THE
JAPANESE
This episode on Japan and the Japanese people is to explore
into their origin and paste a picture as true to the reality as possible. To
read into Japan's past, one will have to rely on written records from the
Chinese and the Koreans. The earliest Japanese history chronicles would be
Kojiki and Nihon Shoki, all written in Chinese in the 8th century.
There was no written form of the Korean language till A.D. 612 when the
Koreans devised a writing system embedding Chinese characters or employing
Chinese characters in total. It would take the Koreans another 800 years to
invent the Hangul characters. For the Japanese, the 'kana' would not
appear till much later.
The early Japanese history was invariably
linked to that of China and Korea. The Korean link would be best shown by a
Japanese 'surname book' in the 8th century, on which names of continental origin
had occupied a large proportion. Japanese Emperor Akihito recently acknowledged
that their ancestor of the 8th century, Emperor Kammu, reign 736-836, had origin
in the Paekche Kingdom of the 6th century.
The Chinese link,
interestingly, would extend as far as the 2-3rd century B.C. at minimum. Before
that, "Shan Hai Jing", namely, the Book or Classics of Mountains and
Seas, which was compiled into 18 chapters from the original records of 32
chapters by Liu Xiang and Lin Xin at the end of the Western Han Dynasty under
the Han imperial order, already recorded the existence of Wo [Wa] Japan as known
in prehistoric China. "Shan Hai Jing", in Section 12, i.e., the northern
records of the [inner-]seas, claimed that Wo (Wa in Japanese) was subject to the
Yan statelet of the Zhou Dynasty for the possibility that the ancient Wo
Japanese travelled through the peninsula to submit tributes to Yan in today's
Peking area. Following the Liu father and son, we have Wang Chong, a
philosophically-materialist proponent, recording on several occasions in his
book Lun Heng the prehistoric exchange between Wo and Zhou, claiming that
the Wo Japanese had submitted tributes (i.e., Chang-cao or tulip stems and
leaves, a kind of material used for making tulip liquor which was said to have
the superstitious function of eradicating ailments and pestilence in ancient
China) to Zhou King Chengwang (Ji Song, reign approx 1,115-1,078 B.C.).
--Also see the Korean section for the 4th century B.C.E. descriptions
of Ji-zi Chao-xian (Korea) in Shan Hai Jing: Chaoxian (Korea) as Recorded in the Book or Classics of
Mountains and Seas. Note that "Shan
Hai Jing", which could be edited [or written] by annotator Shi-zi (i.e., teacher
of Qin reformer Shang Yang), had a corroborated history of at least the 4th
century B.C.E. There were three major components to "Shan Hai Jing",
namely, "The Book on the Mountains", "The Book on the [Inner-]Seas &
[Over-]Seas" and "The Book on the [Overseas] Wilderness", with the section on
mountains covering the viscera of Mother Earth as known in the Central Kingdom
of China in the 4th century B.C.E. at minimum, the section on the [Inner-]Seas
and [Over-]Seas to have credible geography on the Korea peninsula while the rest
being difficult to pinpoint in an exact match, and the section on the [Overseas]
Wilderness, such as the American continents, being fuzzy and incredulous. (Note
that the "seas" component of "Shan Hai Jing" could be relatively new in
comparison with the "mountain" part of "Shan Hai Jing". Hence, the
writings on Chaoxian (Korea) in "Shan Hai Jing" were
after-the-matter-of-known-facts.)
Notwithstanding the reference to 'Wo'
in the above-mentioned books, Confucius' Analects constantly mentioned that part
of the nine 'Yi' people of the ancient time, who lived in eastern China at the
time of overlord Yao, Yu and Shun, might have moved away to the place where
Confucius and some of his disciples wished to dwell by crossing the seas to the
east, without specifying whether it was the Yellow Sea to Korea/Japan or the
Bohai Sea to Manchuria. That is to say that in Confucius' times, the ancient
Chinese already began to feel fuzzy about the whereabouts of the ancient Nine Yi
people. Frequently, Confucius and his disciples referred to a mythical land
beyond the seas to be the land of the Nine Yi people without defining the actual
locality. Later, in the geography section of Han Shu, it was inferred
that Confucius meant the land of the nine 'Yi' people to be the place of the Wo
people's locality who dwelled in the waters off the Lelang Commandary of Korea.
Further, Sui Shu further corroborated Han Shu in the section on
the Dong-yi (i.e., eastern Yi people) that the Wo people was where the nine 'Yi'
people lived. The later interpretation, however, could be wrong as this
webmaster repeatedly used the word misnomer Eastern Yi in the Korean section to
emphasize the point that the original Koreans might not be Tungunsic at all, but
Sinitic. More to follow next.
More about
Shan Hai Jing is available at http://www.imperialchina.org/ImperialChina/?p=331; the "Eastern Yi People" at http://www.imperialchina.org/ImperialChina/?p=311
The Linkage Between China And Japan
In Chinese TV dramas, two incidents were constantly
mentioned to link the origin of the Japanese to the mainland Chinese: namely, i)
the story of Xu Fu (Jo Fuku)'s sailing to Japan to find panacea on behalf of
first Qin Emperor Shihuangdi
(Shi Huang Di or Shi Huangdi), and ii) the story of hairy-faced knight's
abandoning China's central plains to Tang Dynasty founders in search of an
eastern land for creation of his own kingdom. There is no definite proof that Xu
Fu, together with 3000 virgin boys and girls, had actually landed in Japan 2200
years ago though a tombstone bearing his name was erected in Japan. Some people
speculated that Xu Ju was the legendary Jimmu Tenno, and it seems Xu Fu's
pronunciation is close to Jimmu. The always-on lamps inside of Shihuangdi's
tomb, lit by oil refined from mermaid fish from the East China Sea, corroborated
the fact that Chinese fishing vessels were very active in the East Sea 2200
years ago. Shihuangdi personally oversaw two seafaring trips by Xu Fu. During
his second trip, Xu Fu was said to have conspired in bringing virgin boys and
girls to 'Yingzhou' in East China Sea for colonization. Alternative speculation
would point America as the land of Xu Fu's destination.
The legend of
the knight ('Qiu-ran-ke' or 'Qiu-xu-ke'), i.e., La Biographie du chevalier à la
barbe frisée, happened in late years of Sui Dynasty (AD 581-618). (During Sui
Dynasty, Japan dispatched four delegations to China, by the way, including the
A.D. 607 visit by ono no Imoko [xiaoye meizi], known as Su-yin-gao in Chinese
records.) The knight and his female companion disbursed all their assets and
properties to Li Jing (who later became a famous Tang general), saying that he
would not compete with Li Shiming (Tang's 2nd emperor, i.e., King of Qin and
Emperor Tang Taizong) for the land of China and that should Li Jing hear that
someone had obtained a kingdom in the southeast it would be him: Chinese tea-house stories also claimed that 'Ranxu-ke' operated a chain of
stores in the mainland and that the country that 'Ranxu-ke' had usurped could be
Korea, not Japan. Omitted by official history chronicle "Tang Zhi" [i.e.,
Tang Dynasty History] would be Du Guangting's writing on 'Qiu-ran-ke' in which
he adopted 'Fuyu' [i.e., the ancient royal clan name for the Korean kingdom of
Paekche] for the territory that he had conquered after leading an expedition
with thousand ships.
The most detailed account of China's embassy to Wa Japan would
be in Sui Dynasty's history annals. In A.D. 607, Wa Japanese King
Duo-li-si-bi-gu [with royal clan surname A-mei (speculated to be today's
Japanese pronunciation for heaven), given name Duo-li-si-bi-gu and acclaimed
name A-bei-ji-mi (i.e., Abekimi, speculated to be today's Japanese pronunciation
for the son of heaven or "tian er" in the Chinese language), soundex Ame
Dolisubiku] sent an emissary, ono no Imoko ([xiaoye meizi], known as Su-yin-gao
in Chinese records), to Sui China. The king was known today as Regent Shotoku
under curtain empress Suiko, an aunt, with a purported reign of A.D. 554-628.
The letter stated that they had heard that the new 'buddha' emperor to the west
of the sea had revived buddhism and they would like to have a dozen monks study
Buddhism in China. (Duo-li-si-bi-gu was known as Yongming [Yomei] Tenno in the
New History of Tang Dynasty which carried literally the fabricated Japanese
historical accounts from the 7th-8th centuries.) Sui Emperor Yangdi at first
refused to hear about the Wa State (Japan) because the Japanese king [in fact,
regent] wrote the sentence: "The Son of Heaven from the sunrise wish good health
for the Son of Heaven at the sunset...." However, Emperor Yangdi sent an
emissary, Pei Shiqing [Pei Qing], to the Wa State the second year (i.e., A.D.
