Ordering / Apposition with の?


When using の, I'm well aware that "X の Y" means "Y of X", and the modification
expands leftward, per se. However, I've come across some select examples where
I'm confused at the order of the words, and feel like what is A の B should be
B の A.

The one I'm struggling with is: 雪の冬. I wanted to know how to say "winter
snow," and I'm not sure why [雪の冬] is correct. It seems like it should mean
"winter of snow", or "snow's winter" -- while more intuitively I feel like 冬の雪
should mean "winter snow," as it seems to convey "snow of winter," or
"winter's snow."

I asked a friend who said something about apposition, but I still feel like
that would translate winter snow as 冬の雪, and not 雪の冬. What am I missing?

Any help would be appreciated! I'd love some light shed on this mystery of の.




I'm not sure why you're confused. You seem to be understanding の just fine.
雪の冬 means a "winter of snow" and 冬の雪 "winter snow" (or snow of the winter).

Similarly, 春の雪, which even has an disambiguation entry [on Japanese
Wikipedia](http://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E6%98%A5%E3%81%AE%E9%9B%AA).

冬の雪 has less hits, but I'd guess that's just because it's not nearly as poetic
as 春の雪.

