Is the reading for 大した exceptional?

It is a kanji with hiragana following so I think that makes it an Okurigana but it uses the on’yomi reading of 大 and I thought all Okurigana used the kun’yomi readings. Is this word an exception or am I misunderstanding the rules?

Yes.

It’s an exception. Those things happen, sometimes even mixed kun-on words. But most of the time, the rules work well.

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Thanks. I think my inner five year old just really wanted the reading to be おおした

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What is important is to know that no rule is without exceptions.

Wait until you meet things like 大人 for added excitement. Your five year old will be thrilled!

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Y… you’re exceptional.

But seriously, though, the した in this is etymologically the past tense of する, so it’s not actually kanji+okurigana but rather more like noun+verb.

The Golden Rule in Japanese: all rules have exceptions. Including this one.

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True. I’ve hit a few exceptions like のぼる for 上る and WK called them out in the description. This is the first I hit on my own and so I didn’t trust myself.

Why is that an exception?

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のぼ is just a kun-yomi for 上. So that’s not really an exception to any rule.

To clarify @seanblue’s response a bit, 上る is not an exception, it’s simply a different kun’yomi. There’s quite a number of kanji with multiple kun’yomi, like 出る is で and 出す is だ, or 冷える is ひ and 冷たい is つめ, and so on and so forth.

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Don’t forget 冷める (さめる)
Also 強い (つよい) and 強いる (しいる)
Ah, and stuff like 避ける (さける or よける based on context)

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