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Before going on to the meagre story which is supplied to us by the early years of Japanese history, it will be well to glean from the myths and legends which tradition has preserved the lessons which they contain. Although we may be unable to concede the truth of these traditions in their entirety, and believe in the celestial origin of the race and the wonders of the divine age, we may be able to obtain from them many important facts regarding the habits and manner of life of the early Japanese.

We have often referred to the admirable work Mr. Chamberlain has done in his translation of the Kojiki, and in the scholarly notes he has added. But in our present enquiries we must give him still greater credit for the important lessons which he has drawn from the myths and legends of the Kojiki in his learned introduction. No writer at the present day can afford to dispense with the deductions which he has been able to draw from the oldest writings of the Japanese, and from the traditions of an older date which these writings have preserved. [pg 082] Relying therefore chiefly on this learned introduction,68 we propose to enumerate in a summary manner the particulars concerning the early Japanese life.

In the first place the government of the early Japanese was of the tribal order. The emperor was the chieftain of an expedition which came from the island of Kyūshū and established a government by conquest. The chiefs of the various localities were reduced to subjection and became tributary to the emperor, or were replaced by new chiefs appointed by the emperor. The government was therefore essentially feudal in its characteristics. The emperor depended for the consideration of his plans and for their execution upon officers who were attached to his court. There were guilds composed of those who manufactured various articles, or who were employed to execute special plans. Thus we have guilds of clay image makers, guilds of ladies attendant on the emperor, guilds of butlers, guilds of cooks, guilds of guards, etc. To each of these there was a captain who became by appointment hereditary chief. We have no mention of money for the payment of services rendered. The taxes were probably paid in kind. And all transactions as far as they are mentioned at all seem to have been of the nature of barter.

The religious notions of the prehistoric Japanese were founded on the myths relating to their ancestor. Notwithstanding the vast number of deities who came into existence according to tradition, most of them vanish as soon as they are named and [pg 083] are no more heard of. Even deities like Izanagi and Izanami, who are represented as taking so important a part in events, are not perpetuated as objects of worship in Japanese history, and have no temples erected to their memory and no service prescribed or maintained in their honor. The most important deity in the Pantheon of the Japanese was Amaterasu-ō-mi-kami, who is also called in Chinese characters Tensho Daijin or the Sun Goddess. She appears not only in the myths concerning the origin of the Japanese race, but as the grandmother of the divine prince Hiko-ho-no-ni-nigi, who first came down to rule the Japanese empire. In the Shintō temples at Isé the principal deity worshipped at Gekū is Uké-moche-no-Kami, and the secondary deities Ninigi-no-Mikoto, who came down to found the Japanese empire and was the grandmother of the Emperor Jimmu, and two others. At the Naikū the principal deity is Amaterasu-ō-mi-kami (from heaven shining great deity), also called the Sun Goddess, and two secondary deities. The temples at Isé, especially those that are dedicated to the Sun Goddess, are the most highly regarded of any in Japan. Other temples of considerable popularity are situated in other parts of the empire. Thus there are Shintō temples in Kyūshū and in Izumo, which are old parts of Japan settled long before Buddhism was introduced.

The Shintō religion must be regarded as the primitive religion of the Japanese people. It prevailed among them long before Buddhism was propagated by priests from Korea. It differs from all known [pg 084] systems of religion, in having no body of dogma by which its adherents are held together. The greatest advocate of Shintoism, Moto-ori, a writer of the 18th century, admits that it has no moral code. He asserts that “morals69 were invented by the Chinese because they were an immoral people, but in Japan there was no necessity for any system of morals, as every Japanese acted rightly if he only consulted his own heart.”

Reference is frequently made in the early stories to divination, or the process of obtaining the will of the gods by indirection. The oldest method of divination was by using the shoulder-blade of a deer. It was scraped entirely free from flesh, and then placed over a fire made from cherry wood. The divine will was determined by the cracks caused by the fire in the bone. A later method of divination was by using the shell of a tortoise in the same way as the shoulder-blade of the deer was used. They had superstitions about fighting with the back to the sun; about using only one light in the house at once; about breaking off the teeth of a comb in the night-time; about the destination of the first arrow shot in battle, etc.

The superstition of impurity being attached to the mother at the birth of a child, and to the house and those associated with it in which a death occurred, is often mentioned. A mother, when about to be delivered, was required to retire alone into a separate dwelling or hut without windows. This cruel custom [pg 085] has prevailed in the island of Hachijō70 down almost to the present time. A custom prevailed, also, of abandoning the dwelling in which a death had occurred. The dead body was removed to a mourning hut, where amid sobs and weeping the mourners continued to hold a carousal, feasting upon the food provided for the dead. This abandonment of the house occupied by the living may explain the custom, so often referred to, of each new emperor occupying a different palace from that of his predecessor. We have already referred to the dreadful custom which prevailed until the reign of the Emperor Suinin, of burying living retainers around the sepulchre of their dead master. The custom was replaced by burying clay images of servants and animals around the tomb, and this continued till about a.d. 700.

