Talk:Early Middle Japanese

Adjectives

If, like Vovin, you assume adjectives with stems ending in -si and haplology (si.si > -si.) in the conclusive, there is only one type of regular conjugation:

Adjective root	Irrealis 未然形	Adverbial 連用形	Conclusive 終止形	Attributive 連体形	Realis 已然形	Imperative 命令形
taka-		-ku	-si	-ki	-kere
	-kara	-kari	-si	-karu		-kare
kanasi-		-ku	-	-ki	-kere
	-kara	-kari	-	-karu		-kare

So much simpler, but try selling it to the "traditionalists"! --RJCraig 19:49, 2 February 2007 (UTC)

Yes, it is simpler. And I generally agree with it. Another analysis is to remove the conclusive -si and handle it separately. Then the -k- becomes part of the stem. However, I tried to describe the morphological reality rather as generally accepted rather than theory. Bendono 03:35, 3 February 2007 (UTC)

I haven't seen the analysis carried that far before. That would essentially mean that the stem of every adjective ended in -k...a slightly unusual situation, all in all. (Stem allomorphy or some rather ad hoc phonological "phinagling" to derive the conclusive?) As far as general acceptance...vox populi.... --RJCraig 05:42, 3 February 2007 (UTC)

Chronology

The language of the Heian period is most often called (Vovin, Frellesvig, etc.) "Early Middle Japanese", as it is closer to Middle Japanese of the Kamakura and Muromachi periods than to Old Japanese. And since there is no real consensus about the details of the chronology, historical stages of the language should be refered to as "language of the ***th century" rather than "from year *** to year ***". Tomaaru 02:16, 22 April 2007 (UTC)

e and ye into e?

Not that e and ye into ye, and then to e? 202.120.36.179 05:45, 28 June 2007 (UTC) (Anonymous coward)

There were two separate phonemes: /e/ and /ye/. During this period they merged together into a single phoneme: /e/. At this time /e/ was pronounced [ye]. Bendono 06:38, 28 June 2007 (UTC)

I added a few references. Bendono 12:44, 28 June 2007 (UTC)

Using Hiragana and Katakana?

I'm no expert on Chuko, but they used Hiragana, Katakana and Han characters? I always thought that Hiragana and Katakana were created when Modern Japanese was in use...Moocowsrule (talk) 08:16, 24 August 2008 (UTC)Moocowsrule I'm smart. I looked on the Hiragana and Katakana pages. Sorry.Moocowsrule (talk) 08:20, 24 August 2008 (UTC)Moocowsrule

上一段 and 下一段

How come the 'Lower Monograde' conjugations are listed with the 'e' all the time, while Upper Monograde is (correctly) listed without the 'i'? To me it seems that regarding Japanese grammar in general there is a lot of confusion regarding the difference between grammatical inflection (-> change) on the one hand, and okurigana on the other (albeit partial okurigana, so as to avoid having to regard 超える and 食べる as being different). - 62.234.162.163 (talk) 10:41, 25 October 2008 (UTC)

Name change

As indicated above, and per Martin (1987:77), Miyake (2003:67), and Frellesvig (1995:11), this page should be moved Early Middle Japanese. The details remain the same; the name changes only. Bendono (talk) 07:07, 11 July 2009 (UTC)

/je/ after consonants?

The wiki page lists /je/ as the reconstruction for <e>. I would assume this means え=/je/, not that all instances of the vowel e were realised as /je/ - surely べ was not pronounced /bje/! (The same would hold true for /wo/.) Am I correct in this assumption? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Sjiveru (talk • contribs) 01:15, 14 June 2010 (UTC)

Missing b?

I noticed that b is missing from the table of consonants. Was there really no b or is it just a mistake? CodeCat (talk) 17:40, 18 March 2011 (UTC)

Need some advice

@Eirikr and Kanguole: Previously, I modified Early middle Japanese like the OJ(almost the whole article). Is there any mistake or better way to represent?--C44986054 (talk) 04:52, 26 May 2022 (UTC)

@C44986054: My time over the next few days is somewhat limited, but I'd be happy to have a read-through. ‑‑ Eiríkr Útlendi │^{Tala við mig} 16:28, 26 May 2022 (UTC)

@C44986054: MOS:JAPAN says to avoid ruby characters. It also says that the original script for a term should be given in the article about that topic (e.g. Early Middle Japanese) but not in other articles. Thus, for example, this article has a link to Heian Period, which gives the script for that term, so there is no need to repeat it here. The motivation in both cases is to avoid interrupting the flow of the text, which would make it more difficult to read, without adding information that is already present (albeit one more click away). Kanguole 22:35, 26 May 2022 (UTC)

Good advice, @Kanguole, thank you for that!

