Hiragana

Hiragana is one of three character sets used in the Japanese language.

Each Hiragana letter represents particular syllable. Letter itself has no meaning.
Hiragana is used widely to form a sentence.
Origin
Hiragana

Original
Kanji

Hiragana was developed in the 8-10th century by simplifying the form of particular Kanji symbols.
Compared to Katakana, Hiragana letters have more curved lines.
Number of Letters
In modern Japanese, there are 46 basic Hiragana letters.
In addition to these 46 basic letters called gojon, there are modified forms to describe more sounds -
20dakuon, 5 handakuon, 36 yon, 1 sokuon and 6 additional letters.
FAQ: What are the letters with a bar on top ( )?







Gojon
Gojon-zu
In Japanese, syllables are organized in the form of a table (5 x 10). This table is called gojon-zu (literally
means table of 50 sounds).
To describe these sounds, Hiragana and Katakana alphabets are used.
Letters , and appear more than once in the table. These 5 duplicates (gray colored) are usually
skipped or ignored.
Another syllable is included. It doesn't belong to any row or column.
In total, 46 letters (45+1) are counted as gojon (50 sounds).
You can learn gojon letters at Hiragana Master Drill: Part 1-10.
Structure of the Table
The first row - [a], [i], [u], [e] and [o] are five vowels of the Japanese language.
Letters in the same column contain the same vowel.
Letters in the same row are considered to contain the same consonant.
Letters and represent the same sound [o]. is used only as the particle in a sentence.
Dakuon

Dakuon literally means turbid or murky sound. It is the voiced sound of [ka], [sa], [ta] and [ha]-row
syllables.
Dakuon is indicated with two small dots.
Pronunciation of and , and are the same.
You can learn dakuon letters at Hiragana Master Drill: Part 11.

Handakuon

Handakuon literally means half-turbid or half-murky sound.
Handakuon is indicated with a small circle.
You can learn handakuon letters at Hiragana Master Drill: Part 11.








Yon

Yon is a combination of the consonant of i-column syllables and ya, yu or yo. For example, k + ya = kya.
Yon is described by i-column letters plus small , or . For example, + = [kya].
Pronunciation of , , and , , are the same.
You can learn yon letters at Hiragana Master Drill: Part 12-13.
Sokuon

pause
Sokuon is a pause (no sound) between two syllables.
Sokuon is described by small .
Examples
[sakki] [hisshi] [itta] [yappari]
Pronunciation of sokuon is not very easy. Hiragana Master Drill: Part 14 explains it in detail.
Additional Letters

These additional letters are invented in modern era to describe the sounds of foreign language.
Note: Foreign words are usually written in Katakana. These additional Hiragana letters are rarely used.
Examples
[fa] [ti] [du] [we] [fo]
Small [a], [i], [u], [e] and [o] are attached after particular letters.
Examples
[va] [vi] [vu] [ve] [vo]
is used for [v] sound.