Японско-португальский словарь 1603 года Nippo Jisho

1603 Japanese Portuguese dictionary

The literally the "Japanese–Portuguese Dictionary"; 日葡辞書; Nippo Jisho or Vocabulario da Lingoa de Iapam (Vocabulário da Língua do Japão in modern Portuguese; "Vocabulary of the Language of Japan" in English) is a Japanese to Portuguese dictionary compiled by Jesuit missionaries and published in Nagasaki, Japan, in 1603. Containing entries for 32,293 Japanese words with explanations in Portuguese, it was the first dictionary of Japanese to a European language. The original publication uses the Latin alphabet exclusively, without Japanese characters (i. e. kanji or kana). Facsimile editions were published in Japan in 1960 by Iwanami Shoten and again in 1973 and 1975 by Benseisha. The Benseisha reproduction is generally considered the clearer and more legible. A 1630 translation into Spanish published in Manila by the Dominican friars of the University of Santo Tomas, an 1869 translation into French, and a 1980 translation into Japanese (by Iwanami Shoten) also exist. as of 2023, a translation into English by Jeroen Lamers was in the works.

The Society of Jesus (commonly known as the Jesuits), with the cooperation of Japanese people, compiled the dictionary over several years. They intended it to serve the need of missionaries for language study and research. The Portuguese priest João Rodrigues is supposed to have been the main organizer of the project and its editor: having already published works like Arte da Lingoa de Iapam (Arte da Língua do Japão in modern Portuguese; "Art of the Language of Japan" in English) and Arte breue da lingoa Iapoa (Arte breve da Língua Japonesa in modern Portuguese; "Brief Art of the Japanese Language" in English) explaining the Japanese language for missionaries, he was known among the Portuguese community as having the highest proficiency in Japanese.

The approximately 32,000 entries are arranged alphabetically. Each word is displayed in the Latin alphabet according to Portuguese conventions of the late sixteenth century, and explained in Portuguese. The dictionary's primary purpose was to teach missionaries spoken Japanese. As needed, the authors identify such things as regional dialect, written and spoken forms, women's and children's language, elegant and vulgar words, and Buddhist vocabulary. Many of these words had never been written in any known text before the Nippo Jisho was published, and the system of romanization used by the Nippo Jisho reflects the phonetics of 16th century Japanese (Late Middle Japanese), which differs from modern Japanese: this furnishes present day linguists valuable insight into the Japanese language of the Sengoku period of Japanese history and how it has evolved into its modern form. The dictionary also yields information on rhyming words, individual pronunciation, meaning, usage, names of plants and animals, popular phrases, and customs of the times. Because this dictionary contains the earliest known written example of many words, Japanese language dictionaries often cite it as a primary source, such as the 14 volume Nihon Kokugo Daijiten , known in English as "Shogakukan's Japanese Dictionary", published by Shogakukan.

Only four copies of the original 1603 edition still exist. Three of them are in Europe. One copy is located at the Bodleian Library, University of Oxford; one is at the Bibliothèque nationale de France in Paris (available online since 2013); and one is at the Public Library of Évora [pt] in Portugal. The fourth copy is located at the National Library of Brazil, and it belonged to the wife of Emperor Dom Pedro II, Teresa Cristina.