608). [In here, the Chinese records of the year of visit conflicted with the
fabricated Japanese accounts by at least 20 years. The records beyond this
known contact between ancient Japan and China was to become more and more
ambiguous, till about eight imaginary emperors were fabricated to push the
legendary Kimmu Tenno to the 6-7th century B.C.E.]
Pei Shiqing crossed
the sea to Paekche, arrived at Zhu-dao (bamboo island) Island which could be
today's disputed island in-between Korea and Japan or another island, watched
the Dan-luo-guo statelet to the south [an island recorded to be off Silla's
southern coast, that was initially subject to Paekche and subsequently to Silla,
an island with King by the name of Ru-li-du-luo who sent an emissary to China in
A.D. 661, and an island with an interesting group of pig-leather people like an
island of Xianbei-like hair-cut people off the western Korean coast], passed
through the Du-si-ma-guo statelet, crossed sea again [? from Kyushu to Honshu -
as Japan had already moved eastward to the Yamato Plains from Kyushu about 200
years before, at approx. 400-410 A.D.] to the Yi-zhi-guo statelet, arrived at
the Zhu-si-guo statelet, went eastward to the Qin-wang-guo statelet (Qin King
Country which was commented to be similar to the Chinese: Qin-han of South
Korea? --Could be Qin-Han migrants to Japan from Korea but was said to be from
the lineage of Xu-wo or the Xu-fu Wo statelet [which could also mean that Xu Fu
had actually travelled to southern Korea, not Japan, in the beginning, and then
his descendants migrated to Japan hundreds of years later), travelled through
another dozen countries to reach the coast of Wa Japan. Pei Shiqing recorded
that the domain east of Zhu-si-guo belonged to the vassalage of Wa Japan. Wa
King welcomed Pei Shiqing with over one hundred people, displaying ceremonial
courtesy and beating the drums and horns. Within the next ten days, Wa King
dispatched 200 cavalry to fetch Pei Shiqing at the outskirts of the capital.
After arriving at the capital, Pei Shiqing and Wa King exchanged gifts and
tributes. The Japanese asked another emissary to accompany Pei Qing [Pei
Shiqing] back to China. It was from the mouth of this Japanese emissary that Sui
Emperor Yangdi confirmed the identity of Ryukyu, an
island to the southwest of Japan.
In the phylogenetic tree Ryukyuans and Ainu
were neighbors, but the genetic distance between them was larger than the
distances between Ryukyuans and Hondo Japanese and between Ryukyuans and Korean
populations. The geographic cline of the predominant haplotype in Ryukyuans,
A*24-B*54-DRB1*0405, suggests that an ancestral population possessing
A*24-B*54-DRB1*0405 moved into the Okinawa Islands after the divergence of
Ryukyuans from the Ainu. Such a recent gene flow, probably from South China to
the Okinawa Islands, is considered the major cause of difference in genetic
characteristics between Ryukyuans and the Ainu.
The Torai-Jin ("guihua-ren" [immigrant]
clans) of Japan
Certainly, the mainland people had arrived in Japan much
earlier than the 6th century A.D. It seems the earliest reference to mainland
people's landing in Japan would be during the aftermath of Wei Man's usurping
the Choson Kingdom of Ji Zhun around the 190s B.C.E. As we had detailed in the
Korean section, Ji
Zhun fled to southern Korea to be king of Haan [Han(2)]. Some of Ji Zhun's
palace people were driven into the sea by Wei Man's Chinese army according to
Chen Shou. There was speculation that those people sailed to southern Korea
and/or Japan. In then southern Korea, the Chenhan (i.e. Qin-Han) and Bianhan
people, who nominally obeyed to Mahan, had retained more ancient Qin Chinese
characteristics than the Wei Man Chinese in northern Korea. The Chenhan people
claimed that their ancestors came from China's Qin Dynasty (221-206 B.C.), they
called their country by 'bang' [i.e., nation], and they worked as iron
miners for the Koreans and the Wa Japanese. Out of the three-Haan land in
southern Korea would arose Paekche, Kaya and Silla, where the Torai-Jin
("guihua-ren" [immigrant] clans), i.e., ancient Chinese refugees from the
Chinese continent, had dwelled before a further move to Japan.
Han
Emperor Wudi, after zoning Korea into the commanderies of Zhenfan, Xuantu,
Lelang and Lindun, came into contact with the Wo Japanese on the western shore
of Kyushu, who possibly shared the same iron-smith background as the Chinese
dwellers at the southern Korean tip. The geography section of Han Shu
definitely stated that the Wo people dwelled in the waters off the Lelang
Commandary of Korea. Thereafter, in the section on the Eastern Yi people in
Hou Han Shu, it was recorded that during the 2nd year of
Jianwu-zhongyuan, A.D. 57, the Wo-nu-guo statelet in Japan, which was situated
at the southernmost tip of Kyushu, dispatched an emissary, who called himself by
da fu, to seeing Han Emperor Wudi, on which occasion a seal was
conferred. The seal was excavated at the Hakata Bay [i.e., the opposite side of
Kyushu] during the Edo era, around A.D. 1784, with the Chinese characters of
Han-wei[wo]-nu-guo-wang[king] inscribed.
Now, in Chen Shou's San Guo
Zhi (The History of Three Kingdoms), it was recorded that thirty stateles in
ancient Wo Japan had diplomatic relations with China, including the
Wei[wo]-nu-guo statelet which appeared to enjoy the highest esteem in that it
had a gold seal on a similar footing as the Dian-yue statelet in southwestern
China. Some kind of fiduciary and vassal relationship was established between
the Wa State and China. The competing entity on the Japan islands, i.e.,
Himiko's statelet, sought help with countering the neighboring Wo statelet.
http://www.os.xaxon.ne.j
p/~sinkodai/efuruta/esss.html said that
"Chiu-T'ang-shu or old T'ang History contains the Records on Japan and Wa-state,
and one passage in it radically contradicts the existing dogmatic
interpretations advanced by historians of ancient Japan. According to this
passage, Wa-state was granted a gold seal by Kuang-wu of Later Han dynasty" in
apparently the first years of the first century A.D. In the 3rd century, the Wa
people requested for pilgrimage to Chinese capital with Governor -General Liu
Xia of Daifang Commandary in Korea. Diplomatic emissaries were frequently
exchanged, and seals were conferred upon the Wa Queen by Wei China. Later, when
the Wa State in Japan had internal turmoil, Queen Himiko requested with the new
Governor-General of Daifang Commandary, Wang Qi, for assistance. An official
called Zhang Zheng (Chang Cheng) was dispatched to the Wa State in the 8th year
of Cheng-shih or A.D. 247. When the Chinese emissary, Zhang Zheng, who
apparently took a Chinese army to the Japan islands for creating detente
among the rivalry Wo Japanese, returned to China with two dozens of Wa people in
A.D. 266, China was already ruled by Sima Shi's Jinn Dynasty [AD 265-317].
As a result of the ensuing disintegration of northern China as well as
the turmoil in Korea, i.e., the Tungunsic [and mixed or misnomer Tungusic]
invasion towards the south, the composition of the Chinese-lineage ironsmiths in
southern Korea and western Japan were apparently overtaken by the invaders. (By
the word misnomer, this webmaster is making the point that the Fuyu invaders
from Korea were not actually C-haplogroup Tungus from the northern Xing'an Ridge
and the Amur River but the mixed O2-haplogroup people from today's Inner
Mongolia territory.)
The massive Chinese-Korean emigration to Japan,
termed "guihua-ren" [i.e., the naturalized people to Japan], however, would not
come till northern China disintegrated into chaos during the "Five Nomadic
Groups Ravaging China" in late Western Jinn Dynasty [AD 265-317]. on basis of
Kojiki and Nihon Shoki, "guihua-ren" [i.e., the naturalized people
to Japan] included clans such as Yutsuki-kimi [Gong-yue-jun; bow moon gentleman
or chieftan], Higashikan-atai [Dong-han-zhi; Eastern Han descendant chieftan],
Nishibun-abido [Xi-wen-shou; Western culture head] and etc. [The suffix like
'-jun', '-zhi' or '-shou' meant for the hereditary titles of heads of the
immigrant clans.] The Yutsuki-kimi
clan, claiming the Qin Dynasty surname or the Hata clan in Japanese, was
responsible for developing the silkworm industry and civil engineering in Japan;
the Higashikan-atai clan, led by Achi-no-Omi who claimed descent from Emperor
Lingdi of Eastern Han Dynasty, developed the handicraft industry and metallergy;
and the Nishibun-abodi clan took charge of bookkeeping and protocol inside of
the Japanese government.
