasis on the word preceding it is its nearest equivalent in English. On the other hand, wa is emphatic and separative in Japanese, though there will generally be no emphasis on the corresponding portion of the phrase in English, when the English noun is a nominative. Wa, however, corres- ponds to an emphasised word in English whenever that word is not a nominative, as shown by several of the examples given above. IF 128. It may be asked: what is the rule in the case of two nominatives in antithetical clauses? The answer is that either ga may be used in both, or else wa may be used in both. Thus the fifth example on p. 84, Kore wa wasei, are wa hakurai, " This is of native make, that is an imported article," might be altered to Kore ga wasei, are ga hakurai. The effect would be to throw the emphasis more strongly on the two subjects than on the two predicates.
N. B. Sometimes wa, occurring after an adjective in ft«, must be rendered by *' if," thus:
Yoroshiku wa, dekakemasho*
" If you are all right let us start.'*
Elegant speakers sometimes prefer to say yoroshikuha, which is the form most used in the Book Language.
WO. II 129. Wo is the nearest Japanese equivalent to a sign of the accusative case, thus :
Tamago wo uderu. "To boil eggs,"
Mgg§ (accus.) io^Hi. • •
Yome wo
Bri4e (ace)
morau.
Sonna kake-ne wo
8nch exeettlre^riee {occ,)^
itchay komarimasu.
WO. 89
** To receive a bride," i.e., " to marry.'* (Of course said only of the man. A girl's
marrying is called yome ni iku, lit. ** to go as a
bride.")
( "I don't know what to do
|
Hito no |
kuru |
WO |
|
JFertmn *» |
emtmet |
iaccusJ) |
|
matsu. |
||
|
tO'Otgmig, |
if you ask such an exorbit- ant price," or more simply ^ "You should not ask such an ^exorbitant price.'''
L "To await the coming I of some one."
ir 130. Originally wo was nothing more than an interjec- tion serving, as it were, to interrupt the sentence and draw attention to the word to which it was suffixed. We must therefore not be surprised at its absence in many cases where European languages could not dis- pense with the accusative case. It is not that the wo has been dropped in such contexts, but that it never was there, thus : Baka iu.na I (very rude). | „ ^^^.^ ^^,^ nonsense."
Meshi kuu toki, f " When eating rice,"
Miee emi iime. \ " When dining."
Before the verb suru, ** to do," wo is mostly absent, as :
rr 1. f" To make a translation,"
Hon-yaku suru. |<. To translate."
Saisoku suru. <* To do urgency," i.e., " to urge on." IT 131. The student will sometimes meet with, and perhaps be puzzled by, sentences like the following :
Daijin-gata wo hajime, ( "All the officials
JW4t^i9ters(accu5.)begiHH4ug(trans.),]yfeirt there, from the
shO'kwan-in made soroimashtta. 1 ministers of state
mii^MeUUt UH trcrci-CMNiriele. (downwards."
go THE POSTPOSITION.
Here the first clause literally means "placing the ministers of state at the beginning." It is therefore but natural that the word daijin-gata, being what we should term an accusative, should take wo,
IT 132. In the Written Language, wo is often used adversa- tively at the end of a clause. But this is rare in the Colloquial, which prefers to use ga for that purpose, as already explained in 1^ 93.
YA.
1( 133. Ya is an interrogative and exclamatory particle of constant occurrence in the Written Language. In the Colloquial it is less used, excepting in such contexts as Haru ya ! **I say, Haru ! '* said when calling a person by name. It also occurs corruptly for wa after the in- definite forms of verbs, as explained in the N. B. on p. 86. Sometimes it has the sense of " and " or ** or," thus :
Tonari no uchi de, inu ya >
neko ga suki to miete^ emt» mf foud thmi aeemtiHg^
takusan ni katte orimasd,
qnauiitff 4h remMmg mre.
** They vjrould seem^ to be very fond of dogs and cats in the house next door ; for they keep quite a number of them."
or something
-y^nanika. Q other."
YE.- IT 134. Ye means " to," ** towards," hence sometimes "at:" Gakko ye 0 ide desu ka ? \ " Do you go to
Sehomi l«« h^mourakMe exit 4» f \ school ?"
* Some good authorities prefer the orthography E, as better repre- senting the pronnnciation. In Classical Japanese the word is spelt He, We follow the last edition of Dr. Hepburn's Dictionary.
YA, YE, AND YORU ^I
Station ye iki-gake. ni.
Station t0ward§ ifiHg'WhUe^
Rokumeikwan ye chotto yorimasu,
Mt0hnm»eimm» «l, Jn§i w4ll»»t0p.
** I will just look in at the Rokumei- kwan on my way to the station."
N. B. Rokumeikwan is the name of a well-known public building in Tokyo. It signifies " the Hall of the Cry of the Stag," in allusion to a line of ancient Chinese poetry.
Koko ye oite qite kudasai. i ** Please put it
HLere to pnttU^ig pHUiH(g €0m4le9C€Md. | down here."
N. B. The second oite is the sanfe verb as the first, but has only the force of an auxiliary (see 1[ 298).
YORI.
II 135. Yori means " from," ** since," " than : "
^^ . . ..,_ . ( " From Kyoto" (or its
Kamtgata yoru | neighbourhood). ^
,.,... . ( " Since the day before
Issakuptsu yoru lyesterday."
