Japan is somewhat reminiscent of a lone man who believes that the world is not yet ready to accept him. For a long time, the country was hiding from the rest of the world and only at the beginning of the 20th century began to establish friendly relations with other states. From that moment on, interest in everything Japanese has increased significantly. Cuisine, traditions, holidays, mentality, clothing - all this is of interest to the public. Many Europeans are trying to comprehend the basics of the Japanese language. The first thing that causes problems is the numerals, namely the Japanese numbers.
Features of Japanese numerals
Japanese numerals are a special combination of numbers, which consists of the Chinese and Japanese counting systems. Due to the fact that the Chinese system is duplicated, Japanese hieroglyphic numbers have a double reading: OH (on) and KUN (kun).
Usually in Japan they use Arabic numbers, but you can also find hieroglyphs. Especially often they come across in the menu of restaurants at ryokans (traditional Japanese hotels). In addition, they resort to hieroglyphs if you need to write the text "vertically". Arabic numbers are used for horizontal writing.
The inhabitants of the Land of the Rising Sun have two counting systems: their own (the account is kept only up to 10) and borrowed (Chinese). The rules of use are quite simple: the Chinese account is always used with suffixes, Japanese numbers can exist independently.
1 to 10
To get to know Japanese numbers better, you need to know how they are written and read. The table below shows Japanese numbers from 1 to 10 with different pronunciations:
Number | Hieroglyph | OH (Chinese pronunciation) | KUN (Japanese pronunciation) |
Kokonotsu |
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As can be seen from the material presented, the numbers in Japan have a double name. Moreover, the pronunciation may differ in different regions. For example, the number 8 can be pronounced both "hachi" and "hachi" or "hashi".
There are also two different names for the Chinese version of the numbers 4, 7 and 9:
- 4 - "Yeon".
- 7 - "Nana".
- 9 - "Kyu".
In Japan, the numbers 4 and 9 are considered unlucky. Four is pronounced "shi", which is similar to the Japanese word for "death". Therefore, very often the pronunciation of "shi" is changed to "yon". Nine, in turn, is consonant with the word "suffering", which is pronounced simply as "ku". Therefore, you can often hear a modification of the pronunciation of the number 9.
In modern Japanese, all numbers except 4 and 7 have a Chinese pronunciation (that is, they are read by "onnu"). But in the names of the months, even they are pronounced with “ON”.
10 to 20
Japanese numbers that come after ten are formed mainly by a combination of numbers. For example, if you need to say 18, then you should take 10 (ju) and say it in combination with 8 (hachi). The result will be 18 - juhachi. All other numbers of this order are formed in the same way. The result is the following combinations:
11. 十一 - Juichi.
12. 十二 - Juni.
13. 十三 - Jusan.
14. 十四 - Juyeon.
15. 十五 - Jugo.
16. 十六 - Juroku.
17. 十七 - Junana.
18. 十八 - Juhachi.
19. 十九 - Jukuu.
20. 二十 - Niju.
Tens are formed by adding the desired multiplier to the word "ten", for example "sanju" (30) or "niju" (20).
More than a hundred
Japanese numbers are formed by adding one numeral to another. Even hundreds are formed in this way. 100 (百) is pronounced "hyaku" in Japanese. To form the numerals 300, 400, etc., it is necessary to pronounce the name of the corresponding figure from the first table before “hyaku”. Here are some examples:
- 300 (三百) - Sanhyaku.
- 400 (四百) - Yonhyaku.
- 500 (五百) - Gohyaku.
With this question, almost no one has any difficulties. The most interesting begins when you need to pronounce a three-digit number, which is not in the examples. For example, 125. In theory, it is clear that all the numerals that make up the number must be added together, but in practice, many are lost. 125 in Japanese sounds like "hyakuninjugo". If you write the number using kanji (hieroglyphs), then you get 百二十五. That is, 125 is the sum of the numbers: 100 + 20 + 5.
The numbers 1000 and 10000 are denoted as:
- 千 - Sen (one thousand).
- 万 - Man (ten thousand).