There is no evidence that children received any kind of education other than a training in the use of arms and implements. The art of writing was brought over from Korea in a.d. 284. Up to this time there is nothing to show that the Japanese possessed any means of recording the events which occurred. No books existed, and reading and writing were unknown. The language spoken by the people was an ancient form of that which now prevails. The earliest examples of this language are found in the songs preserved in the Kojiki and Nihongi. As in every language, the earliest preserved specimens are poetry, so in Japanese the fragments which have [pg 086] been remembered and brought down to us, are scraps of songs. The origin of this language is, like the origin of the race, impossible at present to verify. It seems plain that the race came from the continent by way of Korea. If this is to be taken as the origin of the race, then the language which developed into the Japanese came from the northern tribes of China and of Siberia.

There is no indication of the method by which the early Japanese reckoned time. The sun in the daytime and the cocks by night, must have given them their division of hours. The year made itself apparent by the changes of temperature. It was not, however, till the introduction of calendars from China that anything like an accurate system of estimating and recording time was introduced.

The food of the primitive Japanese was much more largely animal than it became in later times. To the early Japanese there was no restriction in the use of animal food, such as the Buddhists introduced. Fish and shell-fish have always been, and doubtless from the first were, principal articles of food. The five grains, so called, are often referred to, and are specially mentioned in the Shintō rituals, whose origin goes back to prehistoric times. These grains71 are rice, millet, barley, and two kinds of beans. Silkworms and their food plant, the mulberry, are likewise spoken of. The only kind of drink referred to is saké. It will be remembered that in the myth concerning the Impetuous Male Deity in Izumo, [pg 087] the old man and old woman were directed to prepare eight tubs of saké, by drinking which the eight-headed serpent was intoxicated. In the traditional history of the emperors, they are represented as drinking saké, sometimes even to intoxication. And in the rituals recited when offerings are made to their deities, the jars of saké are enumerated among the things offered. The Japanese writers claim that saké was a native discovery, but there is a well supported belief that in very early times they borrowed the art of manufacturing it from the Chinese. There is at least a difficulty in believing that this liquor should have been invented independently in the two countries. Chopsticks are mentioned in early Japanese times, and clay vessels for food, and cups for drinking made of oak leaves. On the whole, the conclusions to be drawn from the earliest traditions concerning the Japanese lead us to regard them as having attained a material degree of civilization in all matters pertaining to food and drink. Yet it cannot be regarded as other than strange that milk, cheese and butter are nowhere mentioned, and had never been used.

In the matter of clothing we have little except hints to guide us in forming inferences. The rituals enumerate72 “bright cloth, soft cloth, and coarse cloth.” Mr. Satow remarks73 on this enumeration that “in the earliest ages the materials used were the bark of the paper-mulberry (broussonetia papyrifera), wistaria tendrils and hemp, but when the [pg 088] silkworm was introduced the finer fabric naturally took the place of the humbler in the offerings to the gods.” The paper-mulberry which is now used for making paper, was in early times twisted into a thread and woven into a very serviceable cloth. Cotton74 which now furnishes so large a part of the clothing of the people is nowhere mentioned. The skins of animals were doubtless used as clothing before the introduction of Buddhism made the killing of animals uncommon. In the legend of the purification of Izanagi75 we read of a girdle, of a skirt, of an upper garment, of trousers, and of a hat. What the shapes of these garments were we cannot tell, but the number of different garments indicates a considerable development in the ideas of clothing. In the same myth, and in many other places, mention is made of the bracelets which Izanagi wore on the left and right arm. And when he wished to show his pleasure in the daughter who had been produced in washing his left eye, he invested her with his necklace taken from his own neck. Jewelry seems in these prehistoric times to have been more commonly worn than in modern historical times. The jewels76 used were the magatama and kudatama which have been found in the ancient burial places.

Magatama and Kudatama.

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Rings have also been found which are believed to date back to prehistoric times. From the clay images which have come down to us it is now ascertained that the rings were worn as ornaments to the ears and never as rings to the fingers. These rings are of copper or bronze, plated with gold or silver. Combs and mirrors are spoken of, but how the metal mirrors are made we do not know.

The only indications of the character of the houses77 used by the early Japanese are found in the traditions respecting the primitive Shintō temples. The early methods of building were perpetuated in these temples, and in the eighteenth century a very persistent effort was made for the revival of pure Shintō. Under the influence of this movement the temples at Isé and elsewhere were purified from the contaminations which had been introduced by Buddhism. After the close of the war which resulted in the restoration of the emperor to his proper authority in 1868 a small temple in the most severe Shintō style was built at Kudan, one of the picturesque heights of Yedo, in memory of the soldiers who perished in the conflict. From a careful examination of all that can illustrate the houses of the early Japanese, we infer that they were of extreme simplicity. Stone was never used. The structures were entirely of wood. Even the palaces of the emperors were what we would call merely huts. Four upright posts sunk in the ground formed the corners. At the half-way intervals between these posts, were planted four other posts; those at [pg 091] the gable ends were high enough to sustain the ridge pole. On the other sides on the top of the posts were laid two plates. Abutting on these plates and crossing each other at the ridge pole stood the rafters, which sustained the thatched roof. In the absence of nails and pins, the timbers were fastened together by the tough tendrils of climbing plants. A hole in the gable end permitted the escape of the smoke from the fire built on the ground floor. Around the sides of the interior stood a raised couch on which the occupants sat by day and slept at night. The other parts of the floor were uncovered and consisted only of earth. They used mats made from the skins of animals or from rushes, on which they sat and slept. The doors of their dwellings were fastened by means of iron hooks, and swung on hinges unlike the modern Japanese door which always is made to slide.

