Читать книгу Everyday Life in Traditional Japan - Charles Dunn - Страница 10

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A country in isolation

The Land

Being at the eastern end of the Asian continental mass, Japan has a climate in many ways like that of the Northern Atlantic states of the USA—that is to say, winters are cold (with winds blowing from Siberia), and summers are hot (with winds from the Pacific). The cold winds of winter cross the Japan Sea before reaching the mountainous continent-facing coast of Japan, and as they do so they pick up moisture; much of this is deposited as snowfall, which is consistently heavy, often coming up to the eaves of the houses (3). The Pacific side of Japan tends to have bright but cold weather in winter. In summer, the continent-facing side has clear weather, while there is cloud on the Pacific coast, so that, particularly in the south and east, summers are hot and humid. The Japanese find the heat of their summers more unpleasant than the winter cold, and build their houses accordingly.

Japan consists of four main islands, with innumerable smaller ones. The northernmost is Hokkaidō, which was not sufficiently populated during our period to be of importance. To the south is Honshū, the main island, somewhat larger than Great Britain, with Kyūshū and Shikoku lying further south still (2). An additional complication to the climatic picture is that, except in Hokkaidō, there is in June a short but often torrential rainy season, the northern edge of the monsoons, while another is that from late July to mid-September, Japan, especially its southern regions, lies in the path of typhoons coming up from the Pacific, so that any area is liable to be visited by great winds, heavy rainfall, or tidal waves. As if these possibilities of calamity were not enough, Japan lies in the earthquake and volcano belt which runs all round the Pacific basin, and although active volcanoes (4) are usually distant from areas of population and damage from eruptions has not been great, earthquakes are part of everyday life, with small shocks constantly reminding the Japanese that disaster could occur at any moment.

On the favorable side of her geographical position, Japan has a low latitude, with the sun higher in the sky and with less variation in length of day than in northern Europe. Winter is short, and so the growing season is long. Warmth and moisture together with fertile alluvial soils in most of the agricultural districts help to make Japan rich in food-crops (5). Japan is very mountainous, but on the hills trees grow abundantly (6), which meant that in our period building was of wood; houses were made of cedar and other durable timber, needing no paint, but very inflammable, so that fires might easily sweep away whole villages or sections of towns if the wind were right. When an earthquake came, however, the frame houses were pliable and less likely to collapse than if they had been more solidly built of brick or stone.

(3) Snow scene. This photograph has some television aerials and electric wires, but otherwise gives a good impression of a traditional Japanese scene after a moderate snowfall.

The People

In common with most of the other inhabitants of the Asian Pacific littoral, the modern Japanese are classified as Mongols, but there seem to be several strains in the population. It is most probable that there has been a mixture of people coming from Korea and North China, from South China, and from the islands of the Pacific, through the Ryūkyū Islands. There are indications that some elements of Japanese culture are derived from the south; domestic architecture, for example, may have some connection with that of Polynesia.

The Japanese language, even though it has certain similarities of structure with some continental Asian languages like Korean and Mongolian, cannot be shown to have a common descent with them, and the only clearly related language is that of the Ryūkyūs. The sole extraneous ethnic group is formed by the Ainus, now restricted to the island of Hokkaiō in the north; they had all gone from the mainland of Japan long before the seventeenth century, and certain place-names, including that of Mt Fuji, are the only relics of their earlier, far wider, occupation, before they were driven out by their successors, the people who, free from invasion themselves, forged a strong and homogeneous culture, going back some 2,000 years.

(4) The crater of Mt Aso. This volcano, in Kyushu, is still active.

The native Japanese religion, now called shintō, “the way of the gods,” has some elements that may derive from the shamanism of northern Asia, but it also includes simple animistic cults, in which trees and rocks, sometimes whole mountains or islands, are worshipped (7). It had as its culmination a set of creation-legends, which include an account of the divine origins of the Imperial family.

(5) Flooded rice-fields, with terracing on the left. The wide, straight roads are, of course, modern.

One important sector of shintō is concerned with food-production and fertility, rice-wine and jollity. Shintō is also very preoccupied with cleanliness and the avoidance of defilement, and prefers not to have anything to do with death. On the other hand Buddhism, which came to Japan from China through Korea some 1,500 years ago, brought with it, along with glamorous elements of Chinese civilization and artistic achievement, a new introspection and withdrawal from the world, a concern with the afterlife and an acceptance of death (8).

