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Probably a silly question, but in this sentence:

仕事ができなかったら十日と待たずに解雇されるだろうと思う。

What does the と in 十日と待たずに mean? Is it the "if" と, e.g. "when/if 10 days pass, I'd get fired without hesitation?". Shouldn't it say 十日だと (with the だ added)?

Thanks for the answers.

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7

This sentence says "(I) will be fired in no more than 10 days." (time)と待たずに is a common set phrase which literally means "without waiting for (time)".

This と is not "if" nor "then". The role of と here corresponds to the sixth entry of デジタル大辞泉's definition.

６ （数量を表す語に付き、打消しの表現を伴って）その範囲以上には出ない意を表す。…までも。「全部で一〇〇円―かからない」「一〇〇キロ―走らなかった」

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  • Great answer, thank you very much. Where did you find the fact that "(time)と待たずに" is a common set phrase? Google doesn't seem to be helping and none of the online dictionaries I've tried come up with any useful info.
    – awgaya
    Commented Apr 28, 2015 at 19:21
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    Ah, I thought it's common without looking at anything, but BCCWJ Corpus returned only 2 results which were exactly the same. A similar phrase とかからず returned 8 results. Another common way is to use も instead of と (10日も待たずに).
    – naruto
    Commented Apr 29, 2015 at 2:42

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