The agricultural plants spoken of are numerous but leave unmentioned many of the plants of first importance. Tea, now so extensively cultivated, is nowhere spoken of. Tobacco was a late importation and came in with the Portuguese in the sixteenth century. Cotton was not introduced, as we have already said, until the beginning of the ninth century. Potatoes, including both the sweet potato and the white potato, are unmentioned. The orange came to Japan according to the received tradition at the close of the reign of the Emperor Suinin (a.d. 29–70).

Very little is said of the implements used by the primitive Japanese. Metal of any kind was almost [pg 092] unknown. We read of swords and fish-hooks, but these are the only implements referred to which seem to have been made of metal. Pots and cups of earthenware were used. The axes which they must have used to cut down the trees for building and for fuel must have been of stone, or sometimes of deer's horn. Archæologists both native and foreign have brought to light many ancient implements of the Stone age. An interesting and detailed account of these discoveries will be found in the work on Japanese Archæology by Henry Von Siebold, Yokohoma, 1879.

The arms used by the warriors were spears, bows and arrows, and swords. Numerous arrow heads have been found which bear a striking likeness to those found in Europe and America. Spear heads of flint have also been found. That the people were emerging from the Stone age is shown by the swords made of metal which they are represented as habitually using. They also seem to have had a small sword or dagger, as in the myth of the traitorous plot entered into by the empress and her brother against the Emperor Suinin. Castles in the modern sense are not referred to, although the same word shiro is used to represent the stockades with which they protected themselves. The castles of modern times, such as those at Kumamoto, Owari, and Yedo, are without doubt the outgrowth of the primitive stockade, and the same name has continued to be applied in all the successive changes.

Few domestic animals are mentioned. The horse is spoken of as an animal for riding, but not for [pg 093] driving. The same thing may be said of the use of horses in Japan even until modern times. The domestic fowl is referred to in the myth of the disappearance of the Sun Goddess. Dogs are mentioned in the later parts of the traditional period, but not cats. The cow and the products of the cow are not referred to. To these domestic animals may be added the cormorant,78 which was used for fishing, in the same way that it is used in the eastern parts of China and to a small extent in the waters of Owari and Mino at the present time. The wild animals of that day were the deer, the bear, the boar, the hare, etc. These animals were hunted for their flesh and for their skins.

The islands of Japan being largely interspersed with water much of the travel even from the earliest time was performed in boats. The expedition of Jimmu from the island of Kyūshū was in part conducted in the boats which the colony had constructed for the purpose. Whether these boats were of the form now used in Japan it is impossible to determine. It is probable however that the present form of boat is an evolution of the primitive boat, which was used by the prehistoric Japanese and which was a part of the equipment with which their ancestors came over from Korea to the islands of Japan. Travel on land was principally on foot, although as we have said the horse was used at this early day for riding. No wheeled vehicle is mentioned. The bullock cart used in later times was restricted to the use of the imperial household, and probably was introduced by the [pg 094] Buddhists. There were government roads constructed from the home provinces in different directions to those more distant. It is said that this scheme was more fully carried out after the return of the Empress Jingō from her conquest of Korea.

Let us now turn from these evidences of native culture to the events of Japanese history which have to do with the introduction of the civilization from the continent. For three thousand years before the Christian era China has been looked upon as one of the cultured nations of the earth. No written language has ever been or is now understood by so many people as the Chinese. The Chinese were a civilized people centuries before the Japanese had, even according to their own uncertain legends, emerged into the light as an empire. If we accept the opinion which seems most reasonable, that the Japanese came over to the Japanese islands from the continent by way of Korea, and belong to the Mongol tribes of central Asia, then we must assume that the Japanese were closely related to a large section of the Chinese. They have been from the beginning of their history a receptive people. They have stood ready to welcome the good things which were offered to them, coming from whatever direction. They accepted eagerly the Chinese written language and the philosophy with which it came charged. They accepted Buddhism with its priesthood and dogma and ritual, and permitted it to crowd their native religion until it became a pitiful minority. They have in recent times accepted with a hearty impetuosity the civilization of western nations, and are absorbing it as [pg 095] rapidly as the habits and thoughts of a people can take in so important a change.

We have already referred to the first introduction79 of Chinese literature into Japan. It took place in the reign of the Emperor Ōjin a.d. 284. The ambassador who brought the tribute from Korea that year was Ajiki who was familiar with the Chinese literature. He gave lessons in Chinese to the crown prince. The next year the king of Korea sent out an eminent scholar named Wani,80 who continued to give instruction to the crown prince. From this time a knowledge of Chinese gradually spread and scholars were attached to the government to make a written record of the events which took place. Historiographers were sent out during the reign of the Emperor Hanzei, a.d. 404, who were directed to make a record of all important events and forward them to the court. These steps soon began to show themselves in the absence of the wonderful and legendary from the narrative of events. Beginning with the reign of the Emperor Richū the ages of the emperors which before his time had been of such a marvellous length now drop to a reasonable and moderate period.