Nani yori kekkd na o / "Thanks for your .«»,«**.,/*«., vi««**i««<«r-g, gjjjj J present." {More shtna wo artgato , ^ r '^ „ V,"
^ieariieie (accus.) iMmuUfniY'^: J^' ^^^J^ "^O^^"
gozaimasu. splendid - than - any-
gggg^ Vthmg present.)
POSTPOSITIONS COMBINED.
If 136. Postpositions may be combined in Japanese, much as in English we say " in at," ** in by," ** away from," etc. Some instances have already occurred in the preced- ing portions of this chapter. Here are a few more : —
Go shimpai ni wa
mMuguki €u§je4etif Mo
oyobimasen.
" It is not worth your trou- bling about. (Ni ^^ is more em- phatic than ni alone would bie. For a still more emphatic construction with jii way see 1[ 124.)
92
THE POSTPOSIiriON.
Oshii koto ni wa
Megrmiimble fmei m§ indeed, .
N. B. Phrases of this kind are idiomatic and in constant use.
"It is a pity that..."
yn-ni'ji yori mo osoku^
Vtvelve'MmurM tha» eveu^ late
natcha iketnasen, m§»fer^ee0tmiMgf U^uo^gm.
Ano hlto to wa, goku ^
Vhmt perBmH mith aff^r, very
kon-i de gozaima$u,
iuiimmte 4».
Ano hen mo, moto
rhni neigMmnrhmed mif^ origin
to wa yohodo hirakemashita,
with mg^fer^ very tmmeh hUM-opened-'mHi*
** It won't' do to be later than twelve o'clock."
"He timate man."
IS very in- with that
" That neighbour- hood is much improv- ed compared with ,what it used to be,"
Isogazu ^o mo jvoros/m. (Familiar.) J "You needn't
BMrrpiHg-Het even, (is.) gomd, jhurry."
Kuru to ka iimashita. ( " If I mistake pot, he Cmme» ihmi f tmid. (said he would come."
Kao de mo o arai nasaru ^a.^ ("Will you )yash
Pace eveM, lMMewr«»#y ie-^agh deign f jyour face, Sir? "
N. B. De mo is often thus used in a manner not capable of transla- tion into English, though retaining the force of "even ** in Japanese.
Konnichi made no kan-
Ve-dap Ml '« mc
jo WO shimasho.
eenuU (accus,) teiii'do.
Sore made no koto ni\
Vhai tm U thing io
itashimasho.
90iiitmahe,
Ko^e made ni mitakqto' rhU Mi iuf BOW met
ga nakatta.
(nom,) 9em§'ii0l,
" I will do the accounts down to to-day." {More lit, the till-to-day's accounts.)
" I will let it alone " or " Don't let us think about it any more."
" I had never seen it till • now." {Made ni is stronger than made alone would be^)
POSTPOSITIONS COMBINED. 93
N. B. Made ni often corresponds to our word "by^.^in such phrases as myunichi made ni, ** by to-morrow ; " kachi-ji made nit ." by eight o'clock." The Japanese mind does not clearly apprehend the shade of difference which, with us, separates **by" from " till" in \ idtonks of this class.
IT 137. No followed by other postpositions generally has the substantive force of the English word " one " or " ones," already exemplified on pp. 75-76, thus :
Motto it no wa aritnasen ka ? ( " Haven't* you
JKpre gmmS mn^t eu^fpr^ mre-^mi f | any better Ones ? "
M6 chitto a no wo . u pjease show me misete kudasai. ' some _ rather better
tktwiHg €»iulei€eHd. j Ones.
Okii no ga hoshii. \ » I want a big one."
. Big 0Me mf \am) MesiroMt. j °
K6 iu no mo hayarimasn x a fhis kind too is
8^h0HeMmh0 are^fasMi^ua^ie ^ fashion. So
karay £oran nasat. { Y \ 1 "^Z »♦
^^cmmse^mHg^Bi'gimM^ee^H^eMeeu^f P^^^S« ^^ok at them.
^ Motto yasui no ni . skiyo. f "I think I will
JVEpre eheai^ Mte f 994ii'prmhahifr^0. (take a cheaper one."
% 138. Though the no of no ni may, as in the last example, be used in the sense of "one" or "ones," it more fre- quently signifies "whereas," "while," "when." It may be known to have this acceptation by noting that a verb (or an adjective equivalent to a verb) precedes it, as in the following sentence :
Moto no mama de yokatta
Origiu *B fa§hi0M ^y, wtaB'go0d
no ni, naze jun wo tjphereeu^ whff •rder {accus,)
. naoshxta ?
" Why have you chang- ed their order, when it ^did quite well , as it was?"
(Said, e.g., to a servant,)
94 ^HE POSTPOSITION.
As here exemplified, no ni occurs chiefly in phrases expressive of censure or regret. Cbnf. IT 287 for further details concerning this important idiom.
ir 139. Observe that wo and wa, when combined, change by euphony into woba, which is used to denote a spe- cially emphatic accusative ; also that de wa is often con- tracted into ja, as has already been incidentally mentioned in IT 89. jfuy owing perhaps to its being a modem cor- ruption, sounds somewhat more familiar than de wa, but the two are always interchangeable : —
Kimono ni abura woba kakemashlta. I ** I have stained Ci0thet0M, mii h»9e^iac€4* (myclotheswithoi/.'*
\S6 de wa nai,\
\S6 ja nai. | (Famil.)
