Meaning

Primary

To Apologize

Word Type

godan verb

Explanation

This word consists of kanji with hiragana attached. Because the hiragana ends with an sound, you know this word is a verb. The kanji itself means apologize so the verb vocab version is to apologize.

Reading

あやまる
  • Kyoko
    (Tokyo accent, female)
  • Kenichi
    (Tokyo accent, male)

Explanation

Since this word consists of a kanji with hiragana attached, you can bet that it will use the kun'yomi reading. You didn't learn that reading with this kanji, so here's a mnemonic to help you: When you say you're sorry to apologize, you'd probably start with: "I am (あやま) sorry!"

Context

Patterns of Use

Common Word Combinations

  • 相手が謝る

    the other party apologizes

    私が謝る

    I apologize

    親が謝る

    a parent apologizes

Context Sentences

コウイチちゃんに今すぐ謝りなさい!

Apologize to Koichi right now!

何も悪いことをしてないのに謝られるとぎゃくにこっちがこまります。

If you apologize even though you haven't done anything wrong it makes me uncomfortable.

君が満足する結果が得られないのはかわいそうだけど、自分がしたことじゃないのに謝るつもりはないよ。

I feel bad that you won’t get a satisfying result, but I refuse to apologize for something I didn’t do.

Kanji Composition