This study examines the actual condition of the use of keredomo, which is the conjunctive particle mainly used as a modern Japanese concessive expression, during the Edo and Meiji periods. I analyzed examples of keredomo and ga, the conjunctive particle with the same meaning as keredomo, in the light of usage rates and functions of these two particles, and variants of keredomo. The following three facts were indicated as a result of consideration. As for the usage rates, the variants, and the functions, I found a tendency toward change from the latter part of the Edo period to the Meiji period with the use of keredomo. (1) Usage rates: Although ga was superior to keredomo in the latter part of the Edo period, keredomo gradually increases from the latter part of the Edo period to the Meiji period. (2) Variants: Kedo is not found in the latter part of the Edo period, but after becoming the Meiji period, kedo comes to appear. (3) Functions: In the Edo dialect and subsequently in the Tokyo dialect of the Meiji period, although ga was frequently used for a non-concessive expression, keredomo was hardly used for a non-concessive expression function. However, when the Edo dialect is compared with the Tokyo dialect in the Meiji period, the usage of non-concessive keredomo increases from the latter part of the Edo period to the Meiji period.

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This paper examines, on the basis of a corpus study, how and why the modern intransitive-transitive system of Sino-Japanese verbs (Chinese loan words + the Japanese light verb -suru) has greatly changed over time. The conclusions are as follows: 1) Modern Sino-Japanese verbs can be used transitively when they represent changes in which agents are not restricted to humans (or animals); they can be used intransitively when they represent changes which come about without external human control. When both of these conditions are satisfied, they can be used both intransitively and transitively. 2) In this intransitive-transitive verb system of Sino-Japanese, only some of the verbs that have both intransitive and transitive usage have changed. These changes come in two directions: one is to lose transitive usage, and the other is to lose intransitive usage. The former happened as a condition of having transitive usage became more "severe" (verbs which express events that are likely to occur spontaneously cannot have transitive usage) due to assimilation to native Japanese verbs, many of which have a pair of different forms for intransitive and transitive verbs. The latter happened because certain verbs narrowed their semantic field to denote only events for which external human control is necessary. 3) Of these two, the verbs which have lost transitive usage greatly outnumber those that have lost intransitive usage. This can be explained through the native Japanese suffix -saseru functioning as a "causative" marker, substituting for the former transitive usage, whereas there is no "anti-causative" marker in Japanese (the passive marker -sareru does not function as "anti-causative").

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The term yoru-gohan, meaning supper, is a new word used mainly by today's youth. But its formation goes back to at least the time of World War II. Although this word is hard to trace in documents because it was an unpolished expression used by children, recently it has come to properly express changes in eating habits, such as the delay of supper time and the lack of breakfast. Yoru-gohan is now used in newspaper articles, remarks in the Diet, elementary school teaching materials, and can be counted as a Kizukanai Shin-go("unnoticed new word"). Yoru-gohan derives from yoru 'night' to express supper time. Hiru 'afternoon' was added to the basic formation for asa 'morning' and yu 'evening' meals. Yoru is in contrast to hiru. Yoru-gohan is a new phenomenon not only in yoru being used as meal vocabulary, but also because yoru is used as the first half of a compound word. Therefore, yoru-gohan is a notable word from the viewpoint of the historical study of vocabulary and word structure.

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"Wakan-gazoku Iroha-jiten" was edited by TAKAHASHI Goro and published in the 21^<St> year of Meiji Era (1888). In this dictionary, the explanation of meanings was apparently given word for word. By analyzing the rules on which the explanations of meanings in "Wakan-gazoku Iroha-jiten" were based, the association of words becomes clearer. Therefore, the following can be said. The meanings often explained in both wago and kango entries (komoku) are as follows: Midashikomoku - kanjiretsu(=kango) - wagoshakugi. It seems wago were used to explain kango and kango were used to explain wago due to principles connected to the title "Wakan." Furthermore, if the kanji row (kanjiretsu) and title (furigana) in the non-dictionary data of the Meiji Era are acknowledged as words, repetition of the midashi entry and the meaning of the words in "Wakan-gazoku Iroha-jiten" are confirmed. These words could be associated as two-word entries. Thus, the "Wakan-gazoku Iroha-jiten" is useful in considering the vocabulary of the Meiji Era.

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