The numbers are formed in exactly the same way as the previous groups of numbers. For example, 1367 Japanese numbers translated into Russian will sound like "sen (1000) sanhyaku (300) rokujunan (67)". In this way, you can safely form numbers until you need to say a million.
Perhaps this is an exception to the rule. If six-digit numbers are formed by combining the number of previous orders (“juni” or “niju”), then a million is formed using the numbers 100 and 10,000. Accordingly, 1000000 will sound like “Hyakuman”.
On the first - the third pay!
Japanese numerals are very easy to remember. And if you learn the numbers from 1 to 12, then you can not bother with remembering the months of the year. In Japan, they do not have names. Just add the word "gatsu" to the number that indicates the number of the month. For example, January will sound like "Ichigatsu", which literally means "first month". Pay close attention to the fourth and seventh months. When it comes to months, then the "exceptional" ones - April and July - are pronounced "in Chinese", that is, with the "on" pronunciation. The result will be:
- 四月 - Shigatsu (April).
- 七月 - Shichigatsu (July).
Interest in Japan is inevitable. Traditions, language, mentality, culture - all this attracts the eyes of the public. After all, there, in a country where the sun wakes up earlier, everything is different. Even the numbers - and those are not the same as everyone else. That's what makes Japan interesting. Difficult but interesting.
Now let's talk about the most unfortunate number from the point of view of the Chinese - 4.
Classical Chinese numerology sees nothing wrong with the four. This number symbolizes stability, rationality and balance.
Four in classical Chinese culture
Remember:
Four cardinal points - north, south, west and east;
Four seasons of the year - summer, winter, autumn and spring;
Four worthy occupations of a noble person - playing a musical instrument, chess, calligraphy and drawing (we talked about this in the article about in);
The Four Great Terems of China - Penlai, Yuyan, Tenwan and.
As you can see, the four is very popular in classical Chinese culture. In the religious sphere, it is also common:
Four main texts in Taoism;
Four sacred texts of Confucianism.
Number 4 in modern China
All the positive aspects of the four are leveled by only one phonetic coincidence. In Chinese, 4 is read as "Su" in the fourth tone.
On many sites on the Internet you will see "C", but this is not the case. The transcription of "Si" was taken from English sources, where they write "Si". What else should they write? There is no "s" in English. They write the closest transcription - "Si". From English, this error smoothly migrated to the Russian Internet.
In Chinese, 4 is read as "Su" in the fourth tone. And the word “death” is read as “Sy” in the third tone. This phonetic association has given the four such bad reputation.
Tetraphobia
We have 13 is considered a bad number, but we are not afraid of it as much as the Chinese four. Moreover, this is not only a Chinese phenomenon.
In Japanese, 4 is pronounced "shi" similar to the word for "death";
In Korean, 4 is pronounced “sa” similar to the word for “death”;
In Vietnamese, these words are similar, but more distantly.
Tetraphibia is not only a Chinese phenomenon, but is characteristic of the entire southeast of Asia. Often in buildings there are no 4th, 14th, 24th and so on floors, there are no floors from 40 to 49. In Hong Kong it also happens that there is no 13th floor. Hong Kong used to be a colony of Great Britain, and they inherited a dislike of the number 13 from the British. As a result, the 50th floor by number turns out to be the 35th in fact.
Hong Kong builders can be understood. Apartments and offices here are more expensive, the higher the floor. Any property on floors with a four in a room, on the contrary, is cheaper. In this way, they “stuff” the price of real estate, and tetraphibia is not the main motivation here.
The Taiwanese and South Korean armed forces do not use the number 4 in the serial numbers of ships and aircraft as a matter of principle. But the Chinese army despised tetraphobia, and does not pay attention to it.
Almost all Chinese people avoid fours in phone numbers, houses, apartments, cars or whatever.
Some combinations of numbers in China sound scary. 14 - you want to die, 24 - you will die easily, 74 - you will definitely die and 94 - you will die forever. The last phrase sounds illogical to us, but for the Chinese it makes sense, and this sense is terrible.
In neighboring Japan, the number 49 sounds the most terrible way - “pain to death”.
