赤い

Pattern visualization

Examples

1. リンゴは赤いです。▶ —
   Apples are red.
2. 赤い夕日がきれいです。▶ —
   The red sunset is beautiful.

Collocations

Mnemonic

あかい — 赤い, Yamato. An i-adjective. The kanji 赤 is a flattened 大 (person) over 火 (fire) — 'the colour of a person scorched by firelight'. The textbook case of i-adjective inflection — predicative: 赤い. adverbial / pre-te: 赤く. past: 赤かった. negative: 赤くない. With change-verbs ── 赤くなる (turn red), 赤くする (make red). The noun form 赤 aka stands separately ── exactly the Korean split between 'ppalgata / ppalgang'. Together with 青 aoi, 赤 sits in Japan's ancient four-colour set ── one of the oldest colour words. A body idiom ── 顔が赤い: a red face (shame, drink, exertion). You meet 赤 again in Mandarin Roots.

Quick check

1. Natural Japanese for "the litmus turned red"?

   • リトマスが赤くなりました (became red — correct)
   • リトマスは赤いです (is red — state, not change)
   • リトマスを赤くしました (I made it red — agent)
   • リトマスが赤いになりました (ungrammatical — adj must drop い before に)