(6) Forest of sugi, a large tree, like the cedar, near Kyoto, the old capital.

For many centuries these two religions had been complementary: the gods of shintō were incorporated into the Buddhist system, even though the two priesthoods and the centers of worship, Buddhist temples and shintō shrines, usually retained their independence. Between them the two religions provided, and to a large extent still provide, a background for almost all human activity in Japan, but only a background, not a morality. Morality, the rules of conduct within society, was defined in secular principles, largely derived from Confucianism. These principles included a system of loyalties, in which one’s lord came before one’s family, and parents before spouse and children, together with an unquestioning acceptance of authority. Sobriety and frugality were required of superior men, while extravagance, whether in dress, emotion, or expenditure, was to be deplored, although no more than could be expected from the lower classes, especially from those whose aim was the amassing of money, rather than service to one’s lord or one’s country. Although the money motive is less reprehensible today, these attitudes are still to be found among the Japanese, and are demonstrated in loyalty to their employers and to their country.

(7) Miyajima, with its outer gate (torii) set in the sea. The whole island, of which some is visible on the left, used to be worshipped as a god, and women and agriculturalists were not allowed on it.

The End of Civil War

Since the twelfth century, when the old rule by the emperor or his courtiers had been replaced by that of military overlords, there had been periodical civil wars in Japan, either between opposing clans or factions, or sometimes involving an emperor trying to regain the authority that his ancestors had enjoyed. These wars had hindered the development of trade, had been an ever-recurring danger to crops, and had depleted the country’s manpower. It is true that a certain amount of literature had been produced, but it was concentrated in the Imperial and military courts and great religious centers. Nō plays, the tea ceremony and its equipment, the reformation of poetry that led to the 17-syllable haiku, all owe their development to this period, but all were restricted to small aristocratic and religious circles.

(8) Stone Buddha, one of a group of unusually large rock-carved Buddhas near Usuki in Kyūshū.

By the middle of the sixteenth century, however, even though fighting was to continue on and off for another 50 years, conditions began to settle down, and the advancement of commerce and the arts became possible. In 1573, rule over virtually the whole of Japan came into the hands of one man, Oda Nobunaga. He was a passionate and ruthless man; for example, he burnt a whole monastery complex of temples, with all its inhabitants, as part of his plan to take power away from the Buddhist warrior-priests who had been so great a destructive force in preceding years. At the same time he was devoted to the arts, and when he was killed in 1582 by one of his generals (whom he had slighted), the attack on the temple where he was staying occurred while he was dancing a piece from a nō play. His successor, Toyotomi Hideyoshi, who continued the work of unifying Japan, is almost as famous for the splendor of his cherry-blossom viewing parties as for his good government of the country and his unsuccessful invasion of Korea.

(9) Gion Festival. The wagons, with the shoulder-borne floats that alternate with them, date from the Tokugawa period, though the Festival is much older, having been started in the tenth century in an attempt to terminate an epidemic. Each vehicle belongs to a ward of the city, whose men don traditional dress for the occasion. Those on the roof are there to fend off overhead wires.

The wars had dispersed many of the adherents of the Imperial court, so that there were far fewer who resided in the capital, now called Kyoto, and the great annual festivals which had been carried on by these courtiers came to a halt. They were restarted by the townsfolk, and a wave of enthusiasm for participation in this sort of gay ceremonial spread through the cities—the Gion festival, which still trundles its great wagons through the Kyoto streets in July, is an instance of this (9). Other new entertainments were developed: the fūryū dances were among these and spread far and wide. They were great jollifications, often connected with the Buddhist bon festival in the height of the summer, when the spirits of the dead come back to earth and are entertained with singing and dancing. In the fūryū, disguises and fancy dress were assumed, and there was dancing in the streets. Women’s fashions became much simpler in form so that movement was easier, but the materials were more elegant in pattern, especially for the wives of merchants.

It was a time when a lively trade was being carried on with the outside world. In 1543 the first Europeans, some Portuguese, had landed in Tanegashima, an island to the south of Kyūshū, and Francis Xavier came in 1549 to start the Jesuit mission. This was so successful that soon the Jesuits had virtual control of the city of Nagasaki, and churches were established even in Kyoto and Osaka. Christian emblems became popular as decorative motifs, and among the disguises worn in the fūryū, foreign garb, and foreign headgear in particular, had considerable vogue. Strange beasts were exhibited in menageries, and in Kyoto and elsewhere sideshows and puppet-shows were given, as well as crude dramatic performances. Farmers were doubtless less happy than the rest, but the spread of settled government, and a spirit of national unity, partly aroused by the contact with foreigners and in reaction to the threat against national security which their presence seemed to offer, led to an improvement in public morale. The painted screens that were a feature of the period very often illustrate the life of the times, mainly in the towns, with frequent scenes of much activity and jollity.

