食う

Japanese

Kanji in this term

Grade: 2
kun’yomi

Alternative forms

Etymology

/kupu//kuɸu/ → */kuwu//kuu/

From Old Japanese.[1]

The medial /w/ vanishes because Japanese does not have a /wu/ phoneme. It surfaces though in various conjugations, such as the negative form kuwanai or the passive form kuwareru.

Possibly cognate with (kuchi, mouth).

Pronunciation

Verb

食う (godan conjugation, hiragana くう, rōmaji kuu, historical hiragana くふ)

  1. to put something in one's mouth
  2. (men's speech, vulgar) to eat, to devour
     (だれ)でも (ひる)には (めし) ()
    Dare de mo hiru ni wa meshi o kuu.
    Everyone eats food at noon.
  3. to make a living, to live; to survive
  4. to tease, to taunt, to make light of, to make fun of; to torment
  5. (of an insect, usually used in the passive) to bite, to sting
    昨晩 (さくばん)は、 () ()われた
    Sakuban wa, ka ni kuwareta.
    I got bitten by a mosquito last night.

Conjugation

Synonyms

Derived terms

References

  1. 1988, 国語大辞典(新装版) (Kokugo Dai Jiten, Revised Edition) (in Japanese), Tōkyō: Shogakukan
  2. 2006, 大辞林 (Daijirin), Third Edition (in Japanese), Tōkyō: Sanseidō, →ISBN
  3. 1997, 新明解国語辞典 (Shin Meikai Kokugo Jiten), Fifth Edition (in Japanese), Tōkyō: Sanseidō, →ISBN
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