Like many representatives of other cultures, the Chinese have their own ideas about lucky and unlucky numbers. The meaning of numbers in China depends, first of all, on their energy. In Eastern philosophy and religion, the Universe appears dual. Moreover, unlike the European, Christian culture, the two world principles - darkness and light, Yin and Yang - not only oppose each other, but can also merge in harmony. The same ideas permeate Eastern numerology. Even numbers are associated with the world of the living, they exude goodness and order, and odd numbers - with the world of the dead, they bring chaos and exude bad energy. That is why, unlike in Russia, in China it is customary to give bouquets made up of an even number of flowers, and to present only even amounts of money as a gift.
In general, numerology in this country is treated with great trepidation, numerical symbolism pervades absolutely everything here. For most locals, it is fundamentally important to live in an apartment with a lucky number or have a good combination of numbers on the phone. And for the purchase of a license plate containing certain numbers, some Chinese are ready to give a fortune. In addition, since the sound of many Chinese words is the same as the pronunciation of numbers, number sequences are often used to convey messages.
tetraphobia
From a series of even numbers that bring good luck, a four is knocked out. The fact is that this figure is indicated on the letter by the same hieroglyph as the word "death". If nowadays in Western countries superstitions related to numbers are usually treated with irony, then most Chinese take digital symbolism very seriously. In everyday life, the inhabitants of the Celestial Empire try to avoid the number 4, not to allow it to appear in telephone numbers and car numbers. In many buildings you will not find the fourth floor or office under this number, instead they use the designations 3A or 5A. There are also concerns about the numbers 13 (because 1 and 3 add up to 4) and 14 (the hieroglyphs that these two numbers correspond to can also be read as the phrase "certain death"). They are replaced by combinations 15A and 15B, respectively. Or dangerous numbers are simply skipped. For the same reason, air travel on the TU-154 aircraft is especially unpopular in China.
People who are not prone to superstition, such fear can be beneficial. Buying an apartment at number 4 or buying a phone number containing fours can cost much less than their real market value. Sellers who are aware of the tetraphobia of their compatriots try to sell everything that contains a terrible figure at big discounts. However, these same fears can cause merchants to round prices up to a nice number in their favor.
Despite the fact that most try to avoid the demonic number, 4 in China is also an important sacred symbol. As mentioned above, for Eastern philosophy there is nothing absolutely white and absolutely black. The positive values of this figure embody the four seasons, the four elements or the four cardinal points.
Number two in China
The attitude towards the even two is also very ambiguous. On the one hand, 2 is an unlucky number in China. It is with the deuce that contradictions and conflicts begin. This is a symbol of the fact that everything in the world is divided into black and white, Yin and Yang. However, opposites can not only fight, but also complement each other. Yin and Yang are able to merge into a single symbol. Therefore, at the same time, the number 2 is a sign of marriage, love and harmony. Very often, at Chinese wedding ceremonies, you can see the hieroglyph with which this number is transmitted in writing.
Also, according to popular beliefs, the number 2 is also a symbol of the moon, which personifies indecision and uncertainty. A person born on the second number, a deuce will constantly lead astray and pull in different directions.
Lucky number in China
The most auspicious number in Chinese numerology is the eight, which is a symbol of the highest harmony and prosperity. This figure is indicated by the same hieroglyph as the verb "get rich". And since the number also resembles the sign of infinity in its shape, it also personifies the unceasing flow of wealth. It is no coincidence that the grand opening of the Beijing Olympics took place on August 8, 2008 at exactly 8 hours 8 minutes 8 seconds, and the dialing code of China is the number 86.
The cult of the number 8 pervades all Chinese philosophy and religion. For example, in mythology there is an idea of eight divine winds. Traces of the worship of the eight can be found in traditional Chinese architecture, painting, and even poetry. In Buddhism, 8 is also an important sacred number. Despite the fact that at present the activities of Buddhist communities in China are strictly prohibited, this religion has greatly influenced the culture and mentality of the Chinese. According to Buddhist ideas, in order to achieve Nirvana, a believer must follow the Noble Eightfold Path, having given up all their worldly desires. The wheel of Dharma, symbolizing liberation from successive rebirths in Samsara, is also often depicted with eight spokes.
