Name in Japanese P Pierre

Pierre in Japanese

ピエール
Katakana
ピエール
Hiragana
ぴえーる
Romaji (Hepburn)
Piēru

This is the established spelling used for Pierre in Japanese dictionaries, books and media.

How Pierre sounds in Japanese

Read it one katakana at a time:

Pi
エー Ē
Ru

Full reading: Piēru

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Why Pierre is written in katakana

In Japanese, foreign names are written in katakana — the angular script reserved for words borrowed from other languages. So on a form, a name tag, a delivery slip or a news article in Japan, Pierre appears as ピエール. This is the correct and respectful way a non-Japanese name is represented; it is not a kanji "translation". A Japanese reader sees ピエール and immediately reads it by its sound, Piēru.

Katakana is a syllabary, so English sounds are fitted to the nearest Japanese syllables and every consonant (except ん) is followed by a vowel. That is why Pierre becomes ピエール rather than a letter-for-letter copy. More than one katakana spelling can be reasonable for the same name, which is why we flag whether a spelling is a long-established one or a natural default.