The nineteenth emperor was Inkyō, the fourth son of the Emperor Nintoku. He was of an amiable [pg 096] and philanthropic temperament, and accepted the position of emperor with great reluctance. His health was delicate, and he feared to take upon himself such a responsibility. In the meantime there was an interregnum, and the court officials were anxious to have him enter upon the duties of emperor. At last he consented and became emperor a.d. 412. It was during his reign that confusion arose concerning the family names, or rather, that the confusion which had been long growing now had its settlement. Family names had been a matter of growth, and many persons claimed the right to use a certain name who were in no wise entitled to it. The emperor took a singular and effectual method to settle the troublesome and personal questions that arose. He summoned all those who claimed to belong to any family whose claim was disputed to appear at Amakashi and show that they were entitled to the names they claimed. He placed jars of boiling water and required each one to plunge his hand in the water. He who was injured by the hot water was pronounced a deceiver, and he who came off unhurt was pronounced as entitled to the name. The emperor took occasion to settle the questions concerning names, and put the matter on a more stable basis. And as the art of writing now began to be more common among the people mistakes in regard to names did not again seriously recur.

The emperor's ill-health was the occasion for the introduction of another of the civilizing arts of the continent. When the annual tribute from Korea was sent it so chanced that the ambassador who [pg 097] came with it was a person versed in the medical art. If we estimate this man's science or skill by that of the Chinese practitioner of a later day, we should certainly not place a very high value on it. It is narrated, however, that he cured the imperial invalid, and by this means gained great credit for his profession, and added another to the obligations which Japan owed to the continent.

After the death of the Emperor Inkyō there was a quarrel about the succession between his two sons, Prince Kinashi-no-Karu and Prince Anaho-no-Ōji. The courtiers all favored the latter, who was the younger brother, and he surrounded his elder brother in the house of Monobe-no-Ōmai. Seeing no way of escape he committed suicide.81 The younger brother then became the twentieth emperor, who is known under the canonical name of Ankō. He had another difficulty growing out of social complications. He wanted to make the younger sister of Okusaka-no-Ōji, who was the brother of the preceding Emperor Inkyō, the wife of Ōhatsuse-no-Ōji, his own younger brother, who afterwards became the Emperor Yuriyaku. He sent as a messenger the court official, Ne-no-Ōmi, to ask the consent of her elder brother, who gladly gave it, and as a token of his gratitude for this high honor he sent a rich necklace. Ne-no-Ōmi, overcome with covetousness, kept the necklace for himself, and reported to the emperor that Okusaka-no-Ōji refused his consent. The emperor was very angry, and sent [pg 098] a detachment of troops against the supposed offender. They surrounded the house and put him to death. His chief attendants, knowing his innocence, committed suicide by the side of their dead master. The emperor then completed his design of taking the sister of Okusaka-no-Ōji as the wife of the Prince Ōhatsuse-no-Ōji, and he also took his widow and promoted her to be his empress.

Out of these circumstances arose serious troubles. His new empress had a young son by her first husband named Mayuwa-no-Ō, said to have been only seven years old. With his mother he was an inmate of the palace, and was probably a spoiled and wayward boy. The emperor was afraid lest this boy, when he came to understand who had been the cause of the death of his father, would undertake to revenge himself. He talked with the empress about his fears and explained his apprehensions. The boy accidentally heard the conversation, and was probably stimulated thereby to do the very thing which the emperor feared. Creeping stealthily into the room where the emperor lay asleep he stabbed him and then fled, taking refuge in the house of the Grandee Tsubura. The emperor was fifty-six years of age at the time of his death. This tragical event produced a great excitement. The younger brother of the emperor, Ōhatsuse, amazed and angry because his two older brothers were not, as he thought, sufficiently enraged by the murder of the emperor, killed them both. Then he attacked the Grandee Tsubura and the boy Mayuwa in their refuge. Seeing no way of escape Tsubura, at the request of the boy, first slew him and then killed himself.

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Subsequently Ōhatsuse, who seemed to have been of a violent disposition, murdered Ichinobe-no-Oshiha, son of the seventeenth emperor, Richū. His two sons, then merely boys, Ōke and Woke (literally big basket and little basket), hearing of this catastrophe escaped into the province of Harima where they worked as cow-herds. Ōhatsuse was crowned as the twenty-first emperor and is known by the canonical name of Yūriyaku Tennō.

