火のないところに煙は立たない

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Japanese

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Kanji in this term

Grade: 1
けむり
Grade: S

Grade: 1
kun'yomi
Alternative spellings
火のない所に煙は立たない
火の無いところに煙は立たない
火の無い所に煙は立たない

Alternative forms

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Etymology

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Can be broken down as (hi, fire) +‎ (no, genitive particle; in subordinate clauses, can mark the subject of the clause) +‎ ない (nai, not, not any) +‎ ところ (tokoro, place, location) +‎ (ni, at, in, locative particle) +‎ (kemuri, smoke) +‎ (wa, topic and contrastive particle) +‎ 立たない (tatanai, doesn't stand, doesn't rise, the plain negative conjugation of verb 立つ (tatsu, to stand, to rise)).

Literally, "smoke doesn't rise in places with no fire".

Pronunciation

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  • IPA(key): [çi no̞ na̠i to̞ko̞ɾo̞ ɲ̟i ke̞mɯ̟ɾʲi β̞a̠ ta̠ta̠na̠i]

Proverb

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()のないところに(けむり)()たない (hi no nai tokoro ni kemuri wa tatanai

  1. where there's smoke, there's fire