Claming a direct descendant of Qin Emperor
Shihuangdi, Yutsuki-kimi (i.e., King Yusuo), according to Nohonshoki, brought
120 counties of people to Japan from Korea, and later in the 7th century, Japan,
for the Hata clan's contribution, purportedly built the Koryu-ji Temple as a
memorial for Hata no Kawakatsu (Hada no Kokatsu). (Though, contrary to shoki's
account that the Yutsuki clan came to Japan in 285 A.D., the Qin-haan people of
southern Korea, located in original Qin Haan and later Kaya (Imna), might have
come to Japan at the turn of the 4th-5th centuries, when the Korean peninsula
was embroiled in the three-kingdom warfare and Wa Japan was counted as an
outsider force to lend aid to one of the warring parties.) Achi-no-Omi, whose
Chinese name was Liu Ahzhi (Achi in Japanese pronunciation), who claimed a 4th
(?) generation grandson of Han Emperor Lingdi of Eastern Han Dynasty, brought
2,040 clansmen to Japan. on basis of the Japanese shoki-kojiki accounts, Liu
Ahzhi contemplated about leaving China in A.D. 289, i.e., the 10th year of the
Taikang Era of Western Jinn Dynasty, and arrived in Japan during the Ojin 29th
year or A.D. 299. What was conflicting was the mismatch of the Ojin era and the
subsequent timeline, when Liu Ahzhi, under the
order of Yuryaku (xionglve, r. 456-479), at one time travelled with the Koguryeo
embassy to the Eastern Jinn court in the Yangtze River area and recruited
textile craftsmen and craftswomen for employment in Japan. (According to the
Chinese historical account, the Koguryeo embassy received the Jinn conferal in
A.D. 413, which was one year after the death of Koguryeo King Gao Tande who
obstructed the Wa Japanese' passage to and relations with the continent.) Wang
Ren (Wani in shoki or Wani-kishi in Kojiki), a Korean-Chinese migrant from
Paekche on the Korea peninsula, who claimed descent from Han Dynasty Emperor
Gaozu, came to Japan at the recommendation of Achiki [who purportedly first
brought Chinese characters to Japan in A.D. 284] and at the invitation of the
Japanese emperor with 10 volumes of Confucius' Analects and one volume of the
thousand character book. Wang Ren was to be head of the Nishibun-shu clan. Wang
Ren, according to the purported Japanese historical account, came to Japan at
A.D. 285, i.e., the so-called 16th year reign of emperor Yingshen [Ojin Tenno],
which seemed to match with the Chinese records as to Pimiko's contact with
Wei China in A.D. 247 and the Chinese emissary's return to China in A.D.
266. What was likely was that Wang Ren fled to Paekche from Lelang [i.e.,
Pyongyang] after Lelang's demise in A.D. 313 and subsequently came to Japan in
the early 4th-5th centuries. In China, the thousand character book was to be
written by Zhou Xingsi [?-521 A.D.] in the early 5th century, namely, about 200
years after the purported Ojin year of 285 A.D. (Also see an interesting writeup
on the Japanese myth related to Okinaga tarashihime no mikoto.)
To make the above-mentioned years coherent, the
Yamato Japanese had to push the start of Ojin's reign to A.D. 270, and to make
the Ojin reign last for a purported 41 years at a life of 111 years. That
purportedly was meant to corroborate the fabricated account stating that Ojin
was born on the Korean peninsula around A.D. 200s while his mother Jingu Kogo
[Pimiko or Iyo?, legendary Okinaga tarashihime no mikoto] was purportedly
campaigning against Silla. What was even more weird and incredible would be the
successor to Ojin [reign A.D. 270-310], tenno Nintoku, to have a reign of A.D.
313-399, or 86 years.
Wontack Hong, in year 2005, corroborated the 120-year (two sexagenary cycles) difference
between the records of Nihongi and those of
Samguk-sagi, which
was a citation by Wontack Hong built on top of Aston's research (see Aston 1889,
pp. 51-65). By adding the omitted 120 years to Nihonshoki and
Kojiki, the Japanese records could be reconciled with the Korean records
in Samguk-sagi. This meant that tenno Ojin's reign started in A.D. 390,
not 270; that Paekche sent crown prince Cheon-ji to the Yamato court in the
eighth year of Oujin’s reign, i.e., A.D. 397, not 277; and that Wang Ren
(Wani-kishi), Achi-no-Omi (Liu Ahzhi) and Yutsuki-kimi et al., i.e., the
Torai-Jin ("guihua-ren" [immigrant] clans), could have only come to Japan in the
early 5th century, about the time the Ojin Japanese crossed the sea to found
Yamato. 
--The
above-mentioned Japanese clan naming for the continental immigrants was
interesting in that it exhibited a hereditary caste system, with titles suffixed
by Kimi (local elderly), Omi (minister), Muraji (local chieftain with
administrative power), Obido (head), Adai (straight), Fubito (historian), Suguji
(village chief), agatanushi (county chief), suguri (village head) and etc, which
were replaced later in the 7th-8th centuries by the eight "Ason" [court
minister] rankings, i.e., yakusa no kabane as recorded in Nihonshoki. Other than
claiming descent from Qin and Han royal families, the immigrants had purported
origins from Wu, Wei dynasties of the Three kingdom
time period, and the Gongsun Yuan family from Manchuria.
Per Zhang Guoren & Yuan Changyao's
"A Simple History of Japan" [kaiming shudian, hk, july 1993], surnames of
"guihua-ren" clans [Torai-Jin in Japanese], numbering 324 names, had taken about
30% of all Japanese surnames by the early 9th century A.D. in court-sanctioned
"Records of Newly Edited Surnames" [i.e., Shinsen-Joujouroku see
http://homepage1.nifty.com/k-kitagawa/data/shoji.html ].
Reader Steve Gladstone mentioned that Japanese records had linked
"ninjutsu" or "ninja" to Chinese martial arts monks or masters who had fled to
the Japan Island from China. (See angelfire.com/ma/imaf/ninja.html , geocities.com/remipulw
er/Budo/TogakureRyu.html, ninjutsu.org.uk/nineryu.htm, and http://www.daytonbujinkan.com/gyokk oryu.html.) Old Japanese texts carried a sentence to this effect:
"In the era of Koryo & Song, about the 1st year of Huangyou Era, General
Yi-gou [Yi-jun?] from Si-jiang [four river] fought the Khitans, the Tanguts and
Song Emperor Renzong's armies and lost. He then fled to Ise in Japan." What I
saw here in Chinese classics is nothing other than Khitan's messages to the Song
court in regards to their campaign against the Tanguts: The Khitans attacked the
Tanguts in the first year of Huangyou Era, i.e., A.D. 1049, and reported that
they had succeeded in defeating the Tanguts in A.D. 1054.
The Dao-yi (Island Alien) Designation
Sima Qian's "Shi Ji" stopped at Han
Dynasty Emperor Wudi's overthrow of Wei Man Choson. In descriptions of
Xu Fu's elixir-seeking journey, Sima Qian did repeat ancient Chinese legends about the
islands of Peng-Lai, Fang-Zhang and Ying-Zhou (land in the sea). Chen Shou's
"San Guo Zhi" covered the island of Japan and grouped the early Japanese
in the section on Dongyi (Eastern Yi). Later history records referred to the
Japanese as Dao-yi (Island Aliens).
The ancient Chinese had different
terms for the barbarians in four directions. Dongyi or Yi-of-the-East will
include people in Manchuria, Korea and Japan. However, the misnomer Dong-yi was
a recent event. In the 3rd millennium B.C., the Yi people, who had no
directional denotion, were categorically called the Nine Yi people in comparison
with the possibly non-agricultural Yellow Overlord-centric forces -which
defeated Chi-you (who could be the same as the Fiery Overlord Yandi)'s
agricultural dwellers.
In early times, the Yi was associated with the
word 'niao' for bird, and there were eight to nine different 'niao-yi' people in
the east. The Shang Dynasty people, considered a group of the Yi people, were
recorded to have treated 'Xuan Niao' (i.e., Black bird, possibly sparrow) as
their totem. The Manchu legends as to the birth of their founder had something
to do with swallowing the red fruit dropped by a bird. Toba Wei Dynasty, in
return for being called the nickname of 'suo lu' (pigtailed enemies), would call
the southern Chinese by the derogatory name of 'niao yi' (i.e., bird-like
aliens) for possibly the southern Chinese's pitched accents or a generic-kind of
name for the southeastern Chinese and islanders. (Toba, being a part of Western
Xianbei, carried the mark of shaving hair off the head, for which ancient
historians linked them to the convicts who were ordered to construct the Great
Wall by Qin Emperor Shihuangdi. The later Manchus, who carried pigtails, might
have picked up the practice that was only known among the Xianbei people who
lived along today's Xing'an Ridge in western Manchuria.)