In the year a.d. 470 an ambassador came from Go in China and by order of the emperor was entertained by the Grandee Ne-no-Ōmi. A court official, Toneri, was directed to see that this duty was suitably performed. Now Ne-no-Ōmi, it will be remembered, was the grandee who, on a former occasion, was sent by the Emperor Ankō to solicit the hand of the Princess Hatahi-no-Ōji for the present emperor, who was then the crown prince. In order to entertain the Chinese ambassador with becoming magnificence, Ne-no-Ōmi robed himself in a gorgeous manner and among other things put on the rich necklace which he had stolen. Toneri reported to the emperor the superb entertainment which Ne-no-Ōmi had accorded to the Chinese ambassador, and especially the necklace which he wore. The emperor innocently asked that Ne-no-Ōmi should appear before him in order that he might see his superb dress. The empress, who was with her husband when Ne-no-Ōmi came in, recognized the necklace which had been sent by her brother to the late emperor. The theft was charged and Ne-no-Ōmi compelled to confess. The emperor proclaimed the innocence of Okusaka-no-Ōji and his great regret at the mistaken punishments.

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There are many traditions current in Japanese early history concerning this emperor. In one he is represented in his imperial journeys to have seen a house belonging to Lord Shiki built with a raised roof like that of the imperial palace. He was greatly enraged that any subject should dare to take such a liberty, and sent his attendants to burn the house down. The poor frightened lord hastened to the emperor and humbly apologized for his stupidity. And he presented to the emperor in token of his humble submission a white dog clothed with cloth and led by a string. So he was forgiven and his house was spared.

In another legend he is said to have come upon a beautiful girl by the river side washing clothes. He stopped and conferred with her, and said to her, “Do not thou marry a husband, I will send for thee.” With this he returned to the palace and forgot about his promise. But the poor girl did not forget. Year after year passed, till at last after eighty years of waiting she was a very old woman. Then she thought, “My face and form are lean and withered, there is no longer any hope. Nevertheless, if I do not show the Heavenly Sovereign how truly I have waited, my disappointment will be unbearable.” And so with such gifts as she could afford she presented herself before the emperor. He wondering at her and her gifts asked her, “What old woman art thou, and why art thou come hither?” She replied, “Having in such and such a month and such and such a year received the Heavenly Sovereign's commands, I have been reverently awaiting the great command until this day, and eighty years have passed by. Now, my [pg 101] appearance is decrepit and there is no longer any hope. Nevertheless, I have come forth in order to show and declare my faithfulness.” Thereupon the Heavenly Sovereign, greatly agitated, exclaimed, “I had quite forgotten my command; and thou meanwhile, ever faithfully awaiting my commands, hast vainly let pass by the years of thy prime. It is too pitiful.” He sent her back to her home with such consolation as rich gifts could impart.

We give one more of the legends which cling to the name of this emperor.

He was making an imperial progress to the moor of Akizu for the purpose of hunting. And as he sat down to rest a horse-fly bit his august arm. But immediately a dragon-fly came and seized the horse-fly and flew away. Thereupon he composed an august song as follows:

Who is it tells in the great presence that game is lying on the peak of Womuro, at Mi-Yeshinu? Our Great Lord who tranquilly carries on the government, being seated on the throne to await the game, a horse-fly alights on and stings the fleshy part of his arm fully clad in a sleeve of white stuff, and a dragon-fly quickly eats up the horse-fly. That it might properly bear its name, the land of Yamato was called the Island of the Dragon-Fly.82

After a long reign Yūriyaku is said in Kojiki to have died at the age of one hundred and twenty-four.

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The son of the Emperor Yūriyaku, Prince Shiraka, succeeded him. He is known in history as the Emperor Seinei. He lived only five years after his accession and left no descendant to fill the throne. Search was accordingly made for some one of imperial blood who might become emperor. It will be remembered that the Emperor Yūriyaku, before his accession, had murdered Prince Ichinobe-no-Oshiwa, son of the eighteenth emperor, and that his two sons, then young boys, Princes Ōke and Woke, made their escape into the province of Harima. A new governor of this province had just arrived and was in attendance at the festivities in honor of the opening of a new cave83 by a citizen of the place. As usual there was feasting, and drinking, and dancing. The two young men Ōke and Woke, who occupied menial positions in this household, were called upon to dance. After some hesitation they each in succession danced and sang some of the songs which they had learned in their boyhood.84 The new governor recognized these songs to be such as were taught at the court, and on enquiring found the young men to be grandsons of the Emperor Richū. He brought them to the palace and presented them to their aunt Queen Ii-Toyo. After a friendly contest between the two brothers, the younger one, Prince Woke, became the twenty-third emperor [pg 103] under the canonical name of Kenzō. His reign was a very short one, only eight years according to the Kojiki and three years according to the Nihongi. The only incident of consequence recorded of him is that he sought out the burial place of his father, who had been murdered by the Emperor Yūriyaku, and transferred his remains to a fitting mausoleum. He also contemplated the desecration of the mausoleum of the murderer as a mark of his vengeance, but was dissuaded by his brother from the undertaking.

He died without children and was succeeded by his elder brother Prince Ōke who became a.d. 488 the twenty-fourth emperor under the canonical name of Ninken.

Concerning the emperor and several of his successors there is little of interest to record. The twenty-fifth emperor, Muretsu (a.d. 499), who was a son of the emperor Ninken, was chiefly notable for his cruelty. Some of the acts recorded of him can only be equalled by those of the degenerate occupants of the imperial throne of Rome in its worst days. He reigned eleven years and died without children. The twenty-sixth emperor was Keitai Tennō, who was the fifth descendant from Ōjin Tennō. The only noticeable events in his reign were an expedition to Korea to settle difficulties which had then intervened, and an expedition to Chikushi, the northern part of Kyūshū, to repress tumults which had arisen. The next emperors were Ankan Tennō and Senkuwa Tennō, whose reigns were uneventful.