These entertainments and festivities carried on into the seventeenth century, and became the ancestors of, among other things, the live popular drama. But the spirit of the nation changed, as the puritanical and coldly calculating rule of the Tokugawa family tightened its grip on the country after the death of Hideyoshi in 1598, and the defeat of his son in 1615. Foreign influences dwindled, and prohibitions and persecutions, started under Hideyoshi, became increasingly the lot of Christians in Japan. A largely Christian revolt at Shimabara, near Nagasaki, was put down in 1637, and everything was done to stamp out Christianity, more for political than for religious reasons. At the same time, a policy of seclusion was instituted, the aim of which was to avoid any foreign involvement that might lead to disturbance of internal peace. All Japanese overseas, whether engaged in trade in the Southeast Asian peninsula, or as wives or entertainers in Java, were cut off from the homeland, and the only contact with the outside world was through the small and closely supervised Dutch and Chinese trading-stations in Nagasaki, all other foreigners having been expelled. This policy of isolation was reinforced by a prohibition on the building of ocean-going ships, and no Japanese was allowed to leave Japan.

This state of affairs lasted until 1853, when Commodore Perry’s ships appeared in Edo Bay, and forced the government to open some ports. Foreigners began to reappear in Japan. The Tokugawa regime, already under internal pressure, with the country seething with great restlessness, lasted only another 15 years before rule passed back to the young Emperor and his supporters: new ideas flooded in, bringing an end to the feudalism of traditional Japan.

The Government after 1603

A description of everyday life in traditional Japan would be difficult if not impossible to understand without some knowledge of how the government of the country was organized, and for this it is necessary to understand the position of the Tokugawas. The founder of their power, Tokugawa Ieyasu, a man of outstanding ability if not genius, had been an associate of both Nobunaga and Hideyoshi, his predecessors. Under Hideyoshi, he had held the east of Japan, having a fortress at Edo (the present-day capital, Tokyo). When he formally became Shogun in 1603, it was to Edo that he transferred the seat of his government, partly so that it should be surrounded by his supporters and partly because, like some military rulers of earlier times, he considered that the atmosphere of the capital, Kyoto, with its devotion to the fine arts and its sophisticated living, would corrupt the simple virtues of his followers.

After the death of Hideyoshi’s son in his stronghold of Osaka Castle, taken in 1615, the greatest immediate threat to Ieyasu’s power was removed. He died the next year, but members of the Tokugawa family succeeded one after another in the position of Shogun (which in effect became a hereditary one), having full control of all the land of Japan. Whatever threats there remained to this control, whether from the Emperor, religious groups, or military lords, were met with cunning and ruthless efficiency, the government being above all determined to keep the country at peace.

The Emperor in his court at Kyoto was theoretically the source of power, and indeed it was he who gave the Shogun his title. This ancient title, an abbreviation of a longer expression with the meaning of “Commander-in-Chief for quelling the barbarians,” was in effect equivalent to military dictator of the country. Once the Tokugawas had taken over the reins of government, the Emperor’s duties were confined to bestowing this title and to conferring lesser titles on such persons as the Shogun nominated. His time was to be spent in literary and ceremonial pursuits; his needs, and those of his courtiers, were met by a grant of land to provide them with an income. His activities were supervised by the Kyoto Deputy, a government official, so that he was a mere figurehead, albeit one widely respected throughout the country. At no time did there cease to be an emperor, lip-service continued to be accorded him, and it was round his person that final revolt against the Tokugawa régime was centered.

Another potential source of opposition was to be found in the Buddhist temples and shintō shrines; some of the former had played a considerable role in earlier civil wars. The Shogun kept them under control by a number of Superintendents of Temples and Shrines, and their incomes were allotted to them from central or local sources, which could be cut off if necessary. One Buddhist sect—the Shin sect—of which the Shogun was particularly suspicious was dealt with by a characteristic piece of Tokugawa “divide and rule” tactics; in the preceding era members of this sect had caused trouble for the military authorities by setting up autonomous communities of commoners, and to prevent this happening again Ieyasu ordered the sect to be split into two branches so that it would have to support separate groups of temples, kept apart and weakened by rival jealousies.