In later
times, the Yi designation would be associated with a word 'dao' for islands,
pointing to the barbarian people in the East China Seas. (Both the character
'niao' and 'dao' looked quite close and might have corrupted consecutively
during the course of history.) Later, Yi became more an inclusive word to mean
all kinds of aliens. The big Korean school of thought, touched on in the
prehistory section,
claimed that the Koreans were true descendants of the [Dong-]yi people, which
could be partially right.
What could be
inferred was that the original Nine Yi people, being not homogeneous, could
have lived in the interface ground among the main Mongoloid groups of the
Sino-Tibetan, the Hmong-Mien and the Tungunsic, plus people of the Hundred Yue
nature [as ancient Chinese records juxatoposed 'yi' with both 'di' and 'yue' to
become 'yi-di' and 'yi-yue'] - who were pushed to the southeastern Chinese
coast where they evicted the Austronesian-speaking people to Taiwan and
Southeast Asia]. We could further deduce that as a result of the mixing-up of
the Nine Yi people, the Hmong-Mien people and the Tungunsic people in today's
Hebei Province and on the Shandong Peninsula, we then have the phenomenon of the
later people in Manchuria, Korea and Japan sharing the same archaic squatting
traditions as recorded among the ancient Nine Yi people of the 3rd
millennium B.C.E., but lacking the hallmark "phoenix" adoration as still
exists among today's minority Hmong-Mien people in Southwestern China. The
archaic traditions would include the historical practice of "dun ju"
(squatting, which mutated into the Manchu practice of one leg kneeling on the
ground while another leg bending at the knee, a Manchus protocol for seeing the
superiors; or interpreted alternatively as spreading the two feet), slate
coffins, and bearing down the newborn's head with stone, etc. 
The Island
Statelets Beyond Japan:
Chen Shou's "San Guo Zhi" recorded dozens
of statelets on the islands, including Queen Beimihu (Himiko)'s Wa Statelet, the
Gounu-guo statelet under a king to the south of Beimihu's Wa Statelet, and a
pigmy statelet to the south of Wa (about 4,000 li distance) as well. (Also
recorded would be two statelets to the southeast of Japan, i.e., the Luo-guo
(naked body) statelet and the Heichi-guo (black teeth) statelet, which could be
reached by travelling for one year on boat. Some Japanese historians speculated
that the two statelets to the southeast of Japan must have been located in
Central or South Americas. Yao Silian's "Liang Shu" (The History of
Southern Liang Dynasty) further mentioned that the two statelets of Luo-guo and
Heichi-guo were 4,000 Chinese li distance to the southeast of Japan or 1-year
sea journey by boat. "Liang Shu" also recorded an island 10,000 li to the
southwest of Japan where people, of black body and white eyes, were said to have
delicious meat on their body; it said that travellers would shoot to kill those
islanders for eating them. (The measure by distance being innacurate, the timing
for travel should be reliable.)
To the northeast of Japan, "Liang
Shu" recorded a Wen-shen-guo (tattoo) statelet that was located 7,000
Chinese li distance; 5000 li to the east of Wen-shen-guo [tattoo body] would be
the Da-han-guo [great Han] statelet. (Notes: 4,000 Chinese li distance between
the pigmy statelet and Wa or the 7,000-li distance between Mao-ren-guo [i.e.,
the Ainu] and tattoo statelet, in comparison with the distance of 7000 li
between South Korea and Japan, could mean all those statelets were all located
on the Japan archipelago. In my opinion, Wen-shen-guo (the tattoo statelet)
would be somewhere near Hokkaido, while the Da-han-guo statelet would be likely
in the Aleutian Islands & Alaska. "Liang Shu" was noted for its
record of the Fu-Sang (Fusang) Statelet, saying that it was located 20,000
Chinese li distance to the east of Da-han-guo. Here, we could see an apparent
linkage from China, to Korea, to Japan, to the Wen-shen "tattoo body" country,
to Fu-sang, and to the "black teeth" country.)
"Bei Shi" (The
History of Northern Dynasties) recorded a big island statelet called
Dan-mou-luo-guo statelet to the south of Paekche. It said that the island,
having a span of over thousand li distance south-north and several hundred li
east-west, could be reached by boat after three months, that it had lots of
deers, and that it was a vassal of Paekche. The Liuqiu (Ryukyu) island was
recorded to be reachable after 5 days of boat travelling. This points
Dan-mou-luo-guo more towards Southeast Asian countries, Micronesian or
Polynesian islands or Hawaii. However, alternative historic accounts might have
corrected the mistake about "three months" to reach Dan-mou-luo-guo to pinpoint
this island to be an island not too fa away from the southern tip of the Korean
peninsula.
The Fusang (Puso) State:
"Liang Shu" (The
History Of Liang Dynasty) recorded that there existed a state called Fusang to
the east. The word 'fusang' would later be used by the Chinese for designating
Japan in poems. (Shogunate Ashikaga, in reply to Ming Dynasty Emperor Hongwu's
emissary Zhao Zhi, claimed that Japan, though an alien people dwelling in
Fu-sang, had reverance for China's culture.) Wei Chu-Hsien validated a separate
identity of Fusang from Japan by citing ancient records in regards to the usage
of iron in Japan but not in Fusang. The more exact mapping would be to measure
distance between statelets in between: a Wen-shen-guo (tattoo) statelet (near
Hokkaido?) was located 7,000 Chinese li distance to the northeast of Japan; 5000
li to the east of Wen-shen-guo would be Da-han-guo statelet (near the Aleutian
Islands & Alaska?). The Fu-Sang (Fusang) Statelet was located 20,000 Chinese
li distance to the east of Da-han-guo, at least somewhere near British Columbia
or Oregon.
"Great Han" ------------ -- Fu-sang
/ country
/
/"tattoo body"
/ country
/
/
China ---- Korea ---- Japan
\
\
\
\-------------------------> Luo-guo (naked body country)
Hei-chi-guo (black teeth country)
Both Chinese language websites and English language websites
- http://www.geoci
ties.com/EnchantedForest/Tower/1217/asia.html
http://ussers.wi.net/~maracon/index.h tml
http://www.uh.edu/engines/epi1028.htm
had mentioned the
story of Monk Huishen and the Kingdom of Fu-Sang (Fusang). The popular belief is
that Fusang was located in today's Mexico. "Liang Shu" stated that during
the first year of the Yongyuan Era of Southern Qi Dynasty, i.e., A.D. 499, a
monk by the name of Hui-shen (Huishen or Hui Shen) arrived at Jingzhou
prefecture from the Fu-Sang (Fusang) Statelet. Hui-shen claimed that Fu-Sang was
to the east of China; that it was located 20,000 li distance from the Da-han-guo
statelet; that it was a land full of Fu-Sang wood (speculated to be North
American corn by the Chinese or cactus-like agave by the Americans -- Senior
Scholar Prof Wei Chu-Hsien analyzed early writings on Fusang and claimed that
the earliest Fusang description meant for the coastal Redwood Trees with arched
hollowness in the middle as a result of American Indians' farming the wood
plates); that the Fu-Sang (Fusang) leaf was similar to the Tong-tree leaf; that
Fu-Sang looked similar to bamboo shoots at early stage; that the Fu-Sang people
ate it for food; that Fu-Sang appeared to be of red color and tasted like pear;
that the Fu-Sang's surface could be used for cloth or cotton. Hui-shen further
stated that the Fu-Sang people had log cabins but no cities; that Fu-Sang had a
written language and used the Fu-Sang skin for paper; that Fu-Sang had no army
or weapons; that Fusang did not treasure gold or silver; that Fu-Sang had two
prisons, with minor offence going to the north while serious offence going to
the south prison; that amnesty went to the north prison, only; that the king
possessed drums and wore different color clothes for different seasons; that the
Fu-Sang people used buffalo horns for holding stuff; that Fu-Sang possessed
horse carts (?), buffalo carts and deer carts; that the Fu-Sang people used deer
milk for making cheese; that Fu-Sang was abundant with walnuts; that Fu-Sang had
copper but no iron; that Fu-Sang previously had no buddhism but a five-member
monk team, headed by Monk Biqiu, arrived at Fu-Sang from the Libin-guo statelet
(said to be today's Afghanistan) during the 2nd year reign of the Daming Era of
Liu Song Dynasty, i.e., A.D. 458, and propagated buddhism there. (The book
Pale Ink carried place naming designation with the Hui-sheng soundex
across southwestern United States and the Central America countries.)
Note that most of secondary
records had errors in regards to the five-monk team. Hui-shen or Hoei-shin did
not take part in the A.D. 458 journey to Fusang, and he merely returned to China
in A.D. 499. My speculation is that the trips from China to ancient America was
frequent enough for Hui-shen to return to China on a different ship.
Should Monk Fa-Shien had returned to China from India by ship at the timeframe,
why would it not be possible that Monk Hui-shen and et al., could have travelled
to ancient America?
