The copulae are the basis of the
nominal nucleus. It follows a noun, and means "[subject] is ," similarly to the copula
be in English. Certain nouns with descriptive meanings, called "
adjectival nouns," can also precede a copula. Of the various forms of the copulae,
nara(ba) functions as a type of evidential
conditional.
Darō can be added to verbs and adjectives to form the modern
tentative.
Desu can be used as a meaningless
politeness flourish with word forms that do not readily combine with the politeness auxiliary
‑masu, such as an adjective or a
negative auxiliary. The
past deshita and the tentative
deshō are both meaningful and polite extenders to word forms that lack any mechanism to convey pastness and tentativity, namely the western negative
‑n(u).
Copulae: Conjugation table The copulae of Japanese demonstrate
suppletion, in that they combined different forms from different words into one word. The original copulae were all based on the verb , which evolved into the modern . It needed to be preceded by one of the three particles,
ni,
nite →
de de ari/
de aru →
da and
to ari/
to aru →
tari/
taru, the last of which fell out of use, but did phonetically coincide with
te ari/
te aru →
tari/
taru, which in turn evolved into the modern
past auxiliary
ta. It also combined with adjectival roots to expand their conjugation, for example , , etc. • The original conclusive
de ari, was replaced by the attributive
de aru, which evolved into the informal conclusive
da, and the formal conclusive
de aru. In terms of formality and politeness: •
Da is informal and impolite. Depending on specifically what precedes it,
da can be perceived as abrupt or too masculine, and therefore is customarily omitted in some cases. •
De aru is formal and nonpolite (with no inherent assumption of politeness). •
Desu is nonformal (with no inherent assumption of formality) and polite. •
De arimasu is formal and polite. •
Da/
datta/
darō are the colloquial contractions of
de aru/
de atta/
de arō in eastern dialects (including Tokyo Japanese). Their western equivalents include
ja/
jatta/
jarō and
ya/
yatta/
yarō.
Ja/
jatta/
jarō, along with other western features (
‑n(u),
‑nanda,
u‑onbin, etc), are occasionally used in faux-archaic speech or old people's speech rather dialectal speech; for example, the character
Gandalf, an ancient wizard from
The Lord of the Rings, is made to speak with a few selectively chosen western features, while still retaining some eastern features, in the Japanese translations (see relevant quotations in the
footnotes). • is the honorific version of
aru, and
goza(r)imasu is the honorific version of
arimasu.
Gozaru has most of the forms that
aru does (
(de (wa)) gozaru,
(de (wa)) gozaranu,
(de (wa)) gozareba, etc), although it additionally undergoes a minor sound change in the polite conclusive/attributive
gozarimasu →
gozaimasu and the imperative
gozare →
gozai.
Gozaimasu is authentically used in modern Japanese, while
gozaru,
gozarimasu(ru) and
gozaimasuru are used for effect, such as in theatrical or humorous lines. • The current attributive form of
de (wa) aru is still
de (wa) aru.
Da additionally takes
naru →
na (of said
nari) as its attributive form only in
adjectival verbs, as in , and after the auxiliaries , and , as in and ; while the particle
no is used after nouns, as in or . However, since
no also expresses possession, this may cause ambiguity, as in ; moreover, some nouns can function as either "adjectival verbs" or "nouns", and take either
na or
no, such as . The old
naru (of said
nari) and
taru (of said
to ari/
to aru →
tari/
taru) can still be used for literary effect, as in , , , , or in such idiom as or . Incidentally, an ancient possessive
na was
fossilized in words like , , , etc. There is also a niche distinction between and .
Na is also used before the nominalizer
no, as in . •
De is morphologically a gerund, for it is constructed by combining its infinitive (
ni) with the gerundive particle
‑te as with any other gerund. In modern Japanese, it itself functions as both an infinitive and a gerund. When combining with
aru to create finite forms, it is
de that is used, not
ni which is
classical and merely fossilized in the attributive
na(ru) (←
ni aru) and the provisional
nara(ba) (←
ni araba). Another gerund,
de atte is occasionally found in writing: . •
De and
de ari are the more common infinitives: . It is rare to find
ni used alone with an ordinary noun: ;
ni meaning "as," however, can be treated as an infinitive: . Other types of nouns, such as adjectival nouns (), auxiliary nouns (), demonstrative pronouns () etc, can be readily paired with
ni when used adverbially. • The infinitives combine with different words, each with its own parallel: •
de +
aru →
de aru ("be"), parallel with
akaku +
aru →
akaku aru ("be red") and
nomi +
suru →
nomi suru ("drink") •
de +
nai →
de nai ("not be"), parallel with
akaku +
nai →
akaku nai ("not be red") and
nomi +
shinai →
nomi shinai ("not drink") •
de ari +
‑masu →
de arimasu ("be"), parallel with
nomi +
‑masu →
nomimasu ("drink") • The above formations allow "splitting", or adding particles like
wa or
mo between the infinitive forms and the following verbs, which would be impossible with
da ("be"),
akai ("be red") and
nomu ("drink") alone: •
da ("be"), parallel with
akai ("be red") and
nomu ("drink") •
de wa aru ("be …, indeed"), parallel with
akaku wa aru ("be red, indeed") and
nomi wa suru ("drink, indeed") •
de wa nai ("not be …, indeed"), parallel with
akaku wa nai ("not be red, indeed") and
nomi wa shinai ("not drink, indeed") • The particles
wa and
mo are often added, especially to the negatives, although not required in principle.
