Japanese
Lesson 173: Dates
Dates are written by placing the day counter 日 after the day of the month you would like to specify. Unfortunately, the day counter has by far the most irregularities of any counter. The 1st to the 10th, the 14th, the 17th, the 20th, the 24th and the 27th are all irregular.
For regular dates, the date is simply the number followed by the day counter 日. For example, the 15th is 十五日 and the 31st is 三十一日.
Note that the Xth day and X days are said in the same way in Japanese for all numbers other than one.
Date | Reading |
---|---|
day one | 一日 tuitati |
one day | 一日 itiniti |
day two; two days | 二日 hutuka |
day three; three days | 三日 mikka |
day four; four days | 四日 yokka |
day five; five days | 五日 ituka |
day six; six days | 六日 muika |
day seven; seven days | 七日 nanoka |
day eight; eight days | 八日 youka |
day nine; nine days | 九日 kokonoka |
day ten; ten days | 十日 tooka |
day fourteen; fourteen days | 十四日 zyuuyokka |
day fifteen; fifteen days | 十五日 zyuugoniti |
day seventeen; seventeen days | 十七日 zyuusitiniti |
day twenty; twenty days | 二十日 hatuka |
day twenty-four; twenty-four days | 二十四日 nizyuuyokka |
day thirty-one; thirty-one days | 三十一日 sanzyuuitiniti |
The counter 年 can be used for counting years. Counting years is completely regular except when 年 is preceded by 四, in which case 四 is pronounced as よ. Below you can see the 年 counter used in an example sentence.
(I) was born on March 21, 1984. | 一千 九百 八十 四年 三月 二十 一日 に 生まれました。 issen kyuuhyaku hatizyuu yonen sangatu nizyuu itiniti ni umaremasita. |