So \de wa gozaimasen. [ ja M (Polite.)
Shubiki-gwai . ' ^ teppo wo utsu
Me^hliate^eifoud <••« gun [accus.) §trike koto ga dekimasen. met (nom.) cannmi'do.
. *' That is not so; ''"no."
** You mayn't shoot outside treaty limit$."
IF 140. Occasionally an ellipsis must be supplied. Thus to wa is sometimes equivalent' to to iu mono wa, as in the following sentence :
Go^-io^ to^ Mf/i* f " As-for* (the-thing-of-which people
naS 4%1; "n'« ->^) /^.f ?. ^^^' ^^'-I^^.'^*' "' '\ they talk^ of ? " i.e., "What is meant
,by the term go -jo?'' (See vocabulary.)
desH^ ka^^P
QUASI-POSTPOSITIONS.
II 141. What may be termed quasi-postpositions are really nouns preceded by the postposition «o, " of," and used
QUASI-POSTPOSITIOKS.
95
in a sense less copcrete th4n that originally belonging to them. Such are, for instance :
no hokUf " exterior of," i.e., ** besides" (metaph.).
no kagCf " shade of," no kawariy " change of," no mukOy " opposite of," no naka, ** interior of," no shita, " lower part of," no sotOj ** exterior of,"
no tame, ** sake of,"
no uchi, ** interior of,"
no ucy " top of,"
no ushiro, ** back of,"
no wakiy " side of,"
We thus get such phrases as :
le no uchi, Hei no soto, . Kura no naka, Omoi no hoka,
*' behind."
** instead of."
" opposite, " beyond."
** inside, in."
** below."
** outside, " beyond."
" because of,"
I" in order to." "inside, **in."
" on, " upon.
** behind."
"beside" (by the side).
" In(side) the house. " " Beyond the fence." ** In(side) the godown." " Outside of thought," i.e., ** unex- pectedly." Hanashi no tsuide, "• Occasion of talking," i.e., ** in the
course of conversation." Ano yatna no kage, " Behind those mountains."
ir 142. When followed by a verb, the quasi-postpositions take ni after them, except in the case of the substantive verb " to be," which requires de, unless when signifying " there is," etc. {De aru is generally contracted to da ; de gozaimasU to desu, and so on ; see p. 62). Thus ;
96 THE POSTPOSITION.
To-dana no naia ni \ „ ^ j^ {„ t^e cupboard."
Cnphmar4 *a inaide Im,
haitte imasu,
euieriHg U*
(One might equally well say. Todana no naka desu).
Tsukue no ue ni notte imasen] «< jg^j'^ j^ q^ ^^^
. f*"* '' *•' -' ••'f'-f ' *'"'' table ? — Yes, it kap — Tsukue no ue desu. J '
f rakie *$ Up {it)i».
IS.'
'Kono hoka ni mata
VhU^f heaidea, «^«tfM
. iro-iro gozaunasU.
"There are various kinds besides this one."
(For kono=i** of this,*' sec p. 5a ; simi- larly for sono immediately below.)
Kawa no mukd de gozaimasu. | ** It is on the other j»««r »# mppmaiu {it) u. (side of the fiver."
Note also the idiom sono kawari niy lit. "change of that," used in the sense of ** on the other hand." IT 143. When prefixed attributively to a noun, this class of words changes the wt into no, in accordance with the rule explained in II iii, thus:
Tansu no naka no kimono. (. "' ^he clothes in
Cheai-of-drawera '« interior '« eUthea. \ *"^ Cnest Ot draw-
lers. Kono hoka no shina-mono, ( "The other things
rhia^f exierimr '# artieiea. jbesides these."
Mon no waki no momiji wa,
Gnie *a aide *a aaaapie ma^fmr^
rippa ni koyo shimashlta. apieudidlg red^ieaf haa'dome*
"The leaves of the maple -tree by the gate have become beautifully red."
% 144. When a member of this class of words follows a verb, its force changes slightly, so as to correspond to that of an English adverb or conjunction, thus:
QUASI-POSTPOSITIONS.
97
Kate kore suru uchi ni,
Vhnt ihU do wMiet
hi ga kuremashita. dmif (nom.) aarkened.
** While we were doing all this, night came on.'*
(Note the idiom kare kore, " that and this," or, as we should say, V*'this, that, and the other.")
So suru hoka, shtkata
Sm do except, mfUft^f "doing
ga nai. (nom.) 4»u*t,
Kind furimashlta kawari\
l^eBierdmjg raided change
niy kyo wa it o
4th io'dag mffoTf good honour*
tenki {de gozaimasu) mhie wteather (it).
^ * There is nothing else I to be done."
" Whereas it rained yesterday (i.e., after yes- terday's rain), it is beau- tiful weather to-day."
145. There are also quasi-postpositions formed by ni
and the gerunds of verbs, as ni atattCy " just at," from
atarUy " to strike ; " ni shitagattCy " according to," from
shltagauy ** to conform ; " ni yotte, ** owing to," from
yoru ** to rely ;" thus :
" It is rude to say that to a guest."
