Why does 「大雨」mean 「大量に降る雨」?


I've been thinking about the word 「大雨」and can't seem to ignore the kanji「大」in
it. Why does 「大雨」mean 「大量に降る雨」 (a great quantity of rain)? Wouldn't something
like 「多雨」be more appropriate?

When I was first studying Japanese, and I saw the word 「大雨」my first impression
was that it meant "the rain drops were large". Is there any reason why 「大」 in
「大雨」 was chosen to represent that "there is a lot of rain"?




The `大` is probably used here to mean `大【おお】いに` which means `非常に`, `たくさん`, or
`はなはだ`. So it's more like "a great rain", where "great" could either mean
`大量に降る雨` or perhaps "big in scope".

Your logic with `多【た】雨【う】` makes sense, but I've never seen that word until
now. However, the definitions I see for it say "heavy rainfall" or "much
rainfall". The "-fall" in those to me would indicate rain over a longer period
of time, as opposed to one "instance" (day, afternoon, etc.) of rain. In fact,
another definition shows `雨の日が多いこと。また、雨量の多いこと。`




The `大` is probably used here to mean `大【おお】いに` which means `非常に`, `たくさん`, or
`はなはだ`. So it's more like "a great rain", where "great" could either mean
`大量に降る雨` or perhaps "big in scope".

Your logic with `多【た】雨【う】` makes sense, but I've never seen that word until
now. However, the definitions I see for it say "heavy rainfall" or "much
rainfall". The "-fall" in those to me would indicate rain over a longer period
of time, as opposed to one "instance" (day, afternoon, etc.) of rain. In fact,
another definition shows `雨の日が多いこと。また、雨量の多いこと。`

