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As far as I understand, the word 大人 (otona) uses the kanji 大 to represent お and the kanji 人 to represent と. According to this site the readings for 人 do not include な. Where does the な come from then?

Earthliŋ
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Jorge Luque
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3 Answers3

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It's [熟字訓]{じゅくじくん}. Excerpt from Wiktionary:

A Japanese word whose kanji spelling conveys the meaning based on the individual characters, but the reading is not directly related to the spellling. For example, 大 (“big”, usually read ō in kun'yomi compounds) and 人 (“person”, usually read hito in kun'yomi compounds) combine to form 大人, meaning “adult” but read as otona instead of the otherwise-expected ōbito.

We have tons of 熟字訓, e.g. [昨日]{きのう}, [土産]{みやげ}, [二十歳]{はたち} etc. For more, see 熟字訓 on Wikipedia.

chocolate
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    I can't help but be dissatisfied with this answer. While it explains why 大人 has a non-standard pronunciation, It doesn't really answer the underlying question of where the な came in terms of etymology.. Are there any resources for helping find an answer to the etymology behind おとな? The asker seems to be satisfied, but I'm not fully satisfied yet. Would post again as a more etymologically focused question, but not sure if that would be considered a duplicate. – sqrtbottle May 25 '15 at 09:07
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    @Sqrtbottle About OP's "the word 大人 (otona) uses the kanji 大 to represent お and the kanji 人 to represent と", no, the kanji 大人 doesn't show the sound "おと" in "おとな". The word おとな meant 'adult', and people attached the kanji 大人 to it because of the meaning of the kanji, 大=big, 人=people. In the same way, in [土産]{みやげ} for example, the kanji 土産 has nothing to do with the reading of each kanji, [土]{ど/つち} or [産]{さん/う}, but was used for みやげ because of their meaning; 土地の名産. This is what 熟字訓 are. – chocolate May 25 '15 at 14:09
  • (cont.) So, as to "where the な came from", な or おと didn't come from 大人, it was not there in the first place; the sound おとな came from [乙名]{おとな} or [音無]{おとな}(し), or something else. – chocolate May 25 '15 at 14:15
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    @Sqrtbottle Since most other 熟字訓 don't have a single kanji that match their pronunciation, I think that 大人 is simply a specific case where it almost matched. I'm guessing that the spoken word "otona" existed before its kanji and when people decided to assign kanji to it, they thought that 大人 was good enough due to the meaning of the individual kanji. – Jorge Luque May 25 '15 at 18:16
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    @Jorge24, My comment's nothing to do with Kanji in this context, put rather a purely Japanese analytical question. Kanji aside, the etymology to the word おとな is what seems to be missing for me. Whether it's 乙名、音無 etc., is the point of my curiosity. It may be worth starting a new question for it, rather than continuing here (this asker seems to have been looking for reasons to the Kanji's assignment rather than origin of the Japanese word). – sqrtbottle May 25 '15 at 18:53
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    I feel like asking where the な came from is like asking where the T came from in "adult". – Blavius May 25 '15 at 23:02
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    I think this question is actually not about etymology (despite the tag), but about readings and why they don't match up to what the OP expects given the kanji, so I think this answer is perfect. If we focus on etymology instead, I'm not sure there's any well established answer, though we can list speculation. (Maybe that could be a separate question.) 日本国語大辞典 says 「語源に関し諸説があるが判然としない。」 –  May 26 '15 at 04:34
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    @Blavius, this question about the Japanese is categorically different, in that the "T" in adult does not convey any independent meaning, whereas the な in おとな could conceivably be an independent morpheme -- as, indeed, the proposed etymologies suggest. – Eiríkr Útlendi Jun 20 '15 at 01:21
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Regarding the etymology of おとな

大人 contains the meaning of the leader of a group, the most significant one, the eldest one, etc.

The etymology is not clear however one of the reason might related to the word 乙名＝おとな

During 室町 period, the wise leaders who lead some local farmer's autonomous group were commonly called 乙名＝おとな。 It is unclear which word came first but the reading [大人]{おとな} quite possibly came from 乙名。

Reference: See section 大辞林 第三版.

