Early Modern Japanese
Early Modern Japanese was the stage of the Japanese language after Middle Japanese and before Modern Japanese. It is a period of transition that shed many of the characteristics that Middle Japanese had retained during the language's development from Old Japanese, thus becoming intelligible to modern Japanese.
The period spanned roughly 250 years and extended from the 17th century to the first half of the 19th century. Politically, it generally corresponded to the Edo period.
Background
At the beginning of the 17th century, the center of government moved to Edo from Kamigata under the control of the Tokugawa shogunate and Japan closed its borders to foreigners. Until the early Edo period, the Kamigata dialect, the ancestor of the modern Kansai dialect, was the most influential dialect. However, in the late Edo period, the Edo dialect, the ancestor of the modern Tokyo dialect, became the most influential dialect. Compared to the previous centuries, the Tokugawa rule brought about much newfound stability. That made the importance of the warrior class gradually fall and replaced it with the merchant class. There was much economic growth, and new artistic developments appeared, such as Ukiyo-e, Kabuki, and Bunraku. New literary genres such as Ukiyozōshi, Sharebon, Kokkeibon, and Ninjōbon also developed. Major authors included Ihara Saikaku, Chikamatsu Monzaemon, Matsuo Bashō, Shikitei Sanba, and Santō Kyōden.Phonology
Consonants
Middle Japanese had the following consonants:| Bilabial | Alveolar | Postalveolar | Palatal | Velar | Uvular | Glottal | |
| Stop | Voiceless bilabial plosive| Voiced bilabial plosive| | Voiceless alveolar plosive| Voiced alveolar plosive| | Voiceless velar plosive| Voiced velar plosive| | ||||
| Affricate | Voiceless alveolar affricate| Voiced alveolar affricate| | Voiceless postalveolar affricate| Voiced postalveolar affricate| | |||||
| Nasal | Bilabial nasal| | Alveolar nasal| | Uvular nasal| | ||||
| Fricative | Voiceless bilabial fricative| | Voiceless alveolar fricative| Voiced alveolar fricative| | Voiceless alveolo-palatal fricative| Voiced alveolo-palatal fricative| | Voiceless palatal fricative| | Voiceless glottal fricative| | ||
| Liquid | |||||||
| Approximant | Palatal approximant| | Velar approximant| |
/t, s, z, h/ all have a number of allophones before the high vowels :
- t → / __i
- t → / __ɯ
- z → / __i
- z → / __ɯ
- h → / __i
- h → / __ɯ
- /zi, di/ and /zu, du/, respectively, no longer contrasted.
- /h/ partially developed from into .
- /se/ lost its palatalization and became.
Labialization
The labial /kwa, gwa/ merged with their non-labial counterparts into .Palatalization
The consonants /s, z/, /t/, /n/, /h, b/, /p/, /m/, and /r/ could be palatalized.Depalatalization could also be seen in the Edo dialect:
- >
- > "lord"
- > "life"
Prenasalization
Grammar
Verbs
Early Modern Japanese has five verbal conjugations:| Verb Class | Irrealis 未然形 | Adverbial 連用形 | Conclusive 終止形 | Attributive 連体形 | Hypothetical 仮定形 | Imperative 命令形 |
| Quadrigrade | -a | -i | -u | -u | -e | -e |
| Upper Monograde | -i | -i | -iru | -iru | -ire | -i |
| Lower Monograde | -e | -e | -eru | -eru | -ere | -e |
| K-irregular | -o | -i | -uru | -uru | -ure | -oi |
| S-irregular | -e, -a, -i | -i | -uru | -uru | -ure | -ei, -iro |
As had already begun in Middle Japanese, the verbal morphology system continued to evolve. The total number of verb classes was reduced from nine to five. Specifically, the r-irregular and n-irregular regularized as quadrigrade, and the upper and lower bigrade classes merged with their respective monograde. That left the quadrigrade, upper monograde, lower monograde, k-irregular, and s-irregular.
Adjectives
There were two types of adjectives: regular adjectives and adjectival nouns.Historically, adjectives were subdivided into two classes: those whose adverbial form ended in -ku and those that ended in –siku. That distinction was lost in Early Modern Japanese.
| Irrealis 未然形 | Adverbial 連用形 | Conclusive 終止形 | Attributive 連体形 | Hypothetical 仮定形 | Imperative 命令形 |
| -kara | -ku | -i | -i | -kere | -kare |
Historically, the adjectival noun was sub-divided into two categories: -nar and -tar. In Early Modern Japanese, -tar vanished and left only -na.
| Irrealis 未然形 | Adverbial 連用形 | Conclusive 終止形 | Attributive 連体形 | Hypothetical 仮定形 | Imperative 命令形 |
| -da ra | -ni -de | -na -da | -na | -nare -nara |