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Sagari talk
    Keywords: Go term

The Japanese term sagari is now no longer aliased here to descent.

The following very full explanation was provided by John Fairbairn.

Sagari (下り)

A common Japanese term also widely used in English. Some English speakers use the term more broadly than the Japanese do. In Japanese it is a verbal noun and the verb form sagaru is widely used.

Note: it is essential first to understand the term nobi = stretch to understand sagari.

Sagari is used to describe a single move. The meaning given in Hayashi's encyclopaedia "Igo Hyakka Jiten" is: "Sagaru refers to a position where a nobi is played towards the edge of the board and not towards the centre of the board." Diagram 1 shows an example. B1 in Diagram 2 is also a kind of sagari but in this case, he says, it is stressing the securing of the corner.

[Diagram]
Diag. 1 - Normal sagari

[Diagram]
Diag. 2 Another kind



The Nihon Ki-in's "Yogo Kojiten" (Small Dictionary of Technical Terms) is quite succinct. It simply says "a sagari is a nobi move towards the edge of the board", though it should be noted that this dictionary often simply distills from Hayashi). It also gives two examples. One is similar to Diag. 1. The other is Diag. 3:

[Diagram]
Diag. 3



These definitions are easier for a Japanese because the verb sagaru is common in the ordinary language. It means fall, drop, sag, decline, etc. A Japanese person therefore has some idea of the meaning even without the help of a go glossary. English definitions often have to be put differently: for example "a descent from the third to the second line, or the second to the first line". Though this way of putting it is common, it evidently does not capture the example of Diag. 2. In translations,words such as descent or dropping down are often used, though not always consistently.

In practice, most references to sagari in Japanese commentaries refer to a move on the second line. It is, however, possible to use it of moves on the third line (as above) or on the first line. However, when used on the first line there is a strong tendency in Japanese to use an adverbialised form sagarikiri, which can be thought of as meaning something like "sagari to the limit". Furthermore, sagarikiri is very often replaced by orikiri. (Both these terms can ONLY be used of moves on the first line.) Far less often sagaru alone is replaced by its near synonym oriru. None of sagarikiri, orikiru or oriru is ever used in English; if a Japanese term is borrowed, sagari used to cover all cases.

Segoe and Go Seigen's Tesuji Jiten (Tesuji Dictionary) has a section on sagari tesujis. Most are second line moves but a couple of first-line examples are shown here. Note that these are described as sagari in this book, but that is probably because they are shown under the general heading of sagari. If they were shown independently it is my (JF's) opinion that they would more normally be called orikiri.

[Diagram]
Tesuji Dictionary Example 1 (W3)

[Diagram]
Tesuji Dictionary Example 2 (W1)



In the latter case only W1 is mentioned in the book as a sagari. Is W5 a sagari too? I would say yes, but of course it's not a tesuji so not worth mentioning specially.

Some examples of how sagari is used in Japanese sentences:

(1) Kuro 11 no kakari ni wa, Shiro 'a' no hasami mo arimasu ga, Shiro 12 no sagari ga yuuryoku.

(2) Shiro 14 ni Kuro 'b' to wa uchizurai tokoro de, Kuro 15 to mata kakatte kureba, yahari Shiro 16 to sagarimasu.

(3) Sagari wa, wakariyasui desu ne.

(4) Kuro 2 ni wa Shiro 9 made to uchi, Shiro wa kahen ga ookiku nari, Shiro 'a' no sagari mo nokotte imasu.

(5) Kuro 3 to sagareba, Shiro 4 de sumi wo ikimasu.

(6) 8 zu no Kuro 5 de, 9 zu no Kuro 1 kata ateru to, Kuro 3 to sagari, Shiro 4 no ate kara Kuro 5 made to narimasu.

(7) Kuro 4 ni wa, Shiro 5 to sagarimasu.

(8) Shiro 'a' mo uchitai ten desu ga, Shiro 3 no sagari kara Shiro 5-7 no hanetsugi ga ookii deshou.

(9) Shiro 16 de wa, 17 ni sagaru te ga arimasu.

(10) Kuro 35 wa, kou sagaritai.

(11) Kosumitsuke ga yoku nai to shitara, tsugi ni omoiukabu no wa, Shiro 1 no sagari desho.

Note that, apart from -kiru, sagaru does not combine with the otherwise common suffixes such as -komu and -dasu.

FURTHER CONSIDERATIONS

1. There is a special usage of sagari in the phrase sagarisagari (or oriori). When estimating territories during a game, territories not yet fully enclosed near the edge are assumed to be enclosed by dropping stones straight down to the edge. Two examples from Hayashi:

[Diagram]
Sagarisagari

[Diagram]
Also sagarisagari



This usage does not seem to occur in English.

It's an interesting question whether the second sagari here really is one. If it was played in a real game, a word such as osae (block) might be preferred.