I "I know not how to excuse ^myself to you."
*'I am
sorry now for my extrava- gance."
Kyaku ni taishite, shitsurei desH.
Cmeti to confroHiing, mdenett it,
Anatani taishitCy moshi-wake ga go-
X*<9« to confronting, excnte (nom,)
zaimasen,
is'not,
Amari nyuhi wo kake-sugimashh
Voonnnch expenae (accus,) haoing^plmcethexcc' te, ima ni itatte kokwai shite imasu, ededf now to reaching, repentance doing ant,
Shinnen ga kimasil ni yotte^X
Jfew'gear(nom.) eon$e§ to owing,
o kazari wo
hononrahie decorationa (accus,)
itasankereha narimasen.
if^wo'don^i'mahe, (it)doean*t^heeome,j
" As the New Year is approaching, it "will never do not to decorate (the gate)."
CHAPTER VI.
The Numeral.
CARDINAL NUMBERS.
IT 146. In European grammars the numerals are generally disposed of in a few lines, as forming a mere subdivision of the adjective. In Japanese the numeral is rather a species of noun, and a species of noun with marked peculiarities of its own, necessitating its treatment as a separate part of speech.
IF 147. There are two sets of numerals, one of native and the other of Chinese origin. The native set is now obsolete except for the first ten numbers, which are as follows : —
1 hitotsu
2 futatsu
3 mitsu
4 yotsu
5 itsutsu
6 mutsu
7 nanatsu
8 yatsu
9 kokonotsu
10 to
|
M. FORM USED IN COMPOUNDS. |
ENUMERATIVB FORM. |
||
|
htto(-tsuki){ I month' |
) hi |
||
|
ruta(- |
„ K 2 |
» ) |
fn |
|
mi(- |
.. ;(3 |
mi |
|
|
yo(- |
,. ;(4 |
.. ) |
yd |
|
itsu(- |
» ;(5 |
1 itsu • |
|
|
mu(- |
» X6 |
91 |
1 mu |
|
nana(- |
» ;(7 |
9} |
\ nana |
|
ya(- |
» ;(8 |
19 |
) y& |
|
kohono(- |
» ;( 9 |
91 |
) ho{ko)no |
|
to(- |
.. >>(io |
)) |
) io I |
NATIVE JAPANESE NUMERALS. 99
N. B. It will assist the memory to notice that the even numbers are formed from the odds of which they are the doubles by a process of vowel -strengthening, the consonants being originally the same, though slightly disfigured in modern pronunciation, thus :
I hUo (anciently probably /i/o), 2/u/a (anciently probably /u/a).
3 mi, 6 wru.
4yo, Sy2u
5 itsu (anciently i/u), xo to,
IT 148. The substantive forms of the numerals may either be used quite alone, or they may follow the noun, or lastly they may take the postposition wo, " of, " and precede the noun. They very rarely precede a noun without the intervention of no. Thus : —
Ikutsu gozaimasu ka f—Hitotsu. | ** How many are Mtg'mauw ore f o»e. (there? — One.*'
Tsutsumi hitotsu, or ) *, in, . „
Hitotsu no tsutsumi. ] " One parcel.
Mitsu de takusan (de gozaimasho).
"Three will no doubt be (plenty.'*
Yatsu de tarimasH ka?
JBighi hw, wiii-'Bumee f
To hakari kudasai.
SFen ahmui emuifeBeeHd,
Iki mo kaeri mo
O0ia^g atB09 reinruiufg atBO^
hitotsu michi,
0ue road.
\ **Will eight be enough ?"
" Please give me about ten.**
'^Taking the same road there and. back again."
IT 149. The form used in compounds always precedes the noun to which it refers, as hito-tskkiy ** one month ; ** futa-hako, " two boxfuls ; *' mi-han^ ** three nights.'*
IT 150. The enumerative form is used in counting over things, e.g. a bundle of paper money, linen to be sent to the %ash, etc.
zoo THE NUMERAL.
IT 151. Though the native Japanese numerals above "ten " . are now obsolete for ordinary purposes, note that hatacki^ the old native word for " twenty,'* is still used in the sense of "twenty years of age, " and that chiy "a thousand, " and yorozu, " a myriad, "or " ten thousand, " are still retain- ed in proper names ^nd in a few idioms, e.g. Chi-shima, " the Thousand Isles," i.e., ** the Kurile Islands ;" Yorozu- ya, a favourite shop-name, probably originating in the fact of many sorts of articles being exposed for sale.
