ABSTRACT

It follows that the history of the substantive in Japanese has been not a development of significant form but merely a growth of vocabulary. Vocabulary is not within the scope of this work, but reference will be made later to the methods by which it has been increased, notably by the formation of compounds and by the importation of Chinese words. It is, however, appropriate to mention here that practically all Chinese words are imported in the form of substantives, as is to be expected in view of the fact that the Chinese language does not differentiate between parts of speech, any word being able as a general rule to perform any grammatical function. Thus ~ ai, which in Chinese can stand for either' love', 'to love' or 'loving', becomes in Japanese the substantive ai.