In order for the good to never run out, there should be as many eights as possible, or they should be combined with other lucky numbers. Three eights is a tripling of wealth and all sorts of benefits. The number 168 enjoys the same honor, the hieroglyphs forming it can be read as “the path of prosperity”.
Numerology in China has become the basis of marketing. In order to attract customers, many companies and stores try to use the number 8 in their phone numbers or names.
Knowing about the attitude of the Chinese to numerical symbolism, you can easily win over the locals. To do this, during communication, pay attention to the numbers and try to highlight the most successful of them.
Here are the stories of some numbers with which many inhabitants of our planet do not associate anything good. Traditionally it is believed that:
1 place. Number 666
The three sixes are also known as the number of the devil and the number of the beast. When meeting with him, the number can kill. Scientists have long been trying to solve the riddle of the number. If you look at the satanic sign, then in the middle you will see 666. Once they even predicted the end of the world on 06/06/2006. A meeting with him can turn into a grave.
2nd place. Number 23
A fatal number that makes people sick. There are many similarities with this number. The number 23 is the number that causes pain. A match with him could end up in a hospital. There is even a movie called the number 23.
3rd place. Number 13
The number 13 is also known as the number of failures. Those who come across him become losers. But fortunately, the curse of the number can stop itself. Friday the 13th is also known as "the day of bad luck".
And here in Japan:
Number 4 and number 9
The Japanese believe that the most unlucky number is "4". They avoid it at all costs. In hospitals and houses there is no fourth floor (Following the third is the fifth).
The Japanese had speech before writing. According to the generally accepted version, Chinese and Japanese characters are closely related. For the first time, Chinese characters came to Japan thanks to monks who transported texts in Chinese. Because of this, the Japanese reading of certain words was divided into three readings: on-reading (on'yomi), kun-reading (kun'yomi), and gikun. From the point of view of readers, this means that the kanji (character) has multiple readings and multiple meanings. But gikun is a combined variant and is often found in Japanese surnames. Example. The character 道 in Chinese sounded something like [dao]. In Japanese speech, he acquired the sound [do]. Thus, [do] is the on reading of the character 道 in Japanese. With this kanji (a borrowed Chinese character), the Japanese began to designate the word path. Initially, even before the advent of writing in Japan, they already had the word path in oral speech, it is read as [miti], i.e. [michi] is the kun reading of the character 道 in Japanese. Or the combination 一寸 can be read as issun (that is, "one sun"), but in fact it is an indivisible combination of totto ("a little").
Let's get back to reading numbers in Japan.
Onnoe (Japanized Chinese) reading of the number "4", [si], lat. , is reminiscent of the character 死 ("death"), which has the same reading. Another unlucky number for the Japanese is 9. . And all again because of bad consonance. The number "9" (九) is considered unlucky by the Japanese because of the consonance with the hieroglyph "torment" ("pain"). The Japanese call this consonance nothing else than “goroawase”.
Examples of "unlucky" two-digit numbers in Japan:
24
— ni si (二死): "double death";
33
— sanzan (散々): "unfortunate"; "cruel, terrible";
42
— si ni (死に): "towards death";
49
— siku (死苦): "death throes".
Number 39
Afghans avoid the presence of the number 39 on car numbers, mobile and home phone numbers, and even building addresses. People who have it on their house number pay calligraphers to draw a nine that looks like an eight as much as possible. If a resident of Kabul has the number 39 in his phone number, he must take care to put an anti-identifier of the number, otherwise no one will answer his calls. Finally, people who are 39 years old try not to mention it. When asked about their age, they answer that they are almost 40.
Number 0888 888 888
In Bulgaria, the phone number 0888888888 is not operated by the mobile phone company Mobitel due to superstition. The fact is that three of its ex-owners died one after another. The first to go to the other world was Vladimir Grashnov, the former head of Mobitel. According to the official version, the cause of Grashnov's death was cancer. But there were rumors in Bulgaria that he had been poisoned by competitors. Then the number was given to the drug lord Konstantin Dimitrov. Dimitrov died in Holland, where he went to inspect his possessions. The murder was blamed on rival Russian mafia clans. Drug dealer Konstantin Dishliev also became the third owner of the unlucky number. A man officially engaged in real estate activities has died near a popular restaurant in Sofia. A few days before, the police found drugs worth 130 million euros in his home. After that, Mobitel stopped servicing the "damned" number.