IT 152. The set of numerals borrowed from the Chinese is : — ■
1 ichi, rarely itsu 6 rokuy rarely riku
2 ni 7 shichi
3 san 8 hathi
4 shi 9 kuy rarely kyu
5 go 10 >
100 hyaku 1,000 sen 10,000 man or ban
N. B. Ichi also means "whole,** *• all,** as ichi-nichi, " one day," but also " all day long.'* The native Japanese numeral httOt " one," has come to have the same secondary sense in certain cases, as hito-ban, "one night" or "all night"
All the Others are formed by combining these, thus :
11 jU-ichi 20 ni-jH 2g ni-ju-ku
12 ju-ni 21 ni-jU'ichi ^o san-ju
13 jU-san 22 ni-ju-ni 40 shi-jil i^ju-shi 2^ ni-ju-san 50 go-ju ^5 j'^'go 24 ni'jU'Shi 60 roku-ju 16 ju-roku 25 ni'ju-go 70 shlchi-jfc ly jU'Shichi 26 ni- ju-roku So hachi-jil iSju-hachi 27 ni-ju-shlchi 90 ku-jH igju-ku 28 ni-ju-hachi 100 ip-pyaku (for
ichi hyaku)
CHINESE NUMERALS. lOI
200 ni-hyaku 300 sam-hyaku (for san hyaku)
1,000 iS'Sen (for ichi sen) 10,000 ichi-man
100,000 fu-man 1,000,000 hyaku -man
108 hyaku hachi 365 savi-hyaku roku-jU-go 1,889 ^^--s^w hap'pyaku hachi-ju-ku 38,000,000 san-zen hap-pyaku-man
There is a term oku meaning 100,000, and a term cho meaning 1,000,000; but they are scarcely ever used, being almost always replaced by multiples of man, as in the examples just given.
IT 153. The Chinese numerals are not often used indepen- dently. It is customary to make them precede a noun, with which they form a sort of compound, as ichi-nen, " one year ;'* is-sun (for ichi sun), ** one inch.**
In forming such combinations, note the category of letter- changes of which the following are examples :
ch it'Cho for ichi cho ** one c/w* '*
hat-cho „ hachi cho ** eight „
|
jit-cho |
„ ju cho |
*^ten „ |
|
/"and h ip-pun |
„ ichi fun |
** one minute '* |
|
ip'pen |
„ ichi hen |
** once " |
|
sam-pun\ |
„ san fun |
** three minutes '* |
|
sam-ben |
„ san hen |
" thrice ** |
|
top 'pun |
„ rokufun |
** six minutes ** |
|
r op -pen |
„ roku hen |
" six times " |
|
jip-pun |
„ juftin |
** ten minutes *' |
|
jip-pen |
„ ju hen |
** ten times '* |
♦ A measure of distance equivalent to about 120 yards English, t Some words change /, not into /, but into b \ thus sam-btikUf " three scrolls," from san oxid fuku. .,,-^-'^*"
102
THE numeral:
m
sh
{hyap'pufiHov hyakufun hyap-pen „ hyaku hen
' a hundred minutes)" ' a hundred times "
|
{sem-hurr' |
sen fun |
" a thousand minutes)" |
||
|
sem-ben |
sen-hen |
" a thousand times " |
||
|
ik-kin |
ichi kin |
" one |
pound " |
|
|
san-gin |
san kin |
" three |
pounds " |
|
|
rok-kin |
roku kin |
**six |
n |
|
|
jik-kin |
ju kin |
"ten |
>> |
|
|
hyak-kin |
hyaku kin |
" a hundred „ |
||
|
sen-gin |
sen kin |
" a thousand „ |
||
|
sant'tnai |
san mai |
" three |
(flat things)" |
|
|
sem-mai |
sen mai |
** a thousand „ |
||
|
is 'SO |
ichi so |
"one |
(vessel)" |
|
|
san-z6\ |
san so |
" three |
(vessels)" |
|
|
has-so |
hachi so |
" eight |
>> |
|
|
jis-so |
jUsd |
"ten |
}) |
|
|
sen-zo |
sen so |
" a thousand ,, |
||
|
iS'Shaku |
ichi shaku |
"one |
foot" |
|
|
haS'Shaku |
hachi shaku |
" eight |
feet " |
|
|
[jiS'Shaku"^ |
ju shaku |
"ten |
")" |
|
|
it-teki |
ichi teki |
"one |
drop " |
|
|
hat-teki |
hachi teki |
" eight |
drops " |
jit-teki „ ju teki " ten „
N. 6. Though the difficulty of making these letter- changes cor- rectly will strike the beginner chiefly in the case of numeral combina- tions, the same euphonic rules apply to all other Chinese compounds, thus:
ket-chakUf from ketsu chaku^ •* decision," " final resolve.*' iem-pOf „ ten ho, (See vocabulary.)
♦ Not in use.
t Some words in 5 do not change the s into ar, thus san-satsu, ** three volumes," not san-zatsu.
|
Nip-pon, from nitsu hon. |
|
|
akku. |
, aku kdy |
|
amtna, |
, an may |
|
mes-sOf |
, metsu sOy |
|
zas-shi, |
, zatsu shi, |
|
het'to, |
, betsu to, |
PECULIARITIES OF NUMERALS. I0|
" Japan." *' bad language." ** a shampoocr." ** extravagant." " a magazine," "a review." " a groom." (In practice the hyphen is generally omitted in such wends.)
IF 154. The Japanese numerals, as far as they go, are most- ly employed with Japanese nouns, and the Chinese nu- merals with Chinese nouns. But there are numerous ex- ceptions to this rule, for instance :
it'toki (but also ktto-toki), " one hour." futa-fufUf " two married couples."
mi'ban^ ** three nights."
yo-nen, " four years."
After " ten," beyond which the Japanese numerals no longer run, the Chinese numerals are perforce employed with Japanese as well as with Chinese words, thus :
jU'tii hakOy " twelve boxfuls." hyaku kumi, a hundred sets. IF 155. Usage plays various freaks with the numerals. Thus the Chinese numeral shiy " four," which is consider- ed unlucky because homonymous with shi, " death," is in many contexts replaced by the equivalent Japanese numeral yo] for instance :
. yo-nitiy "four persons." {Shi-nin means "a corpse.") ni'jU-yO'ban, ** No. 24."