However, such threats as these were very minor compared with that from the hostile military lords. The Tokugawa ruler allotted territories in exchange for an oath of allegiance, and made sure that faithful followers and relatives, including those who had fought with him at Sekigahara in 1600, were given lands in strategic positions—forming a ring of buffer estates round Edo, a string of others protecting the great routes of Japan or keeping watch on possible lines along which potentially hostile lords might advance on Edo. These latter would be from the “outside” lords, who had surrendered to him at Sekigahara or afterwards. The majority of these were great landowners, and were, in fact, far more wealthy than the Tokugawa adherents. However, the Shogun himself held great estates, and also administered the main cities of Edo, Kyoto, and Osaka.

Thus the political control of the country worked through the officials of the directly held lands and through the vassaldom of the lords, who lived under threat of dispossession or transfer as punishment for disloyalty or misconduct. There were controls on the amount of fortification permitted; lords were encouraged to spy on their neighbors and report on suspicious activities, while social contact was frowned on. Then in addition there were government inspectors, whose function was to keep a watchful eye on the lords and make sure that they conducted their affairs in a manner to be approved.

Yet another weapon in the Shogun’s armory for controlling the top strata of society was the compulsory attendance at his court in Edo. In the early days of Tokugawa rule its possible opponents had to leave hostages in Edo as surety for their good behavior, but later a unified system was evolved. This required alternate residence of one year in Edo and one on his home territory for every large landowner (except for those whose lands were either near by or most distant from the center of government), involving an annual journey one way or the other. Appropriate residences had to be maintained in Edo, where the wives and families of the lords had to stay. This measure, along with the providing of garrisons for the Tokugawa castles and enforced assistance with certain public works, assured both political and economic control of the wealthy overlords, since the constant travel to and fro, coupled with the maintaining of two establishments in the style that was obligatory for a great lord, involved considerable outlay of income, time, and effort.

The rest of the population in town and country was controlled in two ways. First, there were officials appointed by local authorities or by the central government, and these worked through officers who could be termed “policemen.” The other method was through a system of responsibilities, so that an ordinary Japanese could rarely contravene the accepted code of behavior without involving others in punishment for his offence: the head of a family answered for its members, groups of households for each individual household, the headman for his village, and any group might be punished for the misdeeds of one of its members.

There was no semblance of a constitution. As regards criminal justice, magistrates had a code to guide them, but this was never published as a whole, although notices about certain crimes were posted from time to time. In principle, there was no punishment without confession, and this often led to a suspect being rigorously interrogated. This criminal code, such as it was, could be changed without warning. This was in keeping with the fundamental Tokugawa attitude, derived from Confucianist precepts, that the people should not be instructed as to what the law might be, but should be content to do what they were told.

These then were the ways in which the Tokugawa Shoguns sought to perpetuate their family’s power over every inch of the country, and dominance over every aspect of Japanese life, indeed, over every living soul. Their efforts met with remarkable success for 200 years, although a gradual decline in Tokugawa power set in after the mid-eighteenth century. The very nature of Japanese society was in their favor, for the existing class system was a weapon in their hands that required only to be maintained and reinforced in its application. It was only a fairly small number of Japanese who were unaffected by this rigid division into classes: on the one hand were the courtiers and priests, doctors and some intellectuals, and on the other the outcasts, a motley crew performing a variety of lowly tasks. Everyone apart from these exceptions was either a warrior, a farmer, a craftsman, or a merchant.

In this tight class system there was an equally rigid hierarchy, with the warrior class (samurai) at the top; the samurai enjoyed privileges, such as the right to wear two swords, but also had obligations and were expected to lead sober lives and set a good example to the rest. Next came the farmers (the bulk of the population), placed in this position because on them depended the livelihood, in the form of rice, of the warrior class. The honor was dubious, for severe restrictions were put on their liberty, lest they should leave their farms; their lot was usually a miserable one, compounded of hard work and poverty for most of them. Craftsmen came next, and merchants or traders last. Merchants were despised because it was considered that they produced nothing and were activated solely by the desire to amass wealth; indeed, this they proceeded to do, and the culture of the latter part of the period was mainly their creation, and the growth of their power a leading factor in the decline of the old class system.

Because these classes were so clearly divided, and had quite different ways of living, it will be best to treat them separately, describing the conditions and daily life of each in turn.