Bill: Is there as second sagari here? Which one is it? I think if a temporal sequence were contemplated, rather than a physical shape, we might be talking about sagari osae. In both cases, the actual play is likely to be hane-tsugi.

2. Sagari also occurs as part of the term burasagari (verb form burasagaru; oriru does not occur in this usage). Hayashi's definition is "A sagaru move on the third line from an isolated stone on the fourth line in a narabi? shape." Tetchuu (iron pillar) is also a kind of burasagari."

This is the example he gives:

[Diagram]
Burasagari



He says that tetchuu refers to the case where the burasagari is played under the side star stone. It is obviously a common option in handicap games and the iron pillar imagery is presumably meant to recommend it strongly to the weaker player in such cases.

Some westerners use sagari for this example. It would be unusual to do so in Japanese. Other westerners use the terms tetchuu or iron pillar (or variants such as iron post) but apparently without being scrupulous in limiting it to the side star point.

CHARACTERS

Here are some Japanese forms of various words mentioned:

sagari 下り or サガリ

sagaru 下る or サガル

oriru おりる

orikiri オリキリ

sagarisagari 下り下り or サガリサガリ

oriori おりおり

burasagari ブラ下り or ブラサガリ

tetchuu 鉄柱


Comments and Discusssion:

Richard Hunter Thank you John for a fascinating explanation. I might just mention that orikiri?, amongst other words, was put into the 2001 Almanac at my request. I'm not a Japanese language expert. For that, I look to you, John Power, and Jim Davies. Jim did most of the hard work on the Almanac glossary.

John F. I'd like to make a general comment sparked off not by this page but by the one on [Sagari Tesuji] (now descent tesuji), though it seems to belong here as this is the definition page.

Terminological inexactitudes abound on SL. Sometimes they give rise to useful discussion. Most often they don't but stay there to mislead future readers.

Problems can arise whatever the language of the term, but it seems to me that the main problem arises when someone posts a Japanese term. This is a special problem because so many terms of Japanese origin are now used by western players as quasi-English terms, but either with different meanings from Japanese (e.g. yose, fuseki) or with a different range of coverage, e.g. hane ... and sagari.

The example shown in Sagari Tesuji is not usually called sagari in Japan. It would most often be called orikiri, sometimes sagarikiri (oru is another way of saying sagaru). Indeed, the usual Japanese definition is telling: it is a nobi towards the edge. This tells us several things. One is that it is really a mistake to call a nobi a push, as some people do, but also that what is in the Japanese mind is a space for a stretch, i.e. ordinary sagari does not usually get used for a move onto the first line. This is where the -kiri comes in: end, limit.

Bill: I wonder if we are seeing an example of language change. In my own library, which is mostly 20-30 years old, sagari is commonly used for descents from the second line to the first. In a quick look through Sakata's Go no Tesuji to Zokusuji, for instance, I found several instances where sagari was used, and only one different term, saegiru (to cut off), which I doubt is a go term. Perhaps the use of orikiri has become more common in the past generation.

Rest of discussion moved to Japlish talk.

The above is now my suggestion for one way a new term could be introduced to SL to have long-term reference value. The key points are that, at the end, if not too exhausted, a new reader of almost any grade should be able to answer yes to two questions, irrespective of the personality of the contributor: Do I understand this definition? Do I trust this definition?

HolIgor: I've checked with the Japanese books I have.

Cho Chikun:

[Diagram]
Sagari 1 is the critical point



Ishida Yoshio:

[Diagram]
Kuro wa 1 to sagaru

Sagari is a term that I learned here in SL. I've learned to read a little bit Japanese afterwards. And the Japanese terms I met here were useful because they are easily recognizable.

Now, what is a descent?


[Diagram]
Descent?

A slide is also a descent.



Charles Well, no. A descent is like going down in a lift (elevator). A slide is an extension down to the second line. I'm fairly neutral on the question of misuse of Japanese terms when there isn't a major conceptual point. Anyone can still use sagari. But I regard the English terms as the default, in cases where there is an adequate translation.

dnerra: As a native speaker, is it immediately clear to you that a descent could not mean a one space jump towards the edge?
The intent of my question is of course: When both the native and the foreign word need explanation before they can be used without misunderstandings, it is my feeling that is generally better to use the foreign word. The foreign word has the marker in front of it: "This is not necessarily what you think it is unless you have verified its exact meaning." It's an old debate of course (maybe less so in English than in other languages).

Charles I wouldn't say that you could deduce simply from English language considerations that descent didn't mean also either of these B1:

[Diagram]



That is, given that there is a convention in go about up and down, you still need to acquire some usage for phrases like jump down (left) and extend down (right), as well as descend and slide. But it seems quite logical, really - more like descending to the underworld (Orpheus), though you can also descend a mountain just to get down to the bottom again.



This is a copy of the living page "Sagari talk" at Sensei's Library.
(OC) 2004 the Authors, published under the OpenContent License V1.0.