Dictionary

This page consists of a small sample of some common and interesting Tsugaru-ben words. You can find more words in the Matsunoki Corpus. There is now a learner's dictionary that defines the words that appear in the corpus.

The research page also contains other dictionary resources.

Details about parts of speech and inflection can be found here.

Guide

Tsugaru-ben is transcribed in romaji. See the grammar guide for a guide on pronunciation. Characters between parentheses indicate optional pronuncation.

Nouns

Tsugaru-ben	Standard Japanese	English
wa	私	I, me
ome	あなた	you
wa(n)do	私達	We, us (combination of わ + はんど (たち)
mehe	店	Shop
ba(n)ge	夕べ	Evening (usually pronounced with n)
oboko	赤ちゃん	Baby
waraha(n)do	子どもたち	Children
warashi	子ども	Child
jama	高度	Height
kunpita	首	Neck (アイヌ語)
danburi	トンボ	Dragonfly
kimi	玉蜀黍	Corn

Verbs

Tsugaru-ben	Standard Japanese	English	Example
hakkeru (ichidan)	走る	to run	musume tagara no tama ba motte yama sa mugatte hakkeda .
asagu	歩く	to walk
kepparu	がんばる	to do one's best

Adjectives

Tsugaru-ben	Standard Japanese	English	Example
a(n)zumashi(i)	ゆったりして	Comfortable	soregara wa goguragu de anzumashigu kuraheda ndabe ne
sanbi	寒い	Cold
maine1	駄目	No good	moo nido to tsukamareba maine do .

Particles

Tsugaru-ben	Standard Japanese	Notes	Example
sa	に	Postposition	soheba ora no e sa kureba ii !
be		Hortative	mide kuru be .
ba	を	Accusative	basama hadage sa kusurininjin ba uede , sore ba tagagu uru mon da dogode , jenko daba unaru hodo tamede da zuon na .
daba	は	Topic
dakya	は	Topic
hande	から	Conjunctive (because)
ba(t)te	けど	Conjunctive (although)
do	と	Quotative
zu	と	Quotative
on2	Inferential
dya	よ	Final (assert)
byon		Inferential
ba	か	Final (question)
he	ください	Imperative (polite)
bari	ばかり

Inflection

Adjective or verb -te form will often change from "kute" to "fute" or "shite". For example, 寒くて (samukute) would be さんびして (sambishite). まめしい (mameshii), a Tsugaru-ben word meaning diligint would be mameshishite in its -te form.