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既に教室でも例のナイフアクションを繰り広げており、クラスの連中にも俺とXXXとの事は周知の事実となっていた。

The speaker and XXX got in a fight on the first day of school.

I could rewrite this as:

俺とXXXとの事 は クラスの連中 に(も) 周知の事実 となっていた。

Without really knowing how this works, I can assume it's saying the speaker's dust up with XXX has become common knowledge among the class.

But just with AはBにCとなる in general, I don't know what do with Bに.

Chocolate
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xyz
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1 Answers1

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(TL;DR Try thinking of the "に" here in the same way you'd think of it in "〜に広がる".)

From デジタル大辞泉:

しゅう‐ち〔シウ‐〕【周知】
［名］(スル)世間一般に広く知れ渡っていること。また、広く知らせること。「周知の事実」「周知の通り」「運動の趣旨を社会に周知させる」

This definition is not entirely accurate, as we can and often do specify who we are making something widely known to, rather than it just being 世間一般に widely known.

For example:

「各位の研究室の皆様にも周知するようお願いいたします。」
"Please also let everyone in your respective labs know about (something)."

or

「関係者に周知すべき内容」
"Content that related parties should be informed about"

We can also specify who knows about a certain thing, as opposed to who something is being made known to.

「商標が香港において一般大衆に周知であること.」
"That the trademark is, in Hong Kong, widely known by the populace." (They most likely would be seeing the trademark, not being consciously informed by anyone about it.)

or

「全ての地方政府に周知の事実であるものとする。」
"(We) define (something) as a fact widely known by all local governments"

This is the sense in which 周知 is being used in your sentence.

Let's take it in parts. Writing the first half as an independent sentence, we get:

既に教室でも例のナイフアクションを繰り広げている。
(We) even already displayed/had a knife fight in the classroom as well.

(IMO 例の〜 is very hard to translate into English, but it means something along the lines of "the 〜 we/you've been hearing about")

By making this 連用形, we could be implicating a few things, but based on the context gleaned from your example, the second half of the sentence is acting as the consequence of the first half, so:

既に教室でも例のナイフアクションを繰り広げており、、、
We even already had a knife fight in the classroom as well, and (as a result)...

This result is revealed in the second half of the sentence.

クラスの連中にも俺とXXXとの事は周知の事実となっていた。

・俺とXXXとの事 = The thing between me and XXX
・クラスの連中 = (my) mates in class
・周知の事実 = a commonly/widely known fact

Putting these together we get:

クラスの連中にも周知の事実
(as per my example above) "A fact also widely known by my mates in class".

クラスの連中にも俺とXXXとの事は周知の事実(である)
"The thing between me and XXX (is) a fact also widely known by my mates in class."

However, by using なっていた instead of である, we express that fact that the state of affairs had changed from this not being a 周知の事実 to it in fact being a 周知の事実, as a result of 教室でも例のナイフアクションを繰り広げていること。

Thus, your sentence translates to:

"We even already had a knife fight in the classroom as well, and (as a result) the thing between me and XXX had become a fact also widely known by my mates in class."

sbkgs4686
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  • is this case it is still 周知の事実となる ( and 広がる), rather than any transitive action with a indirect object, which is the part that is hard to understand. – xyz Oct 17 '19 at 04:19
  • I guess I'm having a little trouble understanding exactly what about 周知の事実となる you're having difficulty with then, but perhaps [this post I found](https://japanese.stackexchange.com/questions/108/what-is-the-difference-between-となる-and-になる/739) explaining the difference between 〜になる and 〜となる may be of some assistance. The author could have very well said 「クラスの連中にも俺とXXXとの事は周知の事実になっていた。」 without changing the meaning of the sentence, though the nuance would change a smidge. – sbkgs4686 Oct 17 '19 at 10:58
  • that's not quite the issue, if it were just 俺とXXXとの事は周知の事実となる, then it's not even a conversation. If we stick 連中に in between what does that really mean? It's not an indirect object, there is no movement verb towards it, it's not a target of anything, if it's a location that a stretch, in a different context 連中 could be a cause or a purpose but that's also a stretch. Something along those lines – xyz Oct 17 '19 at 18:25
  • @xyz I would argue that it is a target of something. If you make X known to Y, then X is the object and Y is the indirect object. Y is the target of the information (X) you are making known. – user3856370 Oct 17 '19 at 18:48
  • @user3856370, i don't think that is the case because the speaker would rather be as inconspicuous as possible, moreover in this context, the news just gets around, there's no volition on anyone's part to make sure it reaches reach's the speaker's classroom. – xyz Oct 17 '19 at 18:53
  • @xyz We use に when we want to indicate the receiver / target of an action, even if there is no volition involved. Take 「焼き肉の良い匂いが会場全体に広がった」 - "The pleasing smell of 焼き肉 spread throughout the venue" for example. – sbkgs4686 Oct 18 '19 at 14:49
  • the volition is more in terms of the 精神作用の向けられる目標を表す。「母に甘える」「スターにあこがれる」 usage, but ～となる doesn't fit the 移動先や設置の場所や方向を表す。「成田に着く」「東京に向かう」「プールに飛び込む」」「リボンは胸に付けなさい」「服に泥が付く」「南に向いた窓」 either. I don't think i can apply your 会場全体に広がった example because 全体に is an abverb on it's own. the more i think about it, 広がる is much closer to 着く, 向か, etc in function. Whereas ～となる would very hard to force into these use cases. – xyz Oct 18 '19 at 17:20
  • I tried to explain it better. Try giving my answer another read. – sbkgs4686 Oct 19 '19 at 06:53
  • i think in the end, it can only really be an abstract location like with ...般大衆に周知であること. Unlike the your first two examples which use it as an indirect object. – xyz Oct 19 '19 at 19:52