Separately, I've gone through the #Writing_system section -- although I didn't take any comprehensive measures regarding ruby, since I hadn't seen Kanguole's note here yet.

I'll point out that the literal translations of various terms are distracting and often incorrect -- 仮名, for instance, doesn't literally mean "fake name", but rather "borrowed label".

Also, @C44986054, note that there should be a space between any (parentheses) or [brackets] and words that come before or after.

I'll have a go at other sections when I have time.

HTH, ‑‑ Eiríkr Útlendi │^{Tala við mig} 00:13, 27 May 2022 (UTC)

@Eirikr: OK, I think "假" is used to represent "fake" in modern Chinese, so I forget its etymology([1], [2]). It does mean "borrow" in classical Chinese (ex. 假途滅虢). I'll instantly correct it. @Kanguole: I'll delete the Ruby of terms, as for the Rubys in classical quotes do you think it's appropriate?--C44986054 (talk) 05:53, 27 May 2022 (UTC)

The idea is (1) no ruby characters at all (except when explaining ruby itself, which isn't relevant here), and (2) no script form when the term has a linked article (which will contain the script), e.g. for Heian Period, Old Japanese and Late Middle Japanese in the lead.

If you want to present the structure of a sentence, one possibility is to use {{fs interlinear}}, which will give a presentation similar to other language articles.

Taking into account the audience on the English-language Wikipedia, I think each lexical item discussed should be given in romaji, with quite a lot less hiragana. Kanguole 17:38, 27 May 2022 (UTC)

• I'm working on editing the ===Developments=== section. This paragraph seems problematic to me:

In the 10th century, /e/ and /je/ progressively merged into /e/, and /o/ and /wo/ had merged into /wo/(お) by the 11th century.

...

I don't have access to those references -- do they really say that /e/ and /je/ merged into /e/? I'm much more accustomed to the opposite, that these merged first into /je/. See also the Daijisen entry which explicitly states that /we/ merged first into /e/ and /je/, then /je/ was prevalent until the early modern period, when /je/ shifted to just /e/.

I'm inclined to think that our article has gotten muddled over time, and we are now misrepresenting the indicated references. ‑‑ Eiríkr Útlendi │^{Tala við mig} 22:44, 27 May 2022 (UTC)

@Eirikr: I found a secondary reference[3]

(1)悉曇口伝(1105?-1181): エ者以穴呼而終垂舌端則成エ音也

(The pronunciation of "エ" sound starts with a "Siddham-i" mouth shape, and ends in lower tip of the tongue.)

(2)悉曇口伝字記鈔(1345-1416): 呼ヱ音時必音始微細帶イ音、故イヱ呼也

(There's must be a slight "イ" sound in the beginning of the pronunciation of "ヱ". Namely, it's pronounced as "イヱ".)

(3)悉曇口伝: ヲ者以ウ穴呼ウ而終開唇則成ヲ音也

(The pronunciation of "ヲ" starts with a "ウ" mouth shape, and ends in open lips.)

(4)悉曇口伝字記鈔: 呼ヲ者時必帶ウ音、呼ウヲ也

(There's must be "ウ" sound within the pronunciation of "ヲ". Namely, it's pronounced as "ウヲ".)

( is "i" of Siddhaṃ)

--C44986054 (talk) 15:28, 28 May 2022 (UTC)

Citation for S affricate realisation

Looking for a citation on /s/ realisation as /ts/ on this page, I believe this to be an error and would like to fix it, but I am unsure how it ended up on the page in the first place. Saya-pedia (talk) 06:25, 21 August 2022 (UTC)

Lowercase “Middle”

Wikipedia titles use sentence case, and “Middle” isn’t a proper noun. It should be lowercased. GenZenny (talk) 04:24, 16 November 2022 (UTC)

@GenZenny:

"Middle" is not a proper noun.

"Middle Japanese" is a proper noun.

Compare also the capitalization of the modifying adjective when used as a part of the language name, as seen in the bodies of the Middle Chinese, Old Chinese, and Old Japanese articles, among others. ‑‑ Eiríkr Útlendi │^{Tala við mig} 06:20, 20 November 2022 (UTC)