わ行

Japanese

Kanji in this term
ぎょう
Grade: 2
goon
Alternative spellings
ワ行
和行

Etymology

(wa) +‎ (row)

Pronunciation

  • (Tokyo) ぎょー [wáꜜgyòò] (Atamadaka – [1])
  • IPA(key): [β̞a̠ɡʲo̞ː]

Noun

(ぎょう) • (wagyōわぎゃう (wagyau)?

  1. (phonology, orthography, grammar) the tenth and last row of the 五十音図 (literally table of the fifty sounds), consisting of the five kana / (wa), / (wi), / (u) (alternatively, 𛄟 (𛄟)/𛄢 (wu)), / (we) and / (wo), one of which is taken from the あ行 (a-row) to represent classical grammatical inflection in modern text
    Coordinate terms: あ行, か行, さ行, た行, な行, は行, ま行, や行, ら行
    (ぎょう)(かみ)(いち)(だん) / (しも)()(だん) / ()(だん)(かつ)(よう)
    wagyō kamīchidan / shimonidan / godan katsuyō
    wa-row upper-bigrade / lower-bigrade / quintigrade inflection

Usage notes

  • Quintigrade verbs, such as 笑う (warau, to laugh) and 問う (tou, to ask), only use / (wa) in the ワ行 (wa-row), for only one of their inflectional forms (the rest take kana from the ア行 (a-row)), but they are still labeled with ワ(行) in dictionaries and grammar guides.