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ArchivesDoes Amaya mean 'night rain' in Japanese?
This name is rising quickly and I think one of the reasons for this is the poetic meaning of 'night rain' circulating around the internet. This site says it is simply a spelling variant of the Basque name Amaia.
Does it also have a Japanese meaning? Everywhere I see 雨夜 for Amaya, meaning 'night' and 'rain'. Would these kanji be pronounced as Amaya? Is this name used in Japan or known there at all?
But there are some sources that state that 雨夜 doesn't sound like Amaya at all. For example, many claim the first kanji sounds like ah-meh and not ah-mah or that the second sounds like yo and not like ya.
The thing is that you can find a kanji for almost every sound and put it together it another kanji to create a name. This doesn't automatically mean the name has Japanese origins. For example, I can find kanji to write my name and they sound the same but my name is definitely not Japanese in origin.
So I am wondering if this happened with Amaya or if it is indeed a legit Japanese name.
Thank you!
Does it also have a Japanese meaning? Everywhere I see 雨夜 for Amaya, meaning 'night' and 'rain'. Would these kanji be pronounced as Amaya? Is this name used in Japan or known there at all?
But there are some sources that state that 雨夜 doesn't sound like Amaya at all. For example, many claim the first kanji sounds like ah-meh and not ah-mah or that the second sounds like yo and not like ya.
The thing is that you can find a kanji for almost every sound and put it together it another kanji to create a name. This doesn't automatically mean the name has Japanese origins. For example, I can find kanji to write my name and they sound the same but my name is definitely not Japanese in origin.
So I am wondering if this happened with Amaya or if it is indeed a legit Japanese name.
Thank you!
This message was edited 5/12/2019, 3:48 PM
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Replies
Here's what I can tell you:
雨夜 as Amaya is a pretty intuitive pronunciation. "Ame" (ah-meh) is the vocabulary word for "rain," but in compound words, "ama-" (ah-mah) is usual. No problem there.
夜 as a vocabulary word is usually pronounced "yo" or "yoru," but its Chinese (on) reading is "ya," so it works as well.
雨夜 as a vocabulary word is pronounced "amayo" and means "rainy night." Amaya is not a vocabulary word.
My Japanese first names dictionary includes Amaya, but with only three spellings: あまや (hiragana), 阿麻弥 (phonetic kanji), and the third is 雨夜. This implies that it is very rarely used as a given name. If it were common, there would be many more variations.
As a surname, Amaya is usually written 天谷 "heaven/sky" + "valley," which obviously has no connection with 雨夜. Surnames are almost never given as first names in Japan. In my opinion, it's highly unlikely that Western usage of Amaya or Amaia has anything to do with the Japanese surname. If it did, I would think a meaning such as "heavenly valley" would have been suggested.
雨夜 as Amaya is a pretty intuitive pronunciation. "Ame" (ah-meh) is the vocabulary word for "rain," but in compound words, "ama-" (ah-mah) is usual. No problem there.
夜 as a vocabulary word is usually pronounced "yo" or "yoru," but its Chinese (on) reading is "ya," so it works as well.
雨夜 as a vocabulary word is pronounced "amayo" and means "rainy night." Amaya is not a vocabulary word.
My Japanese first names dictionary includes Amaya, but with only three spellings: あまや (hiragana), 阿麻弥 (phonetic kanji), and the third is 雨夜. This implies that it is very rarely used as a given name. If it were common, there would be many more variations.
As a surname, Amaya is usually written 天谷 "heaven/sky" + "valley," which obviously has no connection with 雨夜. Surnames are almost never given as first names in Japan. In my opinion, it's highly unlikely that Western usage of Amaya or Amaia has anything to do with the Japanese surname. If it did, I would think a meaning such as "heavenly valley" would have been suggested.
This message was edited 5/12/2019, 5:53 PM
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Thank you so much for your answer! It was very helpful :)
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Googling 雨夜 with links to PDFs, it seems that this particular form is found as a surname only. The name is found in Namae Jiten data, though it's mostly written phonetically (hiragana/katakana). Not to mention, it is very rare and, what I would imagine, modern.
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Thank you for your answer! I think it is possible that someone heard the name Amaya, thought it was beautiful, and assigned some kanji to it to give it a nice meaning. There are tools on the internet which let you do this and I even found kanji for my (definitely not Japanese) first name. I also read several times now that 雨夜 sounds like Amayo and not like Amaya. It would be interesting to find out if the name has a Japanese background or not.
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All the real-life examples I've found for 雨夜 only have the reading 'Amaya'.
With regards to Amayo when considering its overall usage, I did find 3 (or perhaps 4*) examples of Amayo on FamilySearch, 2/3 of them being female. When I checked the DouseiDoumei telephone book data, I've only come across about 3 people with the writing 天代. Although I haven't found any Google results for 天代 with the reading Amayo, I feel it is a more likely writing for Amayo than 雨夜.
*One example is transcribed as 'Amaya', though given the overall context, I have a feeling her name is actually 'Amayo' in this case.
With regards to Amayo when considering its overall usage, I did find 3 (or perhaps 4*) examples of Amayo on FamilySearch, 2/3 of them being female. When I checked the DouseiDoumei telephone book data, I've only come across about 3 people with the writing 天代. Although I haven't found any Google results for 天代 with the reading Amayo, I feel it is a more likely writing for Amayo than 雨夜.
*One example is transcribed as 'Amaya', though given the overall context, I have a feeling her name is actually 'Amayo' in this case.
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Amayo 天代 looks more like a typical Japanese girl's name than Amaya. -Yo (代 or 世) is a common female suffix, and my Japanese first names database includes both 天代 and 天世 (but not 雨代, nor any other spellings with 雨).
There are two-syllable girl's names ending with -ya (e.g. Aya, Miya), but a three-syllable name ending with -ya is much more likely to be male: Tomoya, Nobuya, etc.
There are two-syllable girl's names ending with -ya (e.g. Aya, Miya), but a three-syllable name ending with -ya is much more likely to be male: Tomoya, Nobuya, etc.
This message was edited 5/13/2019, 3:51 PM
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