Bruno
ブルーノ
Burūno
How It Is Said
- ブbu
- ルru
- ーu
- ノno
Burūno: four beats, each about the same length. Japanese has no strong stress, so the name is said evenly, beat by beat.
By Language
| Language | Katakana | Rōmaji | Note |
|---|---|---|---|
| Italian | ブルーノ | Burūno | |
| Portuguese | ブルーノ | Burūno |
What Happens to the Sounds
- The stressed vowel of an Italian name is often written long in katakana: ルー (rū).
- The Japanese r is a light tap of the tongue, like the quick t in an American "water": ル (ru).
Bruno Taut, the German architect who wrote of the Katsura villa in Kyoto in the 1930s, is ブルーノ・タウト in Japanese.
To Type It
On a computer with Japanese input switched on, type buru-no (the - key gives the bar ー), then press F7 on Windows or Control+K on a Mac to turn it into katakana. On a phone, type the same letters with the Japanese keyboard and choose ブルーノ among the suggestions.
Why Katakana
In Japan, names from abroad are written in katakana, the script for words from other languages. Kanji versions of Western names are mostly invented, and a Japanese reader often sees odd meanings in them; the katakana is what a Japanese person would really write. More on katakana and names