The twenty-ninth emperor was Kimmei Tennō, [pg 104] (a.d. 540–571), who was the son of Keitai Tennō. He reigned thirty-two years and died at the age of sixty-three. It was during his reign, in a.d. 552, that an ambassador from Kudara, one of the three provinces of Korea, presented to the emperor an image of Shaka, and also Buddhist books explaining the doctrine. He commended highly the new religion, and the emperor was deeply impressed with its novelties. This seems the more probable because up to this time Japan looked upon China and Korea as leaders in civilization, and therefore was disposed to regard what had obtained a footing there as worthy of acceptance.

The prime-minister Soga-no-Iname favored the new religion, and urged that the image of Shaka which had been brought over should be duly set up and worshipped. But the ministers Monobe-no-Okoshi and Kumako opposed the proposition, saying, “Our country has its own gods; and they perhaps will be angry with us if we pay our devotions to a foreign god.”

But the emperor settled the matter by saying, “Let Iname try it.” He gave the idol to Iname with the directions that he should set it up and pray to it. Accordingly Iname took the image of Shaka and established it in a house of his own, which he created a temple, and worshipped it.

But shortly after this an epidemic broke out in the country, and Okoshi and Kumako declared that it was due to the strange god which had been received from the western barbarians, and besought the emperor to have it thrown away. The image [pg 105] therefore by the emperor's command was thrown into the sea near Naniwa,85 and the temple in which it had been erected was destroyed. This was the first movement towards the introduction of Buddhism.

In the reign of the thirtieth emperor, Bitatsu Tennō, a.d. 572, who was the son of Kimmei Tennō, Kudara again made a contribution of Buddhist emblems, viz.: books of Buddhist doctrine; a priest of Ritsu sect; a priest; a nun; a diviner; an image maker; and a Buddhist temple carpenter. These were all housed in the temple of Owake-no-O at Naniwa. Seven years after this two Japanese ambassadors who had been sent to Kudara brought back with them several Buddhist images of stone, which the Daijin Umako obtained as his possession. He built several Buddhist temples in which he placed the images and other precious relics which he had secured. He also built a pagoda and houses in which the priests and nuns resided. When Umako was sick he asked from the emperor that he might avail himself of the Buddhist ritual. The emperor gave him this privilege, but commanded him to restrict it to himself.

The Emperor Bitatsu died a.d. 585 at the age of forty-eight. His successor was Emperor Yōmei the thirty-first in order from the Emperor Jimmu. He was by his mother a descendant of the Soga family and his first wife was also a daughter of the prime-minister, [pg 106] the Noble Iname who was also of the Soga family. The bitter hostility between the members of the court who favored Buddhism and those who opposed it continued. The leader of the former party was Umako now the prime-minister, while the opponents of Buddhism were led by Moriya. One of the occasions when their hostility broke out was when the emperor was taken sick and he wished to try the effect of the Buddhist Sampō, that is, the three precious elements of Buddhism, Buddha, the rites of Buddhism, and the Buddhist priests. Moriya and his party advised against this conformity to Buddhism, but Umako supported him in his wishes and introduced a Buddhist priest into the palace to attend upon the emperor. In spite of all this effort, however, the emperor died, having reigned only three years.

The death of the emperor was the signal for the breaking out of serious disturbances. Moriya the champion of the old religion was killed and his party overpowered. From this time Buddhism may be said to have triumphed in Japan. The thirty-second emperor, Sujun, was crowned a.d. 588. He was the son of the Emperor Kimmei, and at the time of his accession was sixty-nine years of age. The communication with Korea continued, and more and more of the Buddhist culture was introduced. Umako, who now had undisputed sway in the government, sent out to Korea persons to study the Buddhist faith, and consecrated many priests and nuns and erected temples for the new worship.

But everything did not move smoothly. Umako, [pg 107] with all his zeal and enthusiasm for Buddhism, was suspected of personal ambition, and was looked upon with distrust. A plot to assassinate the emperor was planned by Umako, which terminated his life, after a reign of only four years, in the seventy-third year of his age.

The thirty-third sovereign was the Empress Suiko, who was the sister of the Emperor Yōmei. Her coronation took place a.d. 593. Her reign was chiefly remarkable for the active influence of Umaydo-no-Ōji (a.d. 572–622), who was the second son of the Emperor Yōmei, and who was made crown prince under the empress, and aided her in the administration of the political affairs of the government. This prince is better known by his posthumous title of Shōtoku Taishi (great teacher of the divine virtue), and is held in great reverence as the principal founder and promoter of Buddhism in Japan. His name has been linked with many legends, which are still current after the lapse of fourteen hundred years. It is said that as soon as he was born he was able to speak, and was in all respects a very clever boy. His memory was wonderfully acute. He had Napoleon the Great's talent of attending to several things at the same time. He could hear the appeals of eight persons at once, and give to each a proper answer. From this circumstance he sometimes went by the name of Yatsumimi-no-Ōji, that is, Prince of Eight Ears.

