From Sitting to Existing: The Evolution of いる in Japanese

Origins in Old Japanese

In Old Japanese (OJ), the ancestor of いる wasn’t an existential verb at all. Instead, it appeared in two related forms:

• wi- meaning “sit down, settle down”
• wor- meaning “be sitting”

These were purely positional verbs, similar to how we might use “sit” or “stand” in English. At this stage, they formed an antonym pair with:

• tat- (“rise, stand up”)
• tater- (“be standing”)

The Path to Middle Japanese

During the Early Middle Japanese period (EMJ), the language developed a new stative form:

• wi-tar- emerged as a new way to express “be sitting”
• This gradually began to replace the older wor- form

The evolution roughly followed this path:

wi- (sit down) → wor- (be sitting) → or- (exist/be)

wi- → wi-tar- → itar- → ita → i- (exist/be)

The Grammaticalization Process

What we see in the development of いる is a classic example of grammaticalization – how concrete, physical meanings evolve into more abstract grammatical functions. The progression followed these stages:

Lexical Verb Stage

• Original meaning: physical action of sitting
• Concrete and easily visualized

Stative Form Stage

• Developed to express the state of being seated
• Beginning of more abstract usage

Progressive Marker Stage

• Used to mark ongoing actions
• Further abstraction from physical meaning

Existential Verb Stage

• Final evolution into marking existence
• Most abstract and grammaticalized usage

Modern Distribution

In contemporary Japanese, this historical development has left clear traces in how いる and its variants are used:

いる (i-)

• Primary existential verb for animate subjects and ongoing actions
• Used in progressive and resultative constructions

おる (or-)

• Humble variant of いる
• Maintains the animate subject association
• More commonly used in Kansai dialects

ある (ar-)

• Used primarily with inanimate subjects and resultative states
• Contrasts with いる’s animate usage

The specialization of いる for animate subjects isn’t arbitrary – it’s a direct result of its origins as a volitional action verb (“sit down”). This etymology made it naturally suited for describing beings capable of intentional movement and positioning or active and ongoing states.

Source

Bjarke Frellesvig’s “A history of the Japanese language”