Читать книгу A History of the Japanese People - Kikuchi Dairoku - Страница 88

As to the term "Yamato," it appears that, in the earliest times, the whole country now called Japan was known as Yamato, and that subsequently the designation became restricted to the province which became the seat of government. The Chinese, when they first took cognizance of the islands lying on their east, seem to have applied the name Wado—pronounced "Yamato" by the Japanese—to the tribes inhabiting the western shores of Japan, namely, the Kumaso or the Tsuchi-gumo, and in writing the word they used ideographs conveying a sense of contempt. The Japanese, not unnaturally, changed these ideographs to others having the same sounds but signifying "great peace." At a later time the Chinese or the Koreans began to designate these eastern islands, Jih-pen, or "Sunrise Island," a term which, in the fifteenth century, was perverted by the Dutch into Japan.