The prince threw the whole influence of the government in favor of Buddhism. Many temples were built in different central districts for the convenience [pg 108] of the new religion. Under his influence the officers of the government rivalled each other in founding temples and maintaining them at their own expense. He took as his teacher a priest who had recently come from Korea, and from him for the first time learned the five Buddhist commandments:

	1. Against stealing.
	2. Against lying.
	3. Against intemperance.
	4. Against murder.
	5. Against adultery.

He gave command to an artificer in copper to make large images of Buddha for each of the officers in the government. The king of Koma in Korea hearing of this great undertaking sent a contribution of three hundred ryō of gold. The images were finished in due time and an imposing religious ceremonial was held in honor of the event. Many of the principal temples of Buddhism in different parts of Japan take their origin from the time of Shōtoku Taishi, and no single character in history is so intimately connected with the development of Buddhism.

It was not only as a religious reformer, however, that he deserves to be remembered. He was a a most painstaking and enlightened ruler. He studiously gathered from the Chinese the elements and methods of government and adapted them to his own country.86 From his time the study of [pg 109] Chinese literature became the essential culture of the active minds of Japan.

Shōtoku Taishi died a.d. 622, having been the principal officer of the government for twenty-nine years.

The impulse which Shōtoku had given to Buddhism did not subside. In the year following his death officers were appointed to govern the growing religious communities, called Sosho and Sozu, which in dignity and power corresponded to archbishops and bishops in Christian nomenclature. The first archbishop was Kwankin, a priest from Kudara, and the first bishop was Tokuseki of Kurabe. These officials examined every priest and nun and made a register of them. A census of Buddhism is also given which belongs to this same period. According to this there were forty-six Buddhist temples and 1385 priests and nuns.

In the year a.d. 626, Soga-no-Umako the daijin and a life-long friend and promoter of Buddhism died, and two years later the Empress Suiko died. So nearly all the prominent participants in the events which had taken place since the first entrance of Buddhism into Japan, had disappeared. In the meantime a religion had taken possession of a field in which it was destined to exert a wide influence and undergo a national development.

Along with this religion had come a literature and a culture, which when absorbed into the life of this people gave them the permanent characteristics which we now recognize as the Japanese civilization. The freer and more frequent intercourse with China and [pg 110] Korea brought with it not only a knowledge of books and writing, but many improvements in arts and many new arts and agricultural industries. When the forces of the Empress Jingō returned from Korea they brought with them persons skilled in many industrial occupations. It is a tradition that a descendant of the Kan dynasty in China had fled to Korea on the fall of that dynasty, and in the twentieth year of the Emperor Ōjin (a.d. 290) had migrated to Japan with a colony who were familiar with weaving and sewing. In the thirty-seventh year of the same emperor an officer was sent to China to obtain more weavers and sewers. The cultivation of the mulberry tree and the breeding of silk-worms87 was introduced from China in a.d. 457, and in order to encourage this industry the empress herself engaged in it. At this early period this important industry was begun, or at least received an impulse which has been continued down to the present time.

With these industrial arts came in rapid succession the elements of a higher civilization. Books on almanac-making, astronomy, geography and divination were brought to Japan from Korea and China. The Chinese calendar88 was first used in the reign of the Empress Suiko under the regency of Shōtoku Taishi. This almanac was based on the lunar periods and the civil year began with the new moon [pg 111] occurring about the beginning of February. But as the length of the civil year is not an exact multiple of the number of days contained in a lunation, the twelve lunar months used by the Chinese and Japanese will be about eleven days shorter than the solar year. Hence to prevent the discrepancy from increasing and throwing the seasons entirely out of their place in the calendar, an intercalary month was inserted nearly every third year. It was inserted not at the end of the year but whenever the discrepancy had reached the number of days in a lunation. The month thus inserted was called by the same name as the preceding with an explanatory prefix. From this period therefore the dates of Japanese events may be relied upon with some degree of certainty. For events occurring before this period, a knowledge of which must have been transmitted by oral tradition, the dates assigned to them in the Nihongi must have been computed by counting back to the supposed time according to the calendar in use at the time of the writing.

The astronomy and geography introduced into Japan along with almanac-making in the fifth century were without question very primitive sciences. At this time even in Europe the knowledge of these sciences was not advanced beyond the imperfect notions of the Greeks. It was not until the sixteenth century, when the discoveries of the Portuguese and the Spaniards and the English had revealed the shape and the divisions of the earth, and the Jesuits had carried this knowledge to China and Japan, that anything like a correct astronomy [pg 112] or geography was possible. By divination, which is mentioned as one of the sciences brought over from Korea, was meant the determination of future events or of lucky or unlucky conditions.