Number 11
The twin towers of the World Trade Center stood close together and resembled a huge number 11. Planes flown by terrorists crashed into them on September 11 (the ninth month of the year). Summing up two units and nine, we get, again, 11. But that's not all. September 11 is the 254th day of the year, and the numbers 2, 5, and 4 add up to 11. The first plane to hit the towers was Flight 11. It had 11 crew members and 92 passengers (9+ 2=11). Finally, in the English names of the city of New York and the country of Afghanistan, as you might guess, exactly 11 letters each.
Number 17
Italians consider the number 17 unlucky. According to them, it symbolizes death, because it is written in Roman numerals, as XVII. "What's wrong here?" - you ask. The fact is that such a sequence is not difficult to convert into the word "VIXI", meaning "I lived." It was it that was often knocked out on the graves of the ancient Romans. In addition, the number 17 is considered unlucky because February 17th is the day the Flood began (this is one of the rare events accurately dated in the Bible). We also mention that in one of the number systems used to interpret dreams, 17 means failure.
Number 250
For the Chinese, the number 250 is offensive. The fact is that in their language it is pronounced as "er bai wu", which translates as "idiot". To use this number as an insult, probably, even the ancient inhabitants of the Celestial Empire began. Interestingly, when copper coins were still common in the country, the amount of 1000 coins was considered an established measure of value. If the product cost 2 times less (500 coins), it was clear that it was inferior in quality. The price of 250 coins was set for goods of the lowest quality.
Number 87
The seemingly innocuous number 87 is referred to in Australian cricket as the "Devil's Cricket Number". Fans of this sport believe that the server, most likely, after scoring 87 points, will soon fly out of the game. The roots of the superstition date back to 1929, when 10-year-old Keith Miller was watching a game with Donald Bradman, considered "the best bat" at the time. In that game, Donald scored just 87 points, after which he was taken out of the game. Fifteen years later, when Miller also became a professional cricketer, his team-mate Ian Johnson once also dropped out with exactly 87 points, allowing the superstition to take hold. The funny thing about this story is that many years later, Miller decided to re-examine the same match in detail. To his surprise, he found out that Donald Bradman then scored 89 points, and not 87 at all.
Number 17
In 2014, for seven days, starting from the 17th day of the seventh month (July), planes crashed on the territory of Ukraine, Mali and Taiwan. Malaysian flight MH17 was shot down at 17:17 in eastern Ukraine. It is noteworthy that the Boeing 777 aircraft was operated for exactly 17 years (from July 17, 1997 to July 17, 2014). In the same month, an Indian military helicopter flying over Taiwan crashed at 17 hours 7 minutes, 7 passengers died in the accident. A little earlier, on July 7, 2014, a Mi-171 helicopter used by the Vietnamese military crashed at 07:37.
Number 26
26 is an unlucky number in India. The devastating earthquake in Gujarat, which killed 20,000 people, is dated January 26, 2001. On December 26, 2004, a powerful tsunami killed almost 230,000 people. On May 26, 2007, powerful bombs exploded in the north-east of India, in the city of Guwahati. On July 26, 2008, a bomb exploded in Ahmedabad. Finally, exactly 5 months later, on November 26 of the same year, a series of bloody terrorist attacks followed in India. When adding the numbers 2 and 6, you get 8. In numerology, the figure eight symbolizes devastation, difficulties, failures. Experts warn that it is better not to appoint marriages and other solemn ceremonies on the 8th day of the month.