N. B. The vulgar sometimes go a step further, corrupting the yo into yon. Thus they will say yon-jU, instead of ski-ja, " forty."
The Chinese shichi, " seven," is sometimes replaced by the Japanese nana. This is done for clearness ' sake, as shichi is easily confoundied With sAt, **four.** Thus
t04 THE NUMERAL.
tradesmen will often say nana-jis-sen, instead of shtchi- jis-setiy " seventy cents." But this is never either neces- sary or elegant. IF 156. Usage likewise establishes a shade of difference in the sense of certain expressions which would at first sight appear to be synonymous, thus :
hitO'hako, " one boxful ; " hako hitotsu, ** one box." hito-tsuki, "one month;" ichi-getsu, " the first month," i.e., **January;" ik-ka-getsu, "one month." (For ka see H 159, middle of p. 106.)
hlto-hany " one night ;" ichi-ban, " number one." fiita-ban, ** two nights ;" ni-ban, " number two." N. B. Both these ban^s are of Chinese origin ; but they are differ- ent words written with different characters.
AUXILIARY NUMERALS.
IT 157. In English we do not say " one bread," " two beers," but " one loaf of bread," ** two glasses of beer." Similar- ly we say " ten sheets of paper," "a hundred head of cattle," "so many rubbers of whist." Compare also the Pidjin- English " piecey," in such expressions as " one piecey man," "two piecey house," etc. Words of this kind are, in Japanese grammar, termed " auxiliary numerals." " Auxiliaries to the numerals" would be more strictly correct. The term "classifier" has also been proposed ; but " auxiliary numeral " is that which has obtained the widest currency. The auxiliary numerals constitute a highly important class of words. For whereas in English such expressions as those just mentioned are somewhat exceptional, they are the rule in Japanese.
II 158. In some cases, indeed, the numeral is prefixed direct- ly to the noun, e.g., ichi-nichiy " one day ;" ichi-nin, " one
AUXILIARY NUMERALS. I05
person;" ichuriy "one league." But usage ordinarily demands the insertion of an auxiliary numeral, as :
tera ik-kefiy " temple one eaves," i.e., " one Buddhist
temple."' fiton sam-mai, "quilt three flat-things," i.e., "three- quilts." onna roku-nin, "woman six persons," i.e., "six women." N. B. One may also say ik-ken no tera, sam-mai no fUton^ etc. IF 159. The choice of the auxiliary numeral appropriate to each class of words is fixed by custom, a mistake in this matter producing the same absurd effect as does a wrong gender in French or German. The Japanese auxiliary numerals are, however, easier to remember than the French and German genders, since they are generally more or less founded on reason, as will be seen by the following list of those most in use. As the auxiliary numerals are always employed, not independently, but in combination with the numerals proper, we give them here preceded in each case by ichi, " one," and «t, " two." The student should carefully notice the phonetic changes caused in many instances by the presence of ichi^ and should refer to the table of changes on pp. loi — 102. The presence pf ni causes no such changes. An auxiliary numeral may therefore always be seen in its original shape when following that word. The chief auxiliary numerals are :
(ichi'bUy ni, etc.-) bu,'* a class ;" for copies of a book. (it-cho, ni')ch6f " a handle ; " for things with
handles, such as muskets, jinri- kishas, and many kinds of tools. {ichi-daiy ni')dai, " a stand ;" for carriages and jin- riklshas.
I06 THE NUMERAL.
{ip'puku, ni-YukUf (various meanings ;) for scrolls, sips of tea, whiffs of tobacco, and doses of medicine.
(ip'pai, ni')haiy " a wine-cup ;" for cupfuls and
glassfuls of any liquid.
N. B. Ip-pai also means " full."
(ip'piki, ni')hikiy " a fellow ;" for most living crea- tures, excepting human beings and birds ; also for certain quan- tities of cloth and sums of money.
(ip'pon, m-)hony " a stem ; " for cylindrical things,
such as sticks, trees, fans, pens, bottles, newspapers rolled up to be posted, etc.
{ichi'jOf «v][;o, " a mat ;** for mats.
{ik'ka, ni-)ka^ " the culm of the bamboo ; " for
a few things that have no other auxiliary numeral appropriated to them, and especially for times and places.
{ik'Metiy ni-)ken, " eaves ;'* for buildings generally.
(ik-kyaku, ni-)kyakUf ** a leg ;" for chairs and tables.
{ik-ko, ni-)kOf the same as ka, but less used.
{ichi-maiy ni')mai^ " a shrub ; " for flat things, such as sheets of paper, coins, plates, coats, shirts, rugs, etc.
{ichi-mei, ni')meiy " a name ; " for human beings. This word met is somewhat bookish ; nin is more genuinely Colloquial.
AUXILIARY NUMERALS.
tor
{ichi'tnenj ni')men^
{ichi-nitif ni')tiin, {is-satsu, ni')satsu,
** a surface ; " for mirrors and framed pictures (Jap. gaku), " a person ; " for human beings. " a volume ; " for volumes of a book. Do not confound satsu with few, which latter refers to complete copies of a work, irre- spective of the number of volumes contained in it. ** a head ; " for poems. " a boat ; " for boats and ships of every description. ** a foot ; " for pairs of socks, clogs, and boots.
