Japanese language Warning: You are not logged in. Your IP address will be publicly visible if you make any edits. If you log in or create an account, your edits will be attributed to your username, along with other benefits.Anti-spam check. Do not fill this in! ===Late Middle Japanese=== {{main|Late Middle Japanese}} Late Middle Japanese covers the years from 1185 to 1600, and is normally divided into two sections, roughly equivalent to the [[Kamakura period]] and the [[Muromachi period]], respectively. The later forms of Late Middle Japanese are the first to be described by non-native sources, in this case the [[Jesuits|Jesuit]] and [[Franciscans|Franciscan]] missionaries; and thus there is better documentation of Late Middle Japanese phonology than for previous forms (for instance, the ''[[Arte da Lingoa de Iapam]]''). Among other sound changes, the sequence {{IPA|/au/}} merges to {{IPA|/ɔː/}}, in contrast with {{IPA|/oː/}}; {{IPA|/p/}} is reintroduced from Chinese; and {{IPA|/we/}} merges with {{IPA|/je/}}. Some forms rather more familiar to Modern Japanese speakers begin to appear – the continuative ending -''te'' begins to reduce onto the verb (e.g. ''yonde'' for earlier ''yomite''), the -k- in the final syllable of adjectives drops out (''shiroi'' for earlier ''shiroki''); and some forms exist where modern standard Japanese has retained the earlier form (e.g. ''hayaku'' > ''hayau'' > ''hayɔɔ'', where modern Japanese just has ''hayaku'', though the alternative form is preserved in the standard greeting ''o-hayō gozaimasu'' "good morning"; this ending is also seen in ''o-medetō'' "congratulations", from ''medetaku''). Late Middle Japanese has the first loanwords from European languages – now-common words borrowed into Japanese in this period include ''pan'' ("bread") and ''tabako'' ("tobacco", now "cigarette"), both from [[Portuguese language|Portuguese]]. Summary: Please note that all contributions to Christianpedia may be edited, altered, or removed by other contributors. If you do not want your writing to be edited mercilessly, then do not submit it here. You are also promising us that you wrote this yourself, or copied it from a public domain or similar free resource (see Christianpedia:Copyrights for details). Do not submit copyrighted work without permission! Cancel Editing help (opens in new window) Discuss this page