Number 191
Since the 1960s, five different aircraft with flight number 191 have crashed. In 1967, an X-15 aircraft crashed in America, which made the 191st experimental flight in a row. Surprisingly, this plane crash was the only one in the history of the use of the X-15. Prin Flight 191 crashed at Mercedita Airport (Puerto Rico) in April 1972. In 1985, tragedy overtook the Delta Airlines Flight, which was also on its 191st flight. It crashed while landing in Dallas. Then 137 people died. In 1979, in the United States of America, having barely taken off from Chicago's O'Hare Airport, a passenger liner crashed. All 273 people on board were killed. His flight number is 191. Finally, in 2012, JetBlue Airways' 191 had to make an emergency landing. One of the pilots during the flight suddenly began to behave inappropriately. Passengers with difficulty kept him while the co-pilot landed the liner. The major airlines Delta Airlines Flight and American Airlines have recently stopped using flights with the unlucky number 191.
The Chinese people have always been famous for their superstition and serious attitude towards legends and common traditions. This is especially true of the magic of numbers, which has been respected and even slightly feared since ancient times, because it can control people's lives. The number 4 in China is considered the most terrible. Thanks to this attitude of the Chinese, even the special term "theraphobia" arose - the fear of the number 4.
What is the reason for such fear? Everything is simple. The bottom line is that the number 4 in China sounds about the same as the word "death". Four is 四 Sì, death is 死亡 Sǐwáng.
Even the different spelling and tone of pronunciation could not save the number from such a sad fate.
To make it more clear, for the Chinese, four means the same as the number 13 for us. This is a devilish number that brings continuous trouble and trouble. By the way, in China they do not believe in the bad value of the number 13, however, in solidarity with European tourists, the Chinese also try not to use this number often.
The panic and fear that the number 4 in China sows with its presence among the local population led to the fact that the Government of the country had to resort to withdrawing this number from general circulation. Arriving in China and settling in a hotel, you will not be able to find in it either a floor or a room signed with the number four. Most often, staff use the substitution with the letter F, or simply the floor or number that follows the fourth in order is signed as the fifth. Signature 3 "a" is also used.
Definitely not everyone does this, there are elevators with the number 4, and floors and house numbers, but the most superstitious people still try to remember the meaning of the number 4. Most recently, in one of the hotels in China, I had to go through a very long corridor three times, looking for my number with the number "2034". It simply did not appear, 2036 followed immediately after 2032 (even side).
Many people know the story that the existing hospital at number 4 almost ceased its activities, because patients refused to undergo treatment in it, explaining their position by the fact that by agreeing to cross the threshold of the hospital with a “dangerous” number, they deliberately doomed themselves to death . In this regard, the hospital had to be urgently renamed.
The unfortunate number 4 in China eventually led to the fact that the country also banned the issuance of license plates containing this magic number. The fact is that almost all motorists who were “lucky” to receive a registration number with a four refused to receive it, frightened by the fact that they could, at best, get into an accident on such a vehicle or even die. Even despite all the paperwork, the revision of paperwork, the confusion in the registration services and the huge queues there, the number 4 has become banned in China.
By the way, the fate of the “unfortunate” and “avoidable” numbers overtook not only the four, but also all other complex numbers that contain it. For example, 14, 24, 54, 742, etc.
Be that as it may, no matter how many people would not like to believe in Chinese ancient superstitions, you can’t deceive the statistics. And she says that most deaths in China occur on the fourth day. Such data is provided by American sociologists, having analyzed data on the mortality of Chinese living in the United States. Is this superstition or fiction? The question remains open, but statistics is an exact science, so it is very possible to understand the Chinese, who are afraid of the number 4.
Although even despite such sad data, many modern Chinese remain cold-blooded in relation to the magic four. Even considering the fact that Chinese numerology is based on Taoism, a time-tested tradition.
I will add that the number 4 in China can also have a positive meaning. For example, the number 48 in literal translation sounds like “death money”, but it means “great wealth”, which is earned by honest hard work.
To believe in this superstition or not, this is your personal business, I will add on my own that this phenomenon cannot be explained by science in any way.
If you want to know more about the traditions and culture of China, life and superstitions, and at the same time study Chinese (or even get a higher education), we suggest that you familiarize yourself with the opportunities for obtaining long-term language courses, undergraduate and graduate programs.
