Wednesday, September 4, 2013

yesterday, today, tomorrow

Yesterday, today, tomorrow are very frequently used in our everyday life. Not often as these three but the day before yesterday and the day after tomorrow are also used. How do you say in Japanese?

the day before yesterday - o-to-to-i  おととい
yesterday - ki-no-u or ki-no-o  きのう
today - kyo-u or kyo-o  きょう
tomorrow - a-su あす or a-shi-ta あした
the day after tomorrow - a-sa-tte あさって

These are all Native Japanese. We have the Chinese origin words for these and use in some occasions (usually in somehow official occasions and in writing) but we here only talk about the Native Japanese words.

Unlike English there seems no word for <day> used. <Day> is <hi, ひ(Chinese character、日)> in Native Japanese. Actually <day> is <hi, ひ> is hudden. As these words have been so frequently used the pronunciation has been deformed (changed).

the day before yesterday - o-to-to-i  おとと
The final syllable highly likely should have been <hi, ひ>.

yesterday - ki-no-u or ki-no-o  きの
The final syllable used be pronounced as <hu, ふ>(used be written as ki-no-hu (fu) きの). This hu (fu) ふ may have originally been pronounced as <hi (fi), ひ>

today - kyo-u or kyo-o  きょ
Likewise the final syllable used be pronounced as <hu, ふ>(used be written as ke-hu (fu) けふ ). This hu (fu) ふ may have originally been pronounced as <hi (fi), ひ> .

tomorrow - a-shi-ta あした
< a-shi-ta あした> also means "morning" although archaic. This may remind you that in German "(der) Morgen" (noun) means "morning" while "morgen" (adverb) means "tomorrow". The transitions processes are similar. Beside we have the following (not forward but backward).

<yu-u-be ゆうべ> means "evening" as well as "last night (evening)".


sptt


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