I picked up Prof Wei's book again and found out
that Prof had listed abundant written texts, from ancient Chinese chronicles,
about the existence of i) the 'Deep Sea Valley' beyond Japan, ii) the 'Feather Mountain'
island in possibly the Pacific Northeast, iii) 'Brown Bear'
stories, and iv) the Redwood Trees. Prof Wei had citations of dozens of entries
about the Redwood Tree, which was known to the Chinese as 'Fu-sang' in Chinese
texts prior to B.C.E. eras. Apparently, ancient Chinese in A.D. eras, i.e., Monk
Hui-shen of the 5th century, had mutated the ancient term 'Fu-sang' to mean
something different from the Redwood tree. Prof Wei Juxian validated that though
America had no iron, ancient Peruvians had imported iron from ancient China for
cutting the stones for the palace construction. Also, Prof Wei Juxian
validated ancient Chinese texts [prior to B.C. eras] as to the abundance of
silver and gold in ancient America that the American natives did not treasure
the metals as recorded in "Liang Shu"
|
Often researched upon by scholars would be a drawing by Liang Dynasty's Emperor
Yuandi, entitled "zhi [duty or post] gong [tribute] tu [picture]" [
Hui-shen also stated that over 1000 li distance to the
east of Fusang would be a country called Nü-guo (the women statelet). Nü-guo was
speculated by Minhua Zhang to be the Amazon statelet in South America. Hui-shen women
were said to have lighter skin, hairy body and long hair that dangled to the
floor. "Liang Shu" further cited a personal account stating that a Jin'an
area traveller was blown to an island of women during the 6th year of Tianjian
Era (i.e., A.D. 507).
Layers Of
Composition of the Japanese People
The
composition of today's Japanese, like many other people, is quite complicated.
Though today's Japanese would usually divide themselves into two groups,
northerners and southerners, the actual ingredients are much more diversified
than that. We could probably list at least the following subgroups:
- The Melanesian - a group of early hunters in
Japan during the so-called middle Jomon period, about 10,000 years ago. Those
people had remained stone-aged people throughout. The name Jomon comes from the
archaeological artifacts from this period, mysterious clay figurines that appear
to be female and clay pots used for cooking and storing food. Jomon, namely,
"cord pattern", will be used for those excavations. Beginning around c. 2,500
B.C. and continuing for nearly a millennium, the Jomon culture spread from the
Kanto Plain near modern Tokyo to the surrounding mountains.
- The Rice Culture People living on the western
coast of Japan who might had migrated here from the Yangtze River Delta of
China. This group of people would include Queen Himiko of Wa State referred to
in Chinese history around the 2-3rd centuries. The Wa people were recorded to
have tattoos over their body, in a similar fashion to the Zhejiang people in
Yantze delta where the descendants of King Shaokang of Xia Dynasty (21-16th c.
BC) had lived. Chen Shou's "San Guo Zhi" also recorded that the early
Japanese of the 3rd century A.D., calling themselves by the title of 'Da Fu',
claimed to be descendants of 'Tai Bo' [the brother of early Zhou Dynasty ruler].
The ancient Japanese, however, did not claim heritage from Xia King Shaokang,
two dynasties ahead of the Zhou royal house - while the Xia people had been
living in the Yangtze area to found the Ancient Yue (Gu-yue) Statelet much
earlier than the later Tai-bo Zhou people. The Japanese, whom history chronicles
repeatedly likened to the tattoo natives of the Yangtze Delta, had an
interesting name for one of their four islands, i.e., Kyushu, a name that
literally means the "nine prefectures", which coincides with Xia Dynasty Overlord
Yu's nine cauldrons. This name, however, was taken in the 19th century around
when the shogunate system was revamped. (One more interesting thing would be the
Japanese citation of Liang Dynasty monk Bao-zhi in saying that the country in
the East Sea (i.e., Wa Japan) was a Ji-shi country, namely, the Ji-surnamed
derivative country of Zhou Dynasty.)
Recent DNA tests of the charcoal remains of rice from 2200 years ago proved that the early rice shared the same origin as that in China's Yantze Delta, while today's Japanese rice is mainly transplanted from Korea. DNA studies conducted on human remains excavated in Shandong Peninsula ( http://www.journals.uchicago.edu/AJHG/journal/issues/v64n1/980634/980634.html ) suggested southern and northern points of origin for Jomon and Yayoi Japanese. on basis of various historical records and modern technology analysis, I would speculate i) that early Japanese, like early Korean, were very much connected with eastern China as a result of the nascent human migration from south to north and ii) that the Tungunsic [and mixed or misnomer Tungusic] invasion from Manchuria gradually overtook the early Continental traits in both Korea and Japan. (My speculation is that ancient Wa Japanese with Tai Bo lineage had been wiped out or assimilated into the later immigrants from Korea. An Zhimin, at carleton.ca/~bgordon/ Rice/papers/zhimin84.htm, wrote about "EFFECT OF PREHISTORIC CULTURES OF THE LOWER YANGTZE RIVER on ANCIENT JAPAN", with speculation about pre-Han-Dynasty contacts between Japan and China.)
- The Yayoi - said to be of the Korean origins
but more likely the eaastern Chinese natives [who were called by the Nine Yi
people]. They had a long history of migration into Japan and recorded incidents
of their voyages would last from 2-3 century B.C. to 2-3 century AD. The
migrations have to do with the chain reactions on the continent, namely, the
demise of the Chinese Qin Dynasty and the establishment of Han Dynasty around
206 BC. In the korean section,
we mentioned Wei Man's usurpation of Old Choson and consequent relocation of
Choson King to southern Korea. Some of the Koreans had been pushed off the
peninsula in between, and the island of Kyushu and islands in the Tsushima
Strait were already the back waters of the fishermen on two sides from very old
times on.
Tombs dating to 200-300 A.D. contained bronze utensils which were mainly brought over from Korea. There was a report saying that a tomb which was opened through a lightening in A.D. 1872 showed the dead king or emperor (Nintoku) wearing Korean clothes and the bronze utensils dated around 4th century. This wave of migration, beginning around c. 200 B.C. and continuing for the next hundreds of years, gradually spreaded eastward to the Kanto Plain. Based on the fact that remnants of settlements were first discovered in the Yayoi District in Tokyo, these immigrants are referred to as the Yayoi people. They brought along advanced culture that bore the marks of China's Qin/Han culture. The three major symbols of the Japanese, i.e., bronze mirror, sword, and royal seal, are exactly the same as symbols used by the Qin Dynasty.
- The Paekche Colonialists & Refugees -
http://www.koreanhistoryproject.com cited a Korean [i.e., Wontack Hong] saying
that Prince Homuda, a Paekche prince, led a expeditionary force to Japan. He
landed on the northern shore of Kyushu at the Hakata Bay, on the westernmost of
Japan's Kyushu, and pushed his way to the agricultural plain formed by the Yodo
and Yamato Rivers at the head of Osaka Bay where the Yamato Kingdom was founded.
The Korean revisionist account could not be correct in that in A.D. 369,
Koguryeo sent an exidition force, including 20,000 cavalry, against Paekche,
which forced the Paekche king into seeking alliance with the Wa Japanese against
Silla, i.e., Koguryeo's ally -- an event that the Korean records on Silla had
mistaken to have had happened in year 364. After defeating Koguryeo, the Paekche
(Baekje) king purportedly ordered a sword to be made as a gift for Japan,
namely, nana tsusaya no tachi (Seven-Pronged Sword). This would mean an inverse
direction from Japan to Korea. (Wontack Hong may have modified the Homuda
invasion year of A.D. 369 to infer to a later year, i.e., after Paekche struck
northward into the Pyongyang area, killing King Kogug-won of Koguryeo in A.D.
371, and then invaded Japan at the hieght of its military might on the Korean
peninsula, before the resuscitated Koguryeo under King Kwang-gae-to the Great
[391-412] was to defeat Paekche again.)
The Japan-Korea link is most evident in the history of Korea's three kingdoms' warfare and China's participation. Tang General Su Dingfang, who had just defeated the Western Turkic Khanate in Central Asia in A.D. 662-666, crossed the see from Chengshan to campaign in Korea. At the request of the Silla king, China came to Korea and aided Shilla in defeating both Paekche & the Japanese (whose 400 warships were burnt by General Liu Rengui). The Japanese link showed the historical links between Paekche and Japan. It was the Paekche who went to Japan to pick up one of their princes and put him on the throne for sake of continuing the war efforts against Silla/Tang. After Paekche was exterminated, some remnants of the Paekche kingdom fled to Japan, and the newly arrived Koreans were said to be responsible for compiling Japan's history books.
