14393
Prior to the development of the な particle (presumably from なる) several
hundred years ago, what constructions were used where な-construtions are
currently used? E.g. in the phase きれいな女, would that have been きれいの女, 女のきれい,
きれい女 (and would that be kireionna or kirei onna?), きれいなる女 or something else?
CC BY-SA 3.0
2014-02-01T19:54:58.887
14374
2014-05-17T06:53:25.923
1194
question
history particle-な
Historical Precursor to な?
It is from なる, in a way; but it may not be the one you're thinking of. The なる
here is the 連体形 of the former copula なり, which itself derives from に+あり
(modern ある). This seems to have been the copula as far back as we have records
of. Indeed, this kind of adjective is younger than the copula it uses - these
kinds of adjectives do not occur before the Heian-jidai.

A couple of forms do appear that have since become them (e.g. adjectives
ending in -らか), but I don't know how these were used - my source (Bentley's
Descriptive Grammar of Old Japanese Prose) mentions their existence, but only
says that these なり-based adjectives are new as of the Heian-jidai; it says
nothing at all about how they were used in Old Japanese. I would speculate
that they're used in the very old adjective patterns that require no
morphology at all: so just like you can get /awo sora/ (/səra/?) where you
would expect /awo-ki sora/, I bet you could get /tapiraka umi/ when later you
would expect /taɸiraka=naru umi/ (for 平らかな海).

As for きれい, it's a Chinese loanword, and was loaned after the creation of
these kinds of adjectives. So there was never a point in time before きれいなる女 -
you would have used a native Japanese word like 美しい, and so you would have
either /utukusi-ki womina/ or the older /utukusi womina/.
CC BY-SA 3.0
2014-02-03T20:23:29.983
14393
2014-02-03T20:29:38.863
2014-02-03T20:29:38.863
3639
3639
14374
answer
As others have noted, the modern な particle used with _-na_ adjectives evolved
from なる, itself _not_ the verb なる "to become", but instead a contraction of
にある "to be in a state". So from newest form to oldest, using your example of
きれい, we would have:

  * 綺麗な女
  * 綺麗なる女
  * 綺麗にある女

The _-naru_ form is still used in modern poetry and other contexts to give
things a somewhat archaic and formal sense, such as in 静{しず}かなる田舎{いなか}, _the
quiet contryside_.

Although the classical _-naru_ adjectives did indeed seem to develop mostly in
the [Heian period](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heian_period) (794-1185), the
construction of [noun phrase] + にある + [noun] can already be found in the
_Man'yōshū_ , dating to some time between the mid-300s and the mid-700s.
Example:

  * [Poem 165](http://etext.lib.virginia.edu/japanese/manyoshu/Man2Yos.html#165):  
宇都曽見乃 人尓有吾哉 従  
うつそみの人{ひと}にある我{わ}れや  
Here, _utsusomi no hito_ is a noun phrase ("person in the real world", i.e.
"someone who is still alive") used to modify _ware_ ("I, me").

There is also at least one example I found of what may be an early _-ni aru_
adjective in the _Man'yōshū_ , 寛{ゆた}, classed in Shogakukan's _Kokugo Dai
Jiten_ as a 形容動詞{けいようどうし} ( _-na_ adjective):

  * [Poem 2367](http://etext.lib.virginia.edu/japanese/manyoshu/Man11Yo.html#2367):  
大舟之 由多尓将有 人兒由恵尓  
大船{おほぶね}のゆたにあるらむ人{ひと}の子{こ}ゆゑに  
_...because [you're] the child of a person who is steadfast like a big ship_  
Here, the phrase _ohobune no yuta_ ("big ship's easygoing-ness / steadfastness
/ steadiness") is used to modify _hito_.

If you're interested in the history of _-na_ adjectives, the [概要 section of
the JA Wikipedia article on
形容動詞](https://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E5%BD%A2%E5%AE%B9%E5%8B%95%E8%A9%9E#.E6.A6.82.E8.A6.81)
describes how Heian-period writers suffixed -にあり (becoming -なり) and -とあり
(becoming -たり) to nouns to create new classes of adjectives.
CC BY-SA 3.0
2014-05-17T01:01:09.677
15991
2014-05-17T06:53:25.923
2014-05-17T06:53:25.923
5229
5229
14374
answer