"a head; for some few quadrupeds, such as horses and cattle. But it is safer to use hiki in all cases. **a feather; " for birds. This word suffers irregular phonetic changes, thus : 3 sam-ha 4 shi-wa 5 go-wa 6 rop-pa 7 shichi-wa 8 hachi-wa 9 ku-wa 10 jip-pa
ir 160. EXAMPLES OF THE USE OF THE AUXILIARY NUMERALS.
" One sheet of (a certain com- mon kind of) paper."
** One (Japanese) poem."
** One mirror."
** Two pen-knives."
{is-shUf ni')shu, (is-sOf ni-)sdf
{is-sokuy m')sokUf
{it-tOy ni-)td,
(ichi'Wa, ni-)way
Hanshi ichi-mai.
Uta is-shu. Kagami ichi-inen, KO'gatana ni-cho, Fude sam-bon.
«* Three pens."
I^
THE NUMERAL.
" Five volumes." {JJon= "book.")
I" Six places."
** Ten war-vessels."
I " A hundred head of cattle."
I "A thousand sparrows" (in (nature).
" A thousand sparrows" (in art).
Ichi-nim-biki no kuruma. f "A jinrikisha with one
One^erMOifpuU *§ vehicle, {man."
Ichi'fiin-nori no kuruma. f " A jinrikisha capable^ of One-pertoi^iife '# vehicle, (holding One person only."
Ni-nin-nori no kuruma. f "A jinrikisha capable of rwo'per.oH^iae '# vehuie. (holding two persons."
Ni-tO'biki no basha. J **A wrriage with two Two-heaa-pull 't carriafre. (horses."
Hon gO'Satsu. Rok-ka-sho.
SiX'pieceff^lace.
Gunkan jiS'SO.
Ushi hyap-piki. Ushi hyaku'to.
Suzume sem-ba. Sem-ba suzume.
{
Tsugi no ma kara isu >
JVexi of r00am ftotm chair
wo san-kyaku bakari (accusj ihrec'leif ahoni
motte koi. carrffi^K ceme.
Aral ip-piki no mushr
Oh i oue^ieceff of ingeci
WO ko-tori ga ni-wa {accus.) Bmall'biril (nom.)iic0'9t>iug de arasotte, hipparikko
hff attpntiHg, pull
shite orimasit^ dmiHg are.
<'Just bring in three ^chairs from the next room." (Said to one^s own ser- vant or to a coolie.)
** I say ! there are two
little birds fighting over
-an insect, and pulling it
backwards, and forwards
between them."
NATIVE AUXILIARY NUMERALS.
109
Go 'go no san-ji v
J^pcwafter 0f ihree^honr
goro ni deru kara, sore
mhmni mi if c^omi because, thai
made ni nunim-hiki no
'^f ./^ '-f-^^y^.-i'-''.;^ Isee that Sijinrikisha with jinnki tchi-dat shita-f . . •' , r_
JinrihiBha ^He^Btand pre'
ku sasete- oite
t§armii0u ennBiHg»i0'do pMaeing
kudasai,.
^OHdeBceuif,
de
**Iamgoingoutatabout three o'clock. So please
two men is ready for me by then. ''
Ddgu-ya
A
" Please send a coolie to fetch a pair of screens and ^two kakemonos, which I have just purchased at the curio-dealer's."
bydbu
Curim'h^tBBe «l» Bcreeu
is 'SO tOy kakemono
oue^air and, hamgiug^Bcroii
ni-fuku katte
tiro^order hawing^oughi
oita kara, kozukai wo
placed heeaHBe, emoiie (accus,)
tori ni yatte kudasai,
fetch t0 Bending condeBcend* ^
IT 161. It will be noticed that all the examples hitherto given of auxiliary numerals are Chinese.* The auxiliary numerals of native Japanese origin are far less numerous. The only ones worth mentioning here are : — {hito-) hashiray ** a post ; " for Shinto divinities.
„ kumiy ** a company ; " for sets of things or persons, such as toys consisting of more than one part,, tea-sets, nests of boxes that fit into each other, pairs of gloves, parties of tourists, etc. „ mune, "the ridge of a roof; " for houses and any groups of buildings included under one roof.
• Wa (p. 107) indeed is Japanese. But we have classed it under the Chinese auxiliary numerals, because it is always used in conjunction with the Chinese numerals icki, ni, etc.
no THE NUMBRALr
{hito-) soroe, ** a match ; " for sets of things of like nature, such as suits of clothes. „ sujif " a line ; *' for rope -like things. „ tomaiy *'a hut thatched with matting;*' for godowns (store-houses). The native auxiliary numerals up to " ten " inclusive take the Japanese numerals before them, thus : futa- hashirUf mi-kumiy mU'tomai. After ** ten " they take the Chinese numerals, thus : jd-ni-hashira, ni-ju-kumi, shi- ju-kachi-tomai. No euphonic changes take place.