- The Micronesian - the Southeast Asian people,
like the proto-Malays, who had spread across the Pacific islands, Taiwan, Ryukyu
and Japan. Chinese history recorded a name 'pygmy state' or 'dwarf state' south
of Queen Himiko's Wa State in the 3rd century AD. (Also possible would that the
original low-height Japanese could have something to do with the pigmy people
from Africa, and on the Chinese continent, the pigmy people were caught by Wu
Dynasty of the Three Kingdoms era around the Huai-shui River.)
- The Ainu (Ezo) - Said to be a group of the
aborigines of Japan.
They had a religion of a bear cult which is about sacrificing
a bear at an annual winter feast. Owning to migrations of people from the
continent, they had been retreating to the northern islands of Japan, Sakhalin
and the Kuril Islands. Today, they reside mainly on Hokkaido. Except for
possibly body hair, intermarriage has led to no particular difference between
them and ordinary Japanese. According to China's historical accounts, the
Japanese claimed that on their island there were a group of people called 'Mao
Ren', namely, hairy people (related to the Ainus?). In A.D. 478, Wa King sent an
emissary to Liu Song Emperor Shundi, claiming that they had campaigned against
55 eastern statelets of hairy people, corroborating the fact that Yamato
Japanese had just started colonizing the whole Japan islands around that
timeframe and pushing against the poor hairy people.
On basis of DNA analysis, as shown at http://www.pitt.edu/~ annj/courses/notes/jomon_genes.html& http://hgm2002.hgu.mrc.ac.uk/Abstracts/Publish/WorkshopPosters/WorkshopPoster11/hgm05 84.htm, Jomon could be ancestors of the Ainu people, and Jomon could be related to the Tibetans.
http://www.boondocksnet .com/expos/wfe_1904_book26.html (by Marshall Everett ) stated that an Ainu chieftan had attended the Anthropology Exhibits at the 1904 World's Fair in St Louise, with such close examinations as follow: "They [Ainu} are dark-skinned, and slow-witted, and their old men, with their long beards, look like patriarchs. They are almost the same height as the Japanese, but are heavier, and they haven't the almond eye...
The Ainu
have wavy hair, often curly. Black is the predominant color. The hair of the
children is lighter, and often auburn. All Ainu hair is coarse and strong...
They are light reddish-brown in color, and have none of the sallow yellowness of
the Mongolian. They have expressive eyes, and almost every Ainu's eyes are light
brown in color. Black eyes are rare among them... Their foreheads are narrow,
and slope gently backward. Their noses are slightly hooked, flat and broad, with
wide nostrils. They have large mouths and firm, thick lips. They have
exceptionally long ear lobes." (A facial profile is available at http://www.kahaku.go.jp/special/past/japanese/ipix/5/5-01.html.)
Wa - Yamato -
Nippon
There are very important
questions here. Is the Wa State mentioned in China's records in the early 1st
century A.D. the same as that which existed during China's Sui Dynasty (AD
581-618)? Is the Wa State the same as the Yamato? And, is the Yamato Kingdom the
same as Nippon (i.e., Chinese Ri Ben or English Japan) of the late 7th century
AD?
Wa: The Wa people in then Japan had close
relationship with the Chenhan and Bianhan people in the southern tip of the
Korean Peninsula. The Daifang Commandary of Wei China (AD 220-265), located near
the present capital city of Seoul, was in charge of affairs of the Wa State.
http://plaza14.mbn.or.jp/
~sinkodai/efuruta/esss.html said that
"Chiu-T'ang-shu or old T'ang History (*5) contains the Records on Japan and
Wa-state, and one passage in it radically contradicts the existing dogmatic
interpretations advanced by historians of ancient Japan. According to this
passage, Wa-state was granted a gold seal by Kuang-wu of Later Han dynasty (AD
25-220)." (The seal, bearing the characters of "Han Wei [assign] Nu [Wo-nu-guo
statelet] Guo [state] Wang [king]", was excavated in Japan around A.D. 1784.)
"Hou Han Shu", written in the 5th century, stated on basis of
"San Guo Zhi" that the King of Wa resides in the country of Yematai
[Yamadai] (disputed to be Yamaichi as a result of the error by the author of
"Hou Han Shu). In the second year of the Jienwu Zhongyuan era, namely,
A.D. 57, the Wa Nu Country sent an envoy with tribute to Loyang, and he called
himself by the ancient Chinese title of "Dafu" ["distinguished court
minister"]. Latter Han Emperor Guangwudi bestowed on him a seal. In the first
year of the Yongchu era (A.D. 107), during the reign of Han Emperor Andi, the
King of Wa presented one hundred sixty slaves. During the reigns of Huandi
(147-168) and Lingdi (168-189), the country of Wa was in wars; and the conflicts
were raging on all sides, and there was no ruler till a woman named Beimihu
[Pimiko] was selected as a ruler. Beimihu (Pimiko) was said to have no husband
but a 1000-female entourage; she was capable of witchcrafts and used a brother
for governing the country; and her funeral was accompanied by live burial of
hundreds of slaves in a tomb that spanned hundred human steps in diameter. From
"San Guo Zhi", it could be discerned that Beimihu's Wa [Wo] Statelet, as
a result of prestige of conferral from the Chinese court, had absorbed or
nominally ruled over neighboring statelets and tribes (?? about 30 small
statelets as recorded in the Chinese history) throughout the years.
After Gongsun Yuan, whose family controlled the Liaodong peninsula and
the northern Korean peninsula for three generations, was exterminated from the
Korea peninsula in A.D. 239 (?), the Wa people requested for pilgrimage to the
Chinese capital with Governor-General Liu Xia of Daifang Commandary. Diplomatic
emissaries were frequently exchanged, and seals were conferred upon the Wa Queen
as "King Qin-wei-wang" (king befriending Wei China) by Wei China, i.e.,
successor to Han China as one of the three kingdoms on the Chinese continent.
During the ten year time period of A.D. 238 onward, Japan sent five delegations
to China while China paid 2 return visits to Japan. In Jan of A.D. 238, the
Queen of Wa sent an emissary ("da fu" Nan-sheng-mi) to Daifang
Commandary, requesting pilgrimage for seeing Chinese emperor. In Dec, Wei Emperor Mingdi (Cao Rui) acknowledged receipt of 4 Wa males and
6 Wa females, and conferred the title of Qin-wei-wo-wang (king befriending Cao
Wei) onto Wa Queen plus hundred bronze mirrors, pearls, silk and other precious
gifts. In the first year of Zhengshi, i.e., A.D. 240, Governor Gong Zun sent Ti
Zhun to Wa and proxy Wa king replied with thanks. In A.D. 243, the Wa king
dispatched a Wa court "da fu" to China. In A.D. 245, Wei China conferred
Nan-sheng-mi a title. In A.D. 245, Governor Gong Zun and Governor Liu Mao
defeated Marquis Bunai-hou in today's southern Manchuria. In A.D. 247, Marquis
Bunai-hou sent tribute to Cao Wei and was conferred the king of Bunai-Mo. Later,
around A.D. 247, when the Wa State in Japan had internal turmoil because Himiko
was at odds with the King of Kunu [i.e., the Gounu-guo statelet to the south of
Wa] (Bei-mi-gong-hu-su), Queen Himiko (Pimiko) requested with the new
Governor-General of Daifang Commandary, Wang Qi, for assistance. An official
called Zhang Zheng was dispatched to the Wa State in the 8th year of Cheng-shih
or A.D. 247. After Queen Pimiko died, internal turmoil erupted after erecting a
male as king. The Pimiko death led to a turmoil with thousand deaths. The Pimiko
live burial included hundred slaves and servants. Iyo, a girl of thirteen from
the Pimiko family, was made queen. When Zhang Zheng returned to China with two
dozens of Wa people, it was already dozens of years later and China was ruled by
Sima family's Western Jinn Dynasty which had usurped Cao Family's Wei Dynasty in
A.D. 265.
http://plaza14.m
bn.or.jp/~sinkodai/efuruta/jimmue/jimmue.html had a good account of this episode of history. Between his
(Zhang Zheng)'s "arrival to Wa and the final return to Lo-yang, many events are
chronicled, such as the death of Queen Himiko, the political turmoil ensuing
after her death, and the assumption of young queen, Ichiyo(or Toyo) as the ruler
of Wa-state. For the enthronement of Ichiyo, Chang Cheng seems to have exercised
his political influence. Consequently there is little doubt that Chang's stay in
Wa-state lasted over a considerable period of time. In addition, according to
the Record of Wa-state in Western Chin History(*3), this particular Wa mission
was received by the newly established Western Chin court during the early years
of Tai-shih (AD 265~274). According to Western Chin's chronicler's own
additional writing of the record, this was the second year of Tai-shih (AD
266)(*4). Therefore, it can be calculated that Chang Cheng's stationing in
Wa-state was 20 years -between the 8th year of Cheng-shih (AD 247) and the
second year of Tai-Shih (AD 266)."
