JSLL #2 - Urashima Tarо̄ - First sentence

Continuing from our previous post, we now have our first sentence.

昔々、ある海辺の村に、浦島太郎という漁師が住んでいました。

昔々、is pronounced むかしむかし (mukashi mukashi) and is the Japanese equivalent of the English fairy-tale opening "Once upon a time." Literally, it means "long, long ago." The kanji 昔 on its own means "the old days, the past, long ago." It's an N3 kanji that occurs in only 4 common words. The second symbol, 々, is a repeater symbol: it simply means, "repeat the previous kanji." After the repeater symbol comes 、(a Japanese comma).

ある海辺の村に、is an adverbial phrase of place. Reading it from right to left, it breaks down as:

• 村に (むらに, mura ni) "in a village"
• 海辺の (うみべの, umibe no) "of the coast"
• ある (aru) "some"

Which amounts to "in some coastal village" for the whole phrase. "Aru" normally means "to exist" when applied to things without a heart, like plants and inanimate objects. But when placed on its own before a noun, like here, it means "some." A typical combination is ある日, "one day, on a certain day."

Words with kanji are as follows in this phrase:

• 村 is an N2 kanji that occurs in 11 common words (and it means "village" in all of them).
• 海辺 "coast" consists of the N4 kanji 海 meaning "sea" on its own, which occurs in 60 common words; and the N2 kanji 辺 meaning "area, vicinity, region; side, edge" on its own, which occurs in 20 common words.

Next is the subject of the sentence, 浦島太郎という漁師が, marked by the subject particle が.

The main noun is 漁師 (りょうし, ryoushi), "fisherman." Qualifying this noun is 浦島太郎という, which consists of the proper name 浦島太郎 (Urashima Tarou, explained in the previous post), and という, "who is/was called." Note how this is just the particle と combined with いう, the verb "to say," but いう in this sentence is not written with a kanji ,言う. Compare:

• はいと言う人 (はいというひと, hai to iu hito) "Someone who says yes"
• 太郎という人 (たろうというひと, Tarou to iu hito)  "Someone called Tarou"

Returning to 漁師, it consists of two kanji:

• 漁 is an N2 kanji that occurs in 10 common words. It always refers to fishing or fishery. The kanji very obviously resembles 魚, the kanji for fish.
• 師 is an N3 kanji that occurs in 24 common words. It occurs mostly as the last kanji, best translated as "-er" or "-ist" or "person doing X."

So the whole phrase 浦島太郎という漁師が translates to "A fisherman called Urashima Tarou"

Finally, there is the main verb of the sentence, 住んでいました (followed by the Japanese period 。). This is 住んで (すんで, sunde), the te-form of the verb 住む, "to live" (in the sense of "to reside" rather than "to be alive") followed by いました, the polite past tense. A ~ていました ending of a verb would normally be translated as a past progressive ("was Xing") or as a perfective (indicating a finished state), but 住む is a bit unusual: it takes the ～ていました form where in English you would say "lived."

The kanji 住 is N4 and occurs in 27 common words. It always refers to residence or habitation.

Putting it all together, the sentence reads:

"Long, long ago, in some coastal village, there lived a fisherman called Urashima Tarou."