6

「あしたのジョー」以外の作品の多くは "梶原一騎" のペンネームで書かれました。

I have searched and found that 「多く」is adverb or adjective and it should be placed before the particle 「の」. Is the word a kind of noun or particle 「の」can be placed before adjective?

Eddie Kal
  • 11,332
  • 5
  • 19
  • 40
George
  • 4,167
  • 2
  • 14
  • 36

2 Answers2

5

In this case「多く」is not an adjective or an adverb.
多く is defined as a noun in Japanese dictionaries.

See weblio（大辞林）, here: http://www.weblio.jp/content/%E5%A4%9A%E3%81%8F

There are other nouns that follow a similar pattern, like「近く」and「遠く」.

sazarando
  • 7,301
  • 14
  • 25
  • 1
    More specifically, it's a pronoun (代名詞). English *many* can also work as an adjective (eg "many people") and as a pronoun (eg "Many of them did", "There were many"). – naruto Jul 05 '16 at 07:05
  • @naruto I'm not sure that it can be a true pronoun. For instance, can you say 「多くはそうとは思いません」? – sazarando Jul 05 '16 at 07:26
  • 3
    That sentence means "Many (people) don't think so". – naruto Jul 05 '16 at 10:22
  • その場合は、「多く」って何に取って代わっているでしょうか？そして、英文の"Many of them did"では"them"は代名詞ですが、"many"も代名詞でしょうか？ – sazarando Jul 06 '16 at 00:27
  • 不定代名詞 (indefinite pronoun) のことでしょうか？ – sazarando Jul 06 '16 at 00:35
  • Yes, *many* is categorized as an [indefinite pronoun](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indefinite_pronoun), and *many* in "Many of them did." seems to be an indefinite pronoun, too. – naruto Jul 06 '16 at 00:40
  • @naruto OK, I see what you mean. Thanks! I've never heard of indefinite pronouns being talked about in the context of Japanese grammar before. Maybe because there are so few of them in regular use. Can you think of any others? – sazarando Jul 06 '16 at 00:42
  • 1
    「幾つか」などでしょうか。まあ、あくまで名詞のカテゴリの1つです。 – naruto Jul 06 '16 at 00:53
2

多く is a nominalized word formed from the te-stem of the adjective 多い.

= 多い [adjective]　--> 多く [連用形 / te-stem] --> 多く [nominalized form]

So this sentence makes sense.

Another example:

私の学校の生徒の多くは女性だ
The students in my school are mostly girls.

Eddie Kal
  • 11,332
  • 5
  • 19
  • 40
Yuuichi Tam
  • 23,976
  • 1
  • 21
  • 41
  • (I'm not perfectly sure on what the masu-stem is as the middle step) [above fixed a bit of English word] – virmaior Jul 05 '16 at 07:01
  • @ virmaior Thank you for correcting. The masu-stem of the adjective 多い are 多く and 多かっ. – Yuuichi Tam Jul 05 '16 at 07:16
  • 1
    I think "masu-stem" is a term for 動詞の連用形 because 助動詞「ます」 attaches to it: `話し＋ます＝話します` This term doesn't work very well for 形容詞の連用形 because 助動詞「ます」 doesn't attach to it: `多く＋ます＝×多くます` –  Jul 05 '16 at 07:22
  • @snailplane Yes. I change it as te-term. – Yuuichi Tam Jul 05 '16 at 07:31