So here you go! The な comes from [名]{な} in 乙名。

Or is it?　GO FIND OUT YOURSELF〜　ヽ(ﾟ∀ﾟ)メ　Study etymology〜　You can probably get a PhD studying this.

Portal -> 日本歴史言語学会

Regarding 熟字訓

It is false to think 大人＝　[大]{お}・人{と}＋な。

@user5185 is right about 大人 being 熟字訓 and got not much relation with the pronunciation おとな。（It might once be related, but not anymore cause no one is sure.）

For more information on 熟字訓 and 当て字 see my another answer for this question.

jarmanso7
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ed9w2in6
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  • This doesn't seem helpful because it doesn't explain the individual kanji meanings in 乙名, or how that combination is understood today (if it's even still used). – Karl Knechtel Sep 15 '23 at 05:16
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おとな is a Japanese word meaning big person...adult. When kanji came to Japan they took the characters 大　人　 to represent their native word.

乙名　is a buddhist term..ie a Chinese loan word assigned a close apporximate to its original pronunciation.

The alleged similarities between the two are superficial.

You will find that in Japanese anyone can take kanji and assign a meaning and reading to them that goes outside the norm.

For instance 鸚鵡　is written using kana alone. おうむのスコックス

Squawks the parrot from dkc2. Or i can just write 鸚鵡 and put スコックス　 above it.

さいのランビ Rambi the rhino 犀のランビ　becomes just 犀

Squitter the spider

I can write 　蜘蛛靴 Spider +　shoes I can then do this

蜘ん靴　spider +shoes

I can then do this 蜘*靴 , or just 蜘靴。 i can then put the furigana スクイータ

Etc So anyone who plays donkey kong country 2 when they see that would know it is thay character.　theres not really a confusion because when talking about a normal spider rhino or parrot only kana is used.

Similarily, multi kanji compounds can be abbreviated in the hopes that the meanimg can still be conveyed. For instance

ゆゆはくしょ　幽霊遊猟白書

Originally 6 character compound meaning ghost hunting report Abbreviated to

幽☆遊☆白書

Any native speaker who sees this would understand what it is saying.

When speaking kanji will ne eliminated or parts of readimgs will be eliminated and replaced with ん

Both these concepts are important to understand especially for understanding anime ,manga and video games as they are used a lot.

This is very common in japanese media. Its pointless trying to find a reason for this. The reason is that the person or people took a word and assigned characters to it that associated with its inherant meaning. We do the same in english. Its not really a foreign concept. In english we assign a singular noun a group noun. You see this wtih fruit. We call oranges and tangerines..oranges. bananas and plaintains...bananas.

We say we are driving the car..while in our truck.

Transportation refers to bus bike train or plane.

Our immediate peers will understand what we are talking about and not question that we are in a truck instead of a car.

We also make up slang code words to refer to things all the time.

In other words we take one word and associate with another similar meaning word for ease of communication and comfort.

Both cars and trucks are vehicles. We shouldnt habe to specifically state what type of locmotive we are driving. So we just use the generic noun car.

Not the same concept i know, but similar enough so as not to be alienated from a foreign language.

Graeme Pollard
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    Welcome to the site. While this answer is likely to be interesting to some, it seems mostly comprised of content that isn't actually related to the concept of jukujikun. – Leebo Sep 15 '23 at 03:35
  • Confused to how this is relevant. Op asked wherr the otona in 大人　comes from. I replied. My reply has nothing to do with the concept of jokujukun in the same fashion as the ops was not asking what jokujikun is. – Graeme Pollard Sep 15 '23 at 17:42
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    Your reply does have something to do with jukujikun. In the first two sentences, you describe how おとな came to be used with the kanji 大人. That kind of reading+kanji relationship is jukujikun, and that's the answer to what the OP wanted to know, even if they didn't know the term to ask about. – Leebo Sep 15 '23 at 22:50