Lesson 22: ミラーさんが作ったケーキ — describing nouns with clauses — Japanese Grammar N5

［V plain］NVerb clause modifying a noun

Noun modifier

A plain-form clause placed before a noun describes it: ［…が作った］ケーキ.

これは　ミラーさんが　作った　ケーキです。

これは　ミラーさんが　つくった　ケーキです。

This is the cake that Mr Miller made.

Japanese has no relative pronoun (“that/which”). The describing clause simply goes in front of the noun, with its verb in plain form. Inside the clause the subject is marked with が (not は).

［clause］N は…Clause-modified noun as topic

Noun modifier

The modified noun can play any role, e.g. the topic of the main sentence.

きのう　見た　映画は　おもしろかったです。

きのう　みた　えいがは　おもしろかったです。

The film I saw yesterday was interesting.

The clause + noun unit behaves like any noun phrase and can take は, が, を, etc. Here ［きのう見た映画］は is the topic of the sentence.