お八つ

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Japanese

Kanji in this term
八
や
Grade: 1
kun'yomi
Alternative spellings
御八
御八つ
おやつ

Etymology

Compound of お (o, honorific prefix) +‎ 八 (ya, “eight”) +‎ つ (tsu, nominalizing suffix).[1][2]　Times in the old Japanese timekeeping system were labelled using either the animals of the Chinese zodiac or numbers descending from 9 to 4, once from noon and again from midnight. The time when おやつ (oyatsu) were eaten was labelled using the number 8, as 昼八つ (hiruyatsu, “8 in the daytime”).

First cited to a text from 1688.[1]

Pronunciation

Noun

お八(や)つ • (oyatsu) 

  1. (historical) in the old timekeeping system, the period of roughly 2:00 until 4:00, both AM and PM
  2. (by extension) a snack eaten at around 3:00 pm
    Synonym: お三時 (o-sanji)
  3. (more generally) a snack between meals

See also

References

  1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 Shōgaku Tosho (1988) 国語大辞典（新装版） (in Japanese), Tōkyō: Shogakukan, →ISBN
  2. ↑ 2.0 2.1 Matsumura, Akira, editor (2006), 大辞林 (in Japanese), Third edition, Tokyo: Sanseidō, →ISBN
  3. ^ NHK Broadcasting Culture Research Institute, editor (1998), NHK日本語発音アクセント辞典 (in Japanese), Tokyo: NHK Publishing, Inc., →ISBN
  4. ^ Kindaichi, Kyōsuke et al., editors (1997), 新明解国語辞典 (in Japanese), Fifth edition, Tokyo: Sanseidō, →ISBN

Further reading

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