The most important civilizing force introduced from China at this period was the formal institutions of education. Although the first establishment of a school dates from the reign of the Emperor Tenji (a.d. 668–671), yet it was not till the reign of the Emperor Mommu (a.d. 697–707) that the university was regularly organized. Branch schools were also established in the several provinces. In the university there were departments for Chinese literature, for medicine, for astronomy and almanac-making, and for astrology. Under the first head were included the art of writing the Chinese characters, the practice of composition, the study of the Chinese classics, and the reading of books of Chinese history. In like manner the training of the students in medicine chiefly consisted in making them familiar with the methods which prevailed in China. The properties of medicinal plants, the variations of the pulse in health and disease and in the changing seasons, and the anatomy of the human body were the chief subjects of study. The human cadaver was never dissected, but a knowledge of anatomy was obtained from diagrams which were wholly hypothetical. In early times medical officers were appointed to experiment with medicines upon monkeys, and also to dissect the bodies of monkeys. From these dissections, as well as from the printed diagrams of Chinese books the imperfect knowledge which they had reached was derived. It was not till 1771 that [pg 113] Sugita Genpaku89 and several other Japanese scholars had an opportunity to dissect the body of a criminal, and by personal observation found the utter falsity of the Chinese diagrams on which they had hitherto relied, and the correctness of the Dutch books, which they had, contrary to the laws of the country, learned to read.

The great reverence felt for Chinese culture led to the introduction at an early date of the Chinese system of official rank. The system remained in force down to the restoration in 1868. The officers were Daijō-daijin (Prime-Minister), Sa-daijin (Minister of the Left), U-daijin (Minister of the Right), together with eight boards,90 charged with the various duties of administration. These boards were divided into sections, and the various departments of the government were respectively performed by them. In this way the administration became thoroughly bureaucratic, in imitation of the Chinese empire, to which the Japanese at this time looked up with the most complete reverence.

In addition to these official boards, six official ranks were also introduced from China. These ranks were designated, first, virtue; second, humanity; third, propriety; fourth, truth; fifth, righteousness, and sixth, wisdom. Each of these ranks91 was divided [pg 114] into two orders termed respectively the Greater and the Lesser. Thus there were twelve distinctions in this system. It was introduced in the reign of the Empress Suiko, a.d. 604, and is generally attributed to the Regent Shōtoku, who was a great admirer of the continental civilization. It existed in this form until the time of the Emperor Kōtoku, when, a.d. 649, it was extended to nineteen distinctions. These were not given to the individual in recognition of talent, but to families to be by them transmitted to their posterity as hereditary rank.

For many years during this period of active intercourse with China and Korea, Dazaifu, situated on the west coast of Kyūshū, north of the present situation of Nagasaki, was the recognized port where strangers were received. This city was the seat of a vice-royalty, having control over the nine provinces of Kyūshū. The office of vice-governor was considered a place of honorable banishment to which distinguished men who were distasteful at court could be sent.

These continental influences continued for many years and indeed have never ceased. There has always existed a class of scholars who looked upon Chinese learning as the supreme pinnacle to which the human mind could attain. This was especially true of the admirers of Confucius and Confucianism. Although it was not until a much later period that the culture of a Chinese philosophy attained its highest mark, yet even in the early arrangement of the studies in the university we see the wide influence which the writings of the Chinese classics exerted.

[pg 115]

We close this chapter with an event which evinced the advance which Japanese civilization had made, and aided greatly in promoting this advance in the subsequent centuries. This event was the publication of the Kojiki (Record of Ancient Things) and the Nihongi (Chronicles of Japan). A book still older than these is said to have been composed in a.d. 620, but it perished in a fire in a.d. 645, although a fragment is said to have been rescued. The circumstances attending the preparation of the Kojiki are given by Mr. Satow in his paper92 on the “Revival of Pure Shintō,” and also by Mr. Chamberlain93 in his introduction to the translation. The Emperor Temmu had resolved to take measures to preserve the true traditions from oblivion. He had the records carefully examined and compiled. Then these collated traditions were one by one committed to one of the household officers, Hiyeda-no-Are, who had a marvellously retentive memory. Before the work of compilation was finished the emperor died; but the Empress Gemmyō, who after an interval succeeded him, carried it on to its completion in a.d. 712. By her direction the traditions were taken down from Are's dictation in the form in which we now have them. It is by no means a pleasing or attractive work, even in the opinion of the Japanese. It is bald and archaic in its form and composition. It is, however, notable as being freer from the admixture of Chinese learning, and therefore a better index of the native culture of the race than the [pg 116] works which followed it.94 Much of it consists of mere genealogies of the emperors and naked statements of leading events, but there are besides this many legends and poems which bear evidence of having been handed down in essentially their present form. As an authority for the chronology of the early events it is, of course, of small value. It is evident that where a narrative of events has been carried through many centuries by tradition alone, without written records to check or assist it, no dependence can be placed on the chronology of the events, further than, perhaps, on the order of sequence.

Only eight years after the publication of the Kojiki, a second work termed Nihongi or Chronicles of Japan was issued. It was prepared by imperial command and appeared in a.d. 720 in the reign of the Empress Genshō. It differs from the older book in being composed in the Chinese idiom, and in being much more tinctured with the ideas of Chinese philosophy. These two works, so nearly contemporaneous, both of them composed in so great a degree of the legendary elements of Japanese history, must be looked upon as marking a distinct epoch in the story of Japan.

[pg 117]