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雨降って地固まる ame futte ji katamaru The Ground Becomes Firm After Rain

This is a philological study of the Japanese proverb 雨降って地固まる (ame futte ji katamaru). It spans four centuries, from a poets' quarrel of 1646 that remembers the proverb at a reconciliation party in the 1620s, and examines the disturbance it always follows, the Chinese hexagram a scholar set beside it, and the English renderings from 1897 to 2004.

Japanese Scroll of The Ground Becomes Firm After Rain (ame futte ji katamaru) — Calligraphy by Eri Takase
The Ground Becomes Firm After Rain (ame futte ji katamaru)

The Ground Becomes Firm After Rain (ame futte ji katamaru) on a traditional Japanese Scroll by Master Eri Takase.

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Abstract

雨降って地固まる, after rain, the ground sets firm, is a native Japanese proverb about a disturbance and what settles after it: a quarrel, an upset, a war, and afterward the ground is firmer than before. Its oldest witnesses that can be read are from the 1640s, a note of 1643 that calls it what the common people say and a polemic of 1646 that remembers it spoken at a reconciliation party in the 1620s. The sense has not moved from then to now, and the witnesses differ only in the size of the disturbance: a lovers' quarrel, a household's hard years, Ieyasu's war. In English the Meiji dictionaries render it the literal, the general, and the quarrel and the calm, and only a 2004 American guide glosses it as human beings becoming stronger through challenge.

Overview

The sense. One sense from the 1620s to today: something goes wrong between people or in a realm, and afterward the ground is firmer than before [1][2]. The witnesses differ only in the size of the disturbance. For the poets and the pleasure quarter it is a lovers' quarrel [3][2]; for 西鶴 a household's hard years [4]; for 常山's Ieyasu a war [5]; for the Meiji dictionaries a disturbance of any size [6][7]; and for 藤井 in 1910, at the widest, anything that looked bad and came out well [8]. The modern dictionaries keep the quarrel at the center and add that the proverb approves of the quarrel's coming out [2].

The words. 雨降って, ame futte, is rain having fallen; the て-form links cause to result, and the Edo books write the older inflection 雨ふりて for the same verb [1][3]. 地, ji, is the ground, read じ in every dictionary and ぢ in a book of 1667 [2]. 固まる, katamaru, is to set, to become firm. The 精選版日本国語大辞典 glosses the figure: 変事の後は、かえって事態が落ち着いて、基礎がかたまる, after an upset, things settle and the foundation sets [2]. Every dictionary from 1901 to today uses a word for disturbance to say what comes before the settling: もめごと, 変事, 騒擾, 紛擾, 小いさかひ, 乱, a quarrel, an upset, a disorder, a lovers' spat, a war [6][7][2]. What firms afterward is a foundation: a household, a friendship, a realm.

The proverb in English. Hepburn's dictionary of 1872 lists the proverb under ame and gives no English [9]. The earliest English cited here is the Yokohama press: the Japan Weekly Mail glosses it storms clear the air in 1881 and reaches for it again in 1889, 1896 and 1908 [10][11][12][13]. Chamberlain's Handbook of 1888 opens its list of proverbs with it [14], and Brinkley's dictionary of 1896 gives the literal and, for the figure, the quarrel and the deeper friendship [15]. From 1897 the Meiji dictionaries render it three ways: the literal, after a rain, the soil hardens; the general, good comes out of evil; and the quarrel and the calm, better friends than ever after a quarrel, after the storm, a calm [16][17][18][19][20][21]. The twentieth century's Japanese-English dictionaries and the Japanese-made proverb books keep those three equations [22][23][24][25]. Of the English proverb books, Zona in 1996 gives the literal [26], Buchanan in 1965 the literal with two of the equations [27], and Trimnell in 2004 glosses the rain as human beings becoming stronger through challenge [28]; the proverb is not in Galef (1987, 2000) [29][30].

The historical record

The 1570s to 90s. 月菴酔醒記, a notebook. The 日国 names this as the oldest witness and quotes nothing from it [2].