N. B. Things having no special auxiliary numeral appropriated to them are counted by means of the native Japanese numerals hltotsu, futatsuj etc.; thus tatnago httotsut " one egg ; " momo to bakari ** about ten peaches." Even things provided with a special auxiliary numeral sometimes replace the latter by httotsu, f&tatsth etc., in slipshod talk.
IT 162. In Classical Japanese, human beings are counted by means of the native numerals, with the unexplained suffix tari attached. Of these words the Colloquial language has only retained the following :
hltori, (for hito-tarif) " one person ; "
/atari {ior futa-tari), ** two persons : **
yottari {£ot yo-tariy) ** four persons ; "
which are used concurrently with, but oftener than, their
Chinese synonyms ichi-nitiy ni-nin and yo-nin."^
IT 163. Questions respecting number and quantity are asked by means of the word iku^ which is, however, not used alone, but always in combination, thus :
iku-ra ? how much ?, lit, ** about how much ? ", ra being
* See IF 155 for the substitution, even before Chinese auxiliary numerals, of Japanese yo for Chinese shi^ *'four."
INTERROGATIVE NUMERAL WORDS. Ill
the particle of vagueness already mentioned in pp. 28 — 29 as helping to form certain plurals ;
ikU'tahi ? ** how often ? *'
iku'tsu ? " how many ? "
;K:£V/} •' " (said of people); iku-mai ? „ „ (said of flat things) ;
iku'hon ? ,, „ (said of cylindrical things) ;
and so on with all the auxiliary numerals. IT 164. Iku may be replaced by naniy usually shortened to nan in such contexts. Nani, though itself Japanese, is chiefly found before words of Chinese origin, thus : nan-ji ? " what o'clock ? ** nan-nen ? " how many years ? ** nan-nin ? ** how many persons ? " nan-ri ? *^how many leagues ? " Very often the word hodo, ** about," is added, thus : nan-nen hodo ? nan-ri hodo ? " How much ? " is often rendered by ika-hodo ? dore hodo? or dono kurai P all really meaning ** About how much ? " ir 165. The following are examples of the use of the Japan- ese auxiliary numerals and of the interrogative numeral words :
Sakazuki hlto-kumi, " One set of 5a^^-cups." Yofuku hitO'Soroe. ** One suit of foreign clothes." Kami fhUa-hashira. ** Two Shinto deities." O iku-tari de
gozatmasu, aref
*' How many are there in your party ? "
Yottari desii. " There are four of us."
Nan-ji desu ? " What o'clock is it ? "
IIZ
THE NUMERAL,
Iku-tsu gozaimasu ? Iku-hon „
Iku-mai (etc.) „
**How many are there ? *' (The choice of one or other oC these Japanese equivalents depends on the na- ture of the object referred to. See t 159.)
Kono This
iku-ra Kesa
VhU
kwaji
no
fansu desup
ake-gata
dmWH *B
dty naga-ya ga futa-mune yaketCy
tw0 r00f'^i4geB hmviMg bnrnif
dozo ga hitO'tomai ochita g^dowtn (nom.) one^hui feii
SO desu,
4»,
"How cabinet ?
much is this
"They say that two naga-ya were burnt ^down and one godown ruined by the fire at dawn this morninsr.*'
/
ORDINAL, FRACTIONAL, ETC., NUMBERS.
^ 166. What we term ordinal numbers are sometimes marked by suffixing the word me (" eye **) to the Japanese, or bamme (6a«=x "number ") to the Chinese cardinal num- bers ; or else the word dai (" order **) may be prefixed and nothing added, or dai may be prefixed and bamme added, to the Chinese cardinal numbers. All such forms take the postposition mo, " of," When preceding a noun, thus :
/ Futsuka-me, " The second day."
Ni'do-mey "The second time."
Nan-cho-me ? " What ward (of a street)? "
Ni-cho-mej "The second V ward."
Futatsu-met Ni 'bamme, Dai ni-ban, Dai ni-bamme.
"The second."-/
Nan -go irasshaimasu ?
no
shitsu ni
r99tm iu
" What is the number of your room (or cabin)?"
ORDINAL NUMBERS, YEAR-NAMBS. II^
Dai san-gd ni ori- \ . ^^
Order ihreetammher 4m mmt. I '^I am in number three.'
masu, ]
lida-machi rokU'Cho-me f " No. 20 of the 6th ward . ni'ju'banchi. (C/ft= "earth.*') (of lida street."
IF 167. Notwithstanding the existence of such forms as the above, the Japanese mind has not, properly speaking, a very clear idea of the distinction between cardinal numbers and ordinal numbers, for which reason the cardinal numbers are often used in an ordinal senses Thus : —
Meiji ni-jU'San-nen (lit. "Meiji 23 year"), "the twenty- third year of (the chronological period termed) Meiji," i.e., "A.D. 1890," according to the European reckoning. Similarly ni-gwatsu or ni-getsu (lit. " two month "), i.e., " February ; '' ju4chi-nichi (lit. " eleven day"), i.e., " the eleventh day of the month."
N, B, The context generally shows whether the number should be taken as a cardinal or as an ordinal. Sometimes the cardinal numbers are distinguished by the insertion of an auxiliary numeral. Thus " two months *' would be ni-ka-getsu, or, in native Japanese parlance and without any auxiliary numetaXt fita-tsUki.
IT 168. Years are usually counted by what are termed " year-names" (Jap. nengo),