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I've been trying to translate Touhou doujinshi, when I came across this sentence:

a man talks about youkai's den

A man talks about events related to youkai's den down the road.

The first part of the sentence is:

なんでも綺麗【きれい】な女【おんな】がたくさん出【で】てきて呑【の】めや歌【うた】えの大【だい】宴会【えんかい】

Meaning, I suppose, something like:

“Lots of different beautiful women come out and have a big feast where they drink and sing”

And the second part is:

でもあくる朝【あさ】には肥【こえ】だめに浸【つ】からされてたってよ

I don't get this 「浸からされてたって」 part at all. I thought, that maybe there was a typo, and it should be 「浸かられてた　って」. But, as far as I know, English translation for 「浸かる」 is already in passive voice: to be submerged; to be soaked.

What is the meaning of 「浸からされてたって」?

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2 Answers 2

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漬からされてた＝漬からされていた＝漬からせられていた

Verbs often have two causatives, one in ～す and one in ～せる. ～す is considered more informal these days, but I think it's the original. So this is the past of the passive causative form.

'has been caused to be submerged,' literally

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  • Thanks for your answer! Please, correct me if I'm wrong: this form is described on imabi as "contracted speech" form, right? I think I understand what this form means, but I still don't understand the double passive I get in English, or is my translation or understanding of this verb wrong?
    – LLL
    Commented Oct 23, 2020 at 16:46
  • @LLL The translation of it may be passive, but the word isn't. It just means something is underwater, without suggesting something made it that way.
    – Angelos
    Commented Oct 23, 2020 at 16:53
  • Ah, I see now, it was just kind of confusing. Thanks for clearing this up and your help!
    – LLL
    Commented Oct 23, 2020 at 16:58
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    @LLL: 漬かる is a verb that describes the state of something, like many verbs ending in -aru. In this case, it means "to be immersed, to be soaking in water or other liquid". This kind of state-description is similar to the passive and is often translated using a passive construction (as here), and the derivation is from the same morphophonemic roots, but these -aru verbs are generally not passive in modern Japanese. Also, although imabi.net describes the -asu ending as "contracted", it's more accurate to say that this is the older form, as Aeon's answer notes.
    – Eiríkr Útlendi
    Commented Oct 23, 2020 at 17:29
  • I see, I always thought of -aru verbs as "already passive verbs", but turns out, it was wrong. Also in context of this doujinshi, which is set in old times, -asu being older form makes sense. Thank you for noting these things!
    – LLL
    Commented Oct 23, 2020 at 17:47
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I don't think this is the shortened version of the causative. The causative would either be 浸からせる or 浸からす for the shortened form.

This should be the causative passive—浸からせられる, shortened as 浸からされる, which is what is written in the manga. This is further described in this imabi article.

For example:

描く→描かせられる→描かされる
To be made to draw.

浸かる→浸からせられる→浸からされる
To be made to sink.

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  • I think you misread my answer. We're saying the same thing.
    – Angelos
    Commented Oct 23, 2020 at 17:23
  • Ah, sorry. I'll just leave this here in case he wants to check out the imabi article though.
    – Shurim
    Commented Oct 23, 2020 at 17:27
  • Well, I think the only difference I can note here is that contracting causative-passive form is not always possible, whereas contracting causative-only form is possible, but it's not standard in terms of 標準語 (standard language). But I feel like the principle stays the same: in both cases the causative part is contracted, so technically it's the same thing @Aeon Akechi said. Thank you anyway!
    – LLL
    Commented Oct 23, 2020 at 17:29

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