The 1620s, as told in 1646. 安原貞室, 氷室守, a polemic against a rival's poetry collection. 貞室 takes the hokku 雨降て地をかためたる氷かな, rain has fallen and set the ground: ice, from the rival collection and says his master 松永貞徳 made it on the spot at a 中直しの座, a reconciliation party, in the last years of 元和, which is about 1622 to 1624, and made it as 雨ふりて地かたまりたる氷かな, 此も吹草より遥に以前のこと也, long before the 毛吹草 [1]. He praises the master's form for setting the proverb's words in the verse whole and at ease, 雨ふりて地かたまるといふこと葉を。やつさすして。やすらかにをかれたり, and calls the collection's 地をかためたる a labored making, 世話をくたきたるさま也 [1]. He adds a second such verse, made after rain at a kickball gathering in early 寛永 [1]. So the proverb was current by the 1620s, and already the thing one said when friends made up.

1638. 毛吹草, the first printed proverb collection, by 松江重頼. 雨ふりて地かたまる, in a list ordered by association, immediately after 思ふ中のつゝりいさかひ, the small quarrels of a couple in love [3]. The company a proverb keeps in this list is its meaning to the man who compiled it.

1643. 松永貞徳's annotated 犬筑波集. A linked verse about the ground setting to the sound of a mortar carries the note 世俗に雨降て地かたまるといふあり, the common people say: rain falls and the ground sets [31].

1656. 世話尽, the second proverb collection. 雨降て地かたまる, listed [32].

1667. 吉原すずめ, a guide to the pleasure quarter. おもふ中の小いさかひ、雨ふりてぢかたまるなどと、おさだまりのあいさつにて, a little quarrel between lovers, and "rain falls and the ground sets" as the usual thing to say [2]. The 日国's first quotation: the proverb as the stock consolation after a lovers' spat.

1688. 井原西鶴, 日本永代蔵, book six. 雨ふつて地かたまると, of a household that has come through hard years [4].

1739. 湯浅常山, 常山紀談, a collection of warrior anecdotes. After the battle of 関ヶ原: 東照宮、石田が亂は雨降りて地固まるといふに同じ。此より靜謐ならん, Ieyasu said: Ishida's rebellion is like rain falling and the ground setting; from here on there will be peace [5]. The lords congratulated him, and 加藤清正 answered that the weather of a realm can cloud over as suddenly as a clear sky, and that the hard thing to read is the human heart; 常山 adds that he does not know where the exchange took place [5].

Early 1800s. 小山田与清, 松屋筆記, a scholar's notebook. Item 三七, 雨降て地かたまると云諺: he cites the 常山紀談 passage and sets beside it a Chinese parallel from the Book of Changes, the hexagram 睽, estrangement: 天地睽而其事同也 男女睽而其志通也, heaven and earth are estranged yet their work is one; man and woman are estranged yet their wills meet, and its last line, 遇雨則吉, meeting rain is auspicious [33]. A parallel, offered as one.

1891 to 1933. The Meiji and Shōwa dictionaries. 国民の品位 (1891) applies the proverb to the 西南 war and the army it produced [34]; 俗諺辞林 (1901) glosses it 騒擾一たび鎭靜に歸すれば、その後は無事を保つべし, once a disturbance has settled, peace should hold, and retells Ieyasu [6]; 俚諺辞典 (1906): 何事か紛擾を極めたる後、却て能く事の治まるをいふ, after some great confusion, matters settle the better [7]. 藤井乙男's 諺語大辞典 (1910) generalizes, わろしと見ゆることの、却て善き結果を來すをいふ, what looked bad brings a good result, quotes the hokku, and pairs it with two English proverbs, Good comes out of evil and After rain comes fair weather [8]. 金言名句辞典 (1928) and 俚諺大辞典 (1933) keep the 1906 gloss nearly word for word: 雨後に土地の固まる如く何事か紛擾を極めたる後却て能く事の治まるをいふ, and 何事も紛擾を極めたる後、却て能く物事の治まるの意 [35][36].