Yamatai, Izumo and Yamato
Venerable Master Dongchu (1908-1977),
in his book on "The Exchange of Buddhism Between China and Japan", proposed the
school of thought about Three Ancient Japanese States. Dongchu pointed out that
ancient non-Ainu Japan, by the turn of the 3rd to 4th centuries, possessed three
major competing statelets of Yamatai (Northern Kyushu, i.e., Kita-kyushu), Izumo
(Shimane Prefecture), and Yamato (Nara). This would be a consolidation of over
100 statelets and tribes as recorded by the geography section and the Eastern Yi
section in Hou Han Shu (The History of the Latter Han Dynasty). As
correctly postulated by Dongchu, 30 plus Japanese statelets and tribes out of
over 100, at the time of Han Emperor Wudi's invasion of the Korean peninsula,
began to send emissaries to China, which was confirmed by Chen Shou's San Guo
Zhi (The History of the Three Kingdoms), a book written earlier than Hou
Han Shu. By the late 3rd century A.D., however, three spheres of influence
had formed, with Three Ancient Japanese States of Yamatai, Izumo and Yamato in
charge, respectively.
Dongchu's conclusion was built on top of Chen
Shuifeng's research, which was based on excavations of bronze daggers and bronze
bells (dotaku) that pointed to the Kita-kyushu area as belonging to the culture
of bronze bells and bronze daggers, the Izumo area belonging to the culture of
bronze bells, and the Nara (Yamato) area belonging to the Yayoi culture. Of
course, the archaeological findings already concluded that the Kyushu area
contained a far more advanced 'iron' culture than the Izumo (Shimane Prefecture)
and Yamato (Nara) areas. Chen Shuifeng claimed that Japan was populated by the
Ainus, by the Tungus coming south to Dewa no kuni from the Strait of Tartary
(Mamiya) [-which I dbout since it was unlikely that the Tungus could have
penetrated the Ainu land to go south from Hokkaido], by the Tungus crossing the
Japan Sea to Izumo, by the Tungus crossing the Tsishima Straight to Hyuga on the
southeastern Kyushu coast, and by the latest Tungus migration that came to be
adored by today's Japanese as the "Tenson-zoku" in the legends of origin. What
Chen Shuifeng speculated on top of the Japanese legends was that the
"Tenson-zoku" migrants ultimately dominated Kyushu, crossed the Seto-neikai
inner sea to take over the Yamato (Nara) area, defeated the Ainus to the eastern
direction, and then turned around towards the west to defeat the early Tungus
statelets in Izumo and Dewa areas.
Chen Shuifeng's opinions did not pay
special attention to the historical records as to the ancient Japanese claim of
heritage from Count Tai-bo, i.e., Zhou King Wenwang's elder brother, nor the
recent excavations exhibiting the origin of the Japanese rice as being from the
Yangtze River area of China. Venerable Master Dongchu, however, stated that the
Yamato (Nara) had conquered Yamatai of Kyushu and Izumo of southwestern Honshu
to unite Japan without specifying the cause and effect, and its context.
While the Japanese legends seemingly corroborated the descent of the
"Tenson-zoku" migrants onto the Kinki (Nara) area of Honshu by crossing the
Seto-neikai Sea from Kyushu, it did not explain the reason why the gold seal,
Han-wei[wo]-nu-guo-wang[king], was discovered in the Hakata Bay of northern
Kyushu around A.D. 1784. Note that the gold seal was conferred upon the
Wo-nu-guo statelet in Japan in A.D. 57, which was situated at the southernmost
tip of Kyushu. Himiko's Wa State, which was said in the later YAMATO Japanese
legends to have resided in some Hyuga palace in Tsukushi on the southeastern
Kyushu coast [but more likely in the center of Kyushu according to the section
on the Eastern Yi in Wei Shu of San Guo Zhi, somewhere around
volcanic Mt. Aso], was about 212 years after the conferral of the gold
seal onto the Wo-nu-guo statelet - which was said to be at the
southernmost Kyushu. Scholar Xue Jun of Ming Dynasty, in Ri Ben Guo
Kao Lve, stated that the Japanese, after crossing the Seto-neikai Sea to
Honshu to found the YAMATO dynasty, still retained the generic name "Wa". Did
Himiko's Wa State [actually the Queen Country at Yamatai per Chinese records]
lose Han Emperor Guangwudi's gold seal already in A.D. 269, or they had to
change the seal because the Chinese dynasty had changed name in mainland China?
Her statelet was of course offered a new seal bearing the title of the "Wa King
who befriended Wei China". Or, as this webmaster believes, Himiko's Wa
statelet, which was known as the Queen Country in Chinese records, was a totally
different entity from the southernmost Wo-nu-guo statelet of the 1st century
A.D. The likely event was that the southernmost Wo-nu-guo statelet of the
1st century A.D. had at one time extended its rule over the entire Kyushu area,
carrying its gold seal northward to the Hakata Bay. By the 3rd century, the
original Wo-nu-guo statelet might have already suffered demise, with Himiko's
Queen Country in Yamatai and a rivalry statelet (Bei-mi-gong-hu's Gounu-guo) [to
the south of the Queen Country] dominating the entire area. --The ideal place to
cross the Seto Sea is not Hyuga (i.e., today's Miyazaki) at the southeastern tip
but today's Kitsuki, or the Saganoseki Peninsula [i.e., the stepping stone to
Sadamisaki Peninsula on the Shikoku Island], or Usuki or Saiki in the mid-coast
of the eastern and/or northeastern Kyushu coastline.
Complicating the
matter would be Himiko's rivalry statelet, i.e., Gounu-guo (Kuna-koku as
pronounced in today's Japanese language) as we discussed above. Did Himiko's Wa
destroy Bei-mi-gong-hu's Gounu-guo, which was situated to the south of
Himiko's Wa in Wei Shu of San Guo Zhi, a statement conflicting
with Hou Han Shu in that the Wo-nu-guo was said to be situated at the
southernmost boundary [of Kyushu] in Hou Han Shu? This conflict could be
resolved should both the Queen Country and the Gou-nu-guo statelet were both
located in central Kyushu. Did the Gounu-guo statelet destroy Himiko's
Wa? Was the Gounu-guo statelet of the 3rd century A.D. the same one as the
southernmost Wo-nu-guo statelet of the 1st century A.D.? Not likely. In light of
the Japanese YAMATO records in Nihonshoki and Kojiki, we could rule out the
possibility of the Gounu-guo statelet's sharing any commonality with the Yamato
Japanese from today's Nara area. The candidate qualified for leading the eastern
expedition against Honshu might be Himiko's Queen Country and their descendants.
(Japanese Naito Konan thought that the Gounu-guo statelet of the 3rd century
A.D. was a country of Kyushu natives called the Kumaso people in Nihonshoki.
They carried similar titles, Isao, e.g., for their chieftans, a same title as
those recorded in the Chinese history for the Ryukyu people. Japanese scholar
Mizuno Yu had a book on the three statelets of the Wo-nuo-guo, the Queen Country
and the Gou-nu-guo. Other than the three names here, there were numerous "nu"
prefixed or suffixed statelets in Kyushu.)
Incidentally, a correct reading of the Chinese records would
show that there still existed a dozen statelets to the east and
south of Himiko's Queen Country, including a county called Qin-wang-guo,
i.e., the country ruled by a king of the Qin people. In Sui Dynasty's history
writing covering the events of the 7th century, we could see that to reach
Yamato, Chinese emissary Pei Shiqing passed through the Qin-wang-guo statelet.
(Xue Jun of Ming Dynasty, in Ri Ben Guo Kao Lve, claimed that the
Qin-wang-guo statelet was founded by elixir-seeking Xu Fu without elaboration.
Today's Chinese people, including the Japanese, took the Wakayama area, southern
tip of Honshu and to the southwest of Nara, as the place where Xu Fu might have
landed. However, the Wakayama heritage could be a latter-day add-on.
Interestingly, Xue Jun had recorded the name of Xu-wo in Japan, namely, the Wa
Japan statelet under Xu Fu's rule, stating that Xu-wo was subject to Da-wo,
i.e., the Greater Wa State. This could mean that Xu Fu, with 3000 boys and girls
[or 3000 boys and 3000 girls], did not have enough adult men to defeat the
aboriginals upon landing in Japan. It was said that Qin Emperor Shihuangdi sent
Xu Fu on the sea trip in search of An Qisheng, a
legendary figure with whom Qin Emperor Shihuangdi had conversations about the
elixirs in the seas and who later left a note with the emperor saying that he
had departed for the overseas.)