Wa puts focus on what goes after it, while
mo puts focus what goes before it. In the following sentences, the focused information is underlined for the Japanese originals and the literal English translations; for the non-literal English translations, all-caps type emulates how an English speaker would emphasize the focused information. • • • • • Sometimes
de and
aru can be split quite widely: • • While
de nai/arimasen are sometimes used in formal contexts, in ordinary speech
ja nai/ja arimasen are used instead. In this case, even though
ja is etymologically a colloquially reduced version of
de wa,
ja nai/arimasen are, functionally, colloquial versions of either
de nai/arimasen, which focus on what comes before them, or
de wa nai/arimasen which focus on
nai/arimasen. Some speakers distinguish the short for
de and the long for
de wa. • • • While
de (wa) arimasen and
de (wa) arimasen deshita are often recommended,
de (wa) nai desu and
de (wa) nakatta desu are acceptable colloquial alternatives. For the idiosyncratic
de (wa) aranai and
de (wa) arimashinai, see
Negative: Conjugation table. •
De (wa) areba is the regular way of forming in modern Japanese.
Naraba (of said
nari) is kept as the conditional of
da, and along with
taraba (of said
te ari/
te aru →
tari/
taru →
ta), retains the old way of forming conditionals. See #Conditional: Conjugation table for more. •
Desu, a copula of uncertain origin, takes its missing forms from
de (wa) aru and
de (wa) arimasu, the latter of which is conceivably the ancestor of
desu. • Although , and were originally conjugations of and , they are now also used as particles or auxiliaries and can attach directly to other verbs' conclusive/attributive forms, as in , .
Desu (or
de arimasu or
de gozaimasu),
deshita and
deshō can add
politeness the
negative auxiliaries
‑n(u) and
‑nai, as well as adjectives: •
Arimasen/gozaimasen / nai desu/de arimasu/de gozaimasu / naku arimasu / nō gozaimasu ("be not") •
Arimasen/gozaimasen deshō / nai deshō/de arimashō/de gozaimashō / naku arimashō / nō gozaimashō ("be probably not") •
Arimasen/gozaimasen deshita / nakatta desu/de arimasu/de gozaimasu / naku arimashita / nō gozaimashita ("were not") •
Arimasen/gozaimasen deshita deshō / nakatta deshō/de arimasu/de gozaimasu / naku arimashita deshō / nō gozaimashita deshō ("were probably not") •
Akai desu/de arimasu/de gozaimasu / akaku arimasu / akō gozaimasu ("be red") •
Akai deshō/de arimashō/de gozaimashō / akaku arimashō / akō gozaimashō ("be probably red") •
Akakatta desu/de arimasu/de gozaimasu / akaku arimashita / akō gozaimashita ("were red") •
Akakatta deshō/de arimasu/de gozaimasu / akaku arimashita deshō / akō gozaimashita deshō ("were probably red") • As shown above,
desu does not have its own negative form, and instead borrows
de (wa) arimasen from
de (wa) arimasu. However, the auxiliary
‑n in
de (wa) arimasen in turn does not have its own past and tentative form, therefore
deshita and
deshō have to be added. The past tentative
‑tarō is infrequent, thus instead of
deshitarō,
deshita deshō is preferred.
Copulae: Grammatical compatibility Derived from
aru and
arimasu, the copulae can have all the forms that these verbs are capable of having. Certain affirmative conclusive and attributive forms have contracted, especially in speech, such as
de aru →
da/
ja and
de arimasu →
desu; the negative forms remain uncontracted, meaning there is no such form as *
daran or *
desen. == Imperfective ==