The dictionaries today. デジタル大辞泉: もめごとなど悪いことが起こったあとは、かえって基盤がしっかりしてよい状態になることのたとえ. The ことわざを知る辞典 reads it as a proverb that values a quarrel coming into the open rather than festering, a kind of 験直し, a clearing of the air, with 川端康成's 山の音 (1949 to 1954) as an example, and gives the English After a storm comes a calm [2]. Its earlier example of use is 相馬愛蔵 and 黒光's 一商人として (1938): これで我が中村屋も雨降って地固まる [2].

What is not a source. The Book of Changes hexagram that 与清 set beside the proverb is a parallel, and he offers it as one; no dictionary or book cited here, Japanese or Chinese, claims a Chinese origin for the sentence, and the Korean proverb the modern dictionary lists is the same image in another language [2]. Nor is building character a sense of the proverb: no witness cited here glosses it so, the two equations that calm after a storm and an argument clears away bad feelings set beside it are the tradition's own, and the quarrel is where the proverb began. The one footing for character is late and English: an American guide of 2004, below, glosses the rain as human beings become stronger as they meet and overcome the challenges of life [28].

The proverb in English

1881. The Japan Weekly Mail, Yokohama. On a quarrel in the foreign settlement: Storms clear the air, or as the Japanese say: "Ame futte, ji katamaru." A fight was perhaps inevitable [10]. The earliest English rendering cited here, and already the quarrel sense.

1888. Basil Hall Chamberlain, A Handbook of Colloquial Japanese, ¶ 449, A few proverbs, the first. Ame futte, ji katamaru, glossed word by word rain having-fallen, earth hardens, then After rain the ground gets hard ("Good comes out of evil") [14]. The literal and the general, in the book that taught a generation of foreigners their Japanese; the later editions keep it.

1889. The Japan Weekly Mail. There is a Japanese proverb, however, which says ame futte ji katamaru (after rain the ground hardens), and as there was much rain lately in our settlement, who can tell that the hope is extravagant? [11].

1896. Brinkley, Nanjō and Iwasaki, An Unabridged Japanese-English Dictionary, page 27, under Ame. Ame futte ji katamaru, marked as a proverb and glossed literally after the rain, the ground hardens and figuratively after a quarrel, love (or friendship) becomes deeper; under the verbs the same proverb is glossed after a quarrel more intimate friendship is formed; good comes out of evil [15]. The first dictionary to give the figure, and it gives the quarrel.

1896. The Japan Weekly Mail. Of an economic incident: The current Japanese saying, "after rain the soil grows firm," is appositely applied [12].

1897. イーストレーキ, 英和実用会話独修. After rain the ground gets hard; Good comes out of evil; Peace comes after contest [16].

1898. 井上十吉, 英語学講義録, page 56. After a rain, the soil hardens, the literal and nothing else [17].

1902. イーストレーキ, 和英会話辞書. Better friends than ever after a quarrel, and After a quarrel, friendship grows deeper [18].

1907. ロイド, 和英新辞典. After the storm, a calm; After rain comes sunshine [19].

1908. The Japan Weekly Mail. A minister answering his critics recalled the old Japanese proverb that after the rain has fallen the soil grows firm [13].

1909. 井上十吉, Inouye's Japanese-English Dictionary, page 30, under 雨. Among the example sentences: The rain makes the soil the harder [37].

1918. 斎藤秀三郎. Good comes out of evil [20].

1929. 研究社, 新英和中辞典. After the storm comes a calm [21].

1942. 研究社, Kenkyūsha's New Japanese-English Dictionary, page 28, under ame. 雨降って地固まる. After rain comes fair weather. Good comes out of evil. Storms make oaks take deeper root [22]. The third equation is new, and it is the nearest any dictionary comes to the stronger reading.

1958. Rokuo Okada, Japanese Proverbs and Proverbial Phrases, page 18. Ame futte ji katamaru. After rain the ground becomes firm, which he calls the Japanese equivalent of After clouds, clear weather and After a storm comes fair weather; his English index equates After a storm comes a calm with this proverb and with 嵐の後には凪が来る [23].

1965. Daniel Crump Buchanan, Japanese Proverbs and Sayings, page 153. Ame futte ji katamaru: "After rain the ground gets firm." This may be interpreted both literally and figuratively. English parallels: After rain comes fair weather. Good comes out of evil [27].

