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I'm reading Sakaguchi Ango's In the forest, under cherries in full bloom, and
I have a question about a meaning of a word in a sentence. The story, if you
don't know it, is about a bandit who's afraid of cherry blossoms. He goes to
the forest and is terrified, feeling a cold wind and... there's also this
thing:

花の下は涯がないからだよ. - he describes his experience later. I have a hard time figuring
out what does that mean. I know 涯 as "horizon", so does that mean "there's no
horizon under the flowers"? I have problems visualising what it could mean...
That the horizon is not visible? Or is it some supernatural thing?
CC BY-SA 3.0
2016-06-22T20:21:25.557
36096
2016-06-22T21:38:55.603
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question
translation meaning words
涯 in a sentence
This 涯 is read as **はて** , and is a rare alternative kanji of
[果【は】て](http://dictionary.goo.ne.jp/jn/177959/meaning/m0u/) (meaning "End" as
in "World's End")

Source: [青空文庫 桜の森の満開の下
坂口安吾](http://www.aozora.gr.jp/cards/001095/files/42618_21410.html)

According to [this question](http://okwave.jp/qa/q4486967.html), 広辞苑 seems to
list this as the possible reading of 涯.
CC BY-SA 3.0
2016-06-22T21:00:06.337
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2016-06-22T21:00:06.337
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answer
According to this
[link](http://detail.chiebukuro.yahoo.co.jp/qa/question_detail/q1329679963)
and this [dictionary entry](https://kotobank.jp/word/%E6%B6%AF-456693), it
seems there the meaning of "limit" or "end" so maybe he is afraid of cherry
blossoms because there's no end/limit beneath them.
CC BY-SA 3.0
2016-06-22T21:01:26.503
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2016-06-22T21:01:26.503
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Naruto's answer is backed up by WWWJDIC's entry at
[http://gengo.com/wwwjdic/cgi-
data/wwwjdic?1MMC涯](http://gengo.com/wwwjdic/cgi-data/wwwjdic?1MMC%E6%B6%AF).

The _hate_ reading is the nominalized stem of verb 果{は}てる. Shogakukan's 国語大辞典
lists the following senses for this that look potentially relevant here:

```

    2　なくなる。失（う）せる。  
       To be(come) lost.  To fade away.  
    3　死ぬ。  
       To die.
    
```

There is also a note given in the entry:

> **補注** 「おわる」が継続中の動作・作用の終止を原義とするのに対して、「はてる」は限定された物・期間などが、その終局に到達することを原義とする。  
>  **Note:** While _owaru_ has an underlying meaning of the termination of an
> ongoing action, _hateru_ has an underlying meaning of a limited thing or
> time period coming to a close.

From this, and given the context you describe for the quote, it sounds like
the bandit is haunted by the ghosts of the people he's wronged, and is afraid
of being under the cherry blossoms because that's where the ghosts don't quite
go away -- hence the cold wind and his terror.

More specifically to the word 涯{はて} in this sentence, I can't think of a good
single-word translation that quite conveys all the meaning needed for this to
make sense the same way in English, but _end_ might be one good fit. For a
multi-word translation, 涯{はて}がない ⇒ _there's no end to things, nothing is
finished → old scores aren't settled_ : i.e. a more supernatural sense than
just not being able to see the horizon.
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2016-06-22T21:38:55.603
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2016-06-22T21:38:55.603
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answer