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I read on Jisho.org that the も particle can mean:

  1. even if; even though; although; in spite of​. Often as 〜ても, 〜でも, 〜とも, etc.

I was translating「事故だったと言っても」, and I was wondering how the meaning changes. From my current understanding, it could mean:

  1. Even if you said it was an accident...
  2. You also said it was an accident...

The full sentence is 「事故だったと言っても信じてもらえないんですよね。」("...I would not believe you.")

When can も be taken to mean 'even if'? From the Jisho example, it says ても, and the Japanese quote uses て-form for 言って, with も right after, so does it only mean 'even if' after a て- formed verb?

Oliver Z.
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  • https://ejje.weblio.jp/content/%E3%81%AB%E3%82%82%E3%81%8B%E3%81%8B%E3%82%8F%E3%82%89%E3%81%9A is one example without the te-form – Ringil Mar 14 '19 at 12:06
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    Related: https://japanese.stackexchange.com/a/992/9831 / https://japanese.stackexchange.com/a/21561/9831 / https://japanese.stackexchange.com/a/2056/9831 – chocolate Mar 14 '19 at 13:21
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    Even if you said it was an accident ... I would not believe you. <-- I think the subject of "言っても" is "I", and the subject of 信じる is "you" (The subject of 信じてもらう is "I"). – chocolate Mar 16 '19 at 16:45
  • How can one tell which subject goes with each verb? – Oliver Z. Mar 17 '19 at 08:06
  • @OliverZ. The subject of もらう is always me (or someone related to me). Look up giving-and-receiving grammar. – Mathieu Bouville Apr 15 '19 at 08:54

1 Answers1

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That entry for も in JMdict (main dictionary of jisho.org) is a little misleading.

J->J dictionaries define ても as its own construct to have the meanings "even if", "even though", among others. The precise formation is

verb/adjective (連用形) + ても (sometimes でも or っても depending on the verb/adjective)

This is the formation used in the sentence you provided.

Now, it is true that も can also mean "even if", "even though", etc. just like ても -- so JMdict isn't wrong in that sense -- but there's a caveat. The usage of も in this way has different formation rules than ても, and it's an "old-fashioned" style of phrasing according to 明鏡国語辞典 第二版:

〘接助〙《動詞の連体形や形容詞の連用形に付いて》…ても。
「今日に至るも完成を見ない」
「どんなに多くも五人までだ」
「遅くも三時までには着く」
▶ 古風な言い方。

Formation for this usage of も is

[verb (連体形) / adjective (連用形)] + も

Side notes:

  1. You gave two ways to interpret 「事故だったと言っても」. The first one is possible. The second interpretation is not possible, grammatically speaking.

  2. If a person A is the one saying 「事故だったと言っても信じてもらえないんですよね。」, that person A cannot also be the one who could not be convinced that "it was an accident", so you should re-evaluate your "...I would not believe you." translation.

Setris
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