1980. 研究社, Kenkyūsha's New English-Japanese Dictionary, fifth edition, page 246, under calm. After a storm comes a calm, 《諺》あらしのあとにはなぎが来る, 雨降って地固まる [24]. The school dictionary of the same house, undated, makes the same equation under the same headword [25]. In the English-Japanese direction the proverb is what after a storm comes a calm becomes in Japanese.

1996. Guy Zona, Even Withered Trees Give Prosperity to the Mountain, page 39. After rain, the earth gets firm. The literal [26].

2004. Edward Trimnell, Tigers, Devils, and Fools, page 11. Rain hardens the ground. Rain can be unpleasant. However, rain causes the loose soil to coalesce, which in turn makes the surface of the earth harder. In the same way, human beings become stronger as they meet and overcome the challenges of life. The nearest thing to a builds character reading in any English book cited here, and it is a 2004 English guide's gloss [28].

Today. JMdict: adversity strengthens the foundations; after a storm comes a calm; what doesn't kill you makes you stronger; the ground hardens after it rains [38]. The first of these keeps the 日国's noun, foundations. The house title, The Ground Becomes Firm After Rain, is exactly right: it is the literal rendering, the ground becomes firm after rain. What a rendering must keep is that something went wrong first, between people, and that the ground that sets is theirs.

A reading

The proverb is about a disturbance, a quarrel, a crisis, a war, after which the ground is firmer than before, and every witness from the reconciliation party of the 1620s to the stock consolation of 1667 to Ieyasu after 関ヶ原 to every dictionary cited above says so. After a storm comes a calm is a fair English for the Ieyasu use, and an argument clears the air is the original use; adversity builds character is a sense no Japanese witness carries, and one American guide of 2004 half supports it. The proverb is also heard today of hardship in general, which the 1938 and 1949 quotations in the ことわざを知る辞典 support; as a use of the proverb the word for that is hardship and foundation, not character.

References

  1. 安原貞室『氷室守』, 1646, National Diet Library pid 2553219, scan 25. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/2553219/1/25
  2. 「雨降つて地固まる」, 精選版 日本国語大辞典 · デジタル大辞泉 · ことわざを知る辞典, at kotobank. https://kotobank.jp/word/雨降つて地固まる-3206810
  3. 松江重頼『毛吹草』, 1638, in 藤井乙男『諺の研究』, 1929, National Diet Library pid 1452761, scan 157. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/1452761/1/157
  4. 井原西鶴『日本永代蔵』, 1688, book 6, National Diet Library pid 2554356, scan 38. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/2554356/1/38
  5. 湯浅常山『常山紀談』, 1739; the 1912 typeset edition, National Diet Library pid 1078984, scan 257. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/1078984/1/257
  6. 『俗諺辞林』, 1901, National Diet Library pid 863228, scan 166. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/863228/1/166
  7. 『俚諺辞典』, 1906, National Diet Library pid 900343, scan 20. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/900343/1/20
  8. 藤井乙男『諺語大辞典』, 1910, 【雨降ツテ地カタマル】, National Diet Library pid 862766, scan 37. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/862766/1/37
  9. Hepburn, 『和英語林集成』, 1872, under AME, National Diet Library pid 993689, scan 23. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/993689/1/23
  10. The Japan Weekly Mail, Yokohama, the bound volume September to December 1881, the passage after the 3 December dateline (line 89555 of the archive.org text layer). https://archive.org/details/jwm-bound-1881.9-12
  11. The Japan Weekly Mail, Yokohama, the bound volume of 1889, the passage after the 3 November dateline (line 454909 of the archive.org text layer). https://archive.org/details/jwm-bound-1889
  12. The Japan Weekly Mail, Yokohama, the bound volume July to December 1896 (line 183118 of the archive.org text layer). https://archive.org/details/jwm-bound-1896.7-12
  13. The Japan Weekly Mail, Yokohama, the bound volume July to December 1908 (line 116066 of the archive.org text layer). https://archive.org/details/jwm-bound-1908.7-12
  14. Basil Hall Chamberlain, A Handbook of Colloquial Japanese, Trübner, London, 1888, ¶ 449, A few proverbs, no. 1 (the shelved copy; the 1898 and 1907 editions carry it as ¶ 448 at archive.org ahandbookcolloq03chamgoog and hand00bookofcolloqchamrich). https://archive.org/details/ahandbookcolloq01chamgoog
  15. F. Brinkley, F. Nanjō and Y. Iwasaki, An Unabridged Japanese-English Dictionary, Sanseidō, Tokyo, 1896, p. 27, s.v. Ame; the figure again s.v. Katamaru and under the verb forms. https://archive.org/details/cu31924082117288
  16. イーストレーキ『英和実用会話独修』, 1897, National Diet Library pid 871361, scan 173. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/871361/1/173
  17. 井上十吉『英語学講義録』和文英訳, 1898, p. 56, National Diet Library pid 869647, scan 31. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/869647/1/31
  18. イーストレーキ『和英会話辞書』, 1902, National Diet Library pid 870192, scans 24 and 314. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/870192/1/24
  19. ロイド『和英新辞典』, 1907, National Diet Library pid 903157, scan 27. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/903157/1/27
  20. 斎藤秀三郎, 1918, National Diet Library pid 1681530, scans 102 and 259. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/1681530/1/102
  21. 研究社『新英和中辞典』, 1929, National Diet Library pid 1904907, scan 64. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/1904907/1/64
  22. 武信由太郎 ed., Kenkyūsha's New Japanese-English Dictionary, Kenkyūsha, Tokyo, 1942 (the Harvard University Press printing), p. 28, s.v. ame.
  23. Rokuo Okada, Japanese Proverbs and Proverbial Phrases, Japan Travel Bureau, Tokyo, 1958, p. 18, and the English index s.v. After a storm comes a calm.
  24. 小稲義男 ed., Kenkyūsha's New English-Japanese Dictionary, 5th ed., Kenkyūsha, Tokyo, 1980, p. 246, s.v. calm.
  25. 岡倉由三郎 ed., Kenkyūsha's New School Dictionary, English-Japanese, Kenkyūsha, Tokyo, undated printing, s.v. calm (the shelved copy, its own page 125).
  26. Guy Zona, Even Withered Trees Give Prosperity to the Mountain, Simon and Schuster, 1996, p. 39.
  27. Daniel Crump Buchanan, Japanese Proverbs and Sayings, University of Oklahoma Press, 1965, p. 153.
  28. Edward Trimnell, Tigers, Devils, and Fools, Beechmont Crest, 2004, p. 11.
  29. David Galef, Even Monkeys Fall from Trees, Tuttle, 1987.
  30. David Galef, Even a Stone Buddha Can Talk, Tuttle, 2000, list of proverbs.
  31. 松永貞徳『新増犬筑波集』, 1643, National Diet Library pid 2541201, scan 22. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/2541201/1/22
  32. 皆虚『世話尽』, 1656, National Diet Library pid 2554768, scan 26. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/2554768/1/26
  33. 小山田与清『松屋筆記』, manuscript, National Diet Library pid 2574523, scan 106. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/2574523/1/106
  34. 『国民の品位』, 1891, National Diet Library pid 755479, scan 79. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/755479/1/79
  35. 『金言名句辞典』, 1928, National Diet Library pid 1109999, scan 11. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/1109999/1/11
  36. 『俚諺大辞典』, 1933, National Diet Library pid 1766149, scan 10. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/1766149/1/10
  37. 井上十吉, Inouye's Japanese-English Dictionary, Sanseidō, Tokyo, 1909, p. 30, s.v. 雨 (the shelved copy).
  38. JMdict, 「雨降って地固まる」, at Weblio 英和・和英辞典. https://ejje.weblio.jp/content/雨降って地固まる

Authors

Tim Jackowski (Systems Architect, Takase Studios, LLC) · 典 Ten (Anthropic Claude Fable 5.1, Takase Studios LLC)

AI written · Ten wrote the history. Tim Jackowski commissioned it and answers for it.

Checked · grok-4.6 (xAI), 2026-09-05, citations · gpt-6-astra (OpenAI), 2026-09-05, citations