The Mysterious Fourth Century:
About one hundred years of history, from Queen Himiko's era of A.D. 269 to the
so-called Korean-revisionist Homuda Invasion, was in a kind of black box. While
there might have existed a ruler by the name of Ojin after Queen Iyo (or
Ichiyo), there was no chance that someone called Nintoku could have reigned from
A.D. 313 to A.D. 399 or 86 years. There is no way to find out what happened to
Himiko's Wa State or her rival state of Kunu. Some speculations exist: Himiko Wa
of Kyushu absorbed Kunu and expanded into the Yamato plains in Honshu, Kunu
absorbed Wa and expanded into Yamato, or an invasion force from Korea landed in
Kyushu and then expanded into Yamato in Honshu; or an invasion force from Korea,
without the connection with the Wa Statelet on Kyushu, landed direct at Honshu
and pushed to the Yamato plains.
To find out what might have happened,
we would have to examine the traces of history from later times. My deduction
below was that Yamato Japan, which could consist of the Tungunsic [and mixed or
misnomer Tungusic] invaders from Korea, had inherited the lineage of Wa Japan,
and it was the consequence of the similar fate of the barbarian invasion against
northern China and southern Korea. The united Japan, for its historical
contact with the Paekche kingdom during the 7th century war against Tang China,
could mean that Yamato Japan might have elements in the Tungunsic invaders from
the Korean peninsula. And, the Tungunsic elements might have usurped the Wa
Japan lineage of the Five Wa Japan Kings.
(Someone studied the ancient Koguryo monument to find the "nan" notation to mean
seven, which could be linked to the Japanese pronunciation of "nana" for seven.
This could mean that the Japanese of the 4-5th centuries might have origin from
the Fuyu people of southern Manchuria, who in turn were related to the ancient
"Mo [He]" people.)
Liu Yu's Song Dynasty (AD 420-479), according to
Liang Dynasty (AD 502-557)'s historian, Shen Yue, had conferred the Wa ruler the
(blank) title of 'King of Six States' of Wa, Silla, Qinhan and Bianhan etc.
Throughout the short history of Eastern Jinn & Liu Song dynasties, the Wa
Japanese had sent numerous missions, and one Korean mission, with Japanese
emissary on board, was recorded to have cried aloud when they saw the
dilapidated Jinn Chinese capital which just went through an war as a result of
internal rebellion. The contacts between Japanese and southern Chinese were
understandable in that northern China was in the hands of the barbarians and the
traditional Korean land route was already cut off at the time. Liu Song
Dynasty's designation of 'King of Six States' could be a good proof that the Wa
State (Wa-koku) did exert influences over peninsula Korea [or southern Korean
peninsula] in some way as a result of collaboration with or colonization by the
Koreans. The two successive dynasties of Qi (AD 479-502) and Liang (AD 502-557)
continued to receive Japanese emissaries. Liang reaffirmed the title of 'King of
Six States' onto the Wa State.
During Liu Song Dynasty, five Japanese
kings dispatched 12 delegations to China in about 80 years, culminating in
Japan's "fei [flying] niao [bird]" buddhist cultural prosperity by the late 6th
century. "Song Shu" recorded that in A.D. 421, Wa King Zan sent over
tributes and Liu Song Emperor Gaozu decreed that the Wa Statelet could be
exempted from the tribute requirement due to sea perils. It further stated that
in A.D. 425, the Wa King dispatched a 'sima' (i.e., an ancient Chinese official
designation meaning counsellor or magistrate) called Cao Da to the Liu Song
Dynasty court. When Wa King Tsan [Zan, San in modern Japanese pronunciation]
died, his brother, Zhen, came to the throne. He sent an envoy to the Liu Song
Court with tribute in A.D. 438 in the name of "King of Wa, Paekche, Silla, Imna,
Chinhan, and Mahan (Mok-han) and Generalissimo Andong Da Jiangjun (i.e., the
general who pacifies the east)." In A.D. 443, Wa King Ji (Sai) was also
confirmed the same title as King of the 6 states. In A.D. 451, the order and
title of the 6 states was changed a bit, to the Six States of Wa, Silla, Imna,
Kara, Chin-han, and Mok-han. "Paekche" was replaced by Kala (Kara). In A.D. 462,
the son of Wa King Ji (Sai), i.e., Xing (Ko), was confirmed the same title. King
Bu (Yuryaku), Ko's brother, was last granted the title in A.D. 478. "Nan-Qi
Shu" (The History of Southern Qi Dynasty) recorded that Wa King Wu (Bu) was
promoted to "Zhendong Da Jiangjun" (i.e., the general who quells the east), King
of Wa, and 'du-du' or governor of the Seven States in A.D. 479, and
"Liang Shu" recorded that King Wa was further promoted to "Zhengdong Da
Jiangjun" (i.e., the general who campaigns in the east) in A.D. 502. "Song
Shu" ("The History of Liu Song Dynasty") did not expound the
relationship between Wa and Korea of the time, unfortunately. In A.D. 478, the
Wa King sent an emissary to Liu Song Emperor Shundi, claiming that their
ancestor, Mi (Dei in modern Japanese pronunciation, i.e., Yingshen [Ojin
Tenno]), had campaigned against 55 eastern statelets of hairy people
(Ainu ?), 66 statelets in the east, and 95 statelets in the north. The Wa King
also complained that Korguryo had raided his emissaries of tributes and gifts
destined for the Liu Song court. In ancient times, Japan took the cross-strait
trip to Korea and then travelled to the Chinese capital via the Manchuria
corridor, in lieu of the perilous sea trip to the eastern Chinese coast. (Per
fabricated Nihonshoki, the eastern expedition was undertaken by someone called
Prince Yamatotakeru who had campaigned eastward under an emperor called Keiko at
about A.D. 130.)
Wontack Hong, at http://gias.snu.ac.kr/wthong/, had a very good account of the intricacy involved in here. He
pointed that many scholars ( including Hirano, 1977) believed that the "rulers
of Yamato Wa were placed below the kings of Koguryeo and Paekche because when
King was given the title of Andong Jiangjun in A.D. 462, ... , the king of
Koguryeo bore the title of Zhengdong Jangjun and the king of Paekche Zhendong Da
Jiangjun. ... The king of Paekche must have been in the position of an overlord
..." Hong further stated that "Wa Kings could not have included the names of
non-existent states (Chin-han, and Mok-han). one may then conclude that the
remnants of Chin-han or Ma-han existed as other members of the Kaya Federation
by ... fifth century. .. Town states constituting Ma-han and Chin-han were by
themselves no longer independent political entities [having mostly been
conquered by Paekche and Silla, except those remaining as the member states of
the Kaya Federation]". Silla's position was apparently less than that of
Paekche. "According to 'Samguk-sagi', Silla established the first contact
with the Southern Chinese Dynasties in A. D. 521 by sending an envoy to the
Court of Liang along with the Paekche envoy." Later, at one time, when Yamato Wa
requested that their monks be sent to China under the umbrella of Silla embassy,
the Silla flatly refused it.
The Invasion Theory: The Japanese could not agree upon
any specific date as to their prehistory. Uncorroborated conventional world
history books cited the event that happened in the year of AD 391 as
something ascertained by three parties, China, Japan and Korea. The Chinese
record is to be searched yet for this claim. The Koreans flatly denied that it
was an invasion into Korea by Wa Japan at all.
But in this year,
according to http://home.
earthlink.net/~dlturk/japanhistory/yamatohistory.html, the "Japanese forces cross to Korea, defeat Paekche and Silla
armies and establish a small colony (called Mimana) on the southern tip of the
pennensula. To thank the Japanese for helping save his territory from the Silla,
the king of Paekche sends scholars to Japan. With them they bring the Chinese
writing system." http://home.
earthlink.net/~dlturk/japanhistory/yamatohistory.html made a rough time table for the Yamato Period to be A.D.
300-550. By adopting A.D. 300-550, the Jimmu Tenno Invasion would have happened
in the 4th century A.D., instead of something like in the first millennium BC.
This certainly is close to the purported Korean claim that Paekche's Prince
Homuda led a expeditionary force to Japan and colonized the country as Yamato.
(See the earlier writing on the nana tsusaya no tachi or the Seven-Pronged
Sword. Wontack Hong, an economist-turned Korean historian, claimed that Homuda
(namely, Homuda no Sumeramikoto, tenno Ojin, or Homuda-wake-no-mikoto, a.k.a.
the god of Hachimanshin/Yahata-no-kami) was a Korean in the first place.)
What happened then in the fourth century at all?
Wontack Hong,
at http://gias.snu.ac.kr/wthong/, firmly believed that the so-called invasion of Mimana in
southern Korea was not an action on the part of the Wa Japan, but an en-route
campaign by Paekche armies. The Paekche armies, in order to cross the sea to
Japan, would have no choice but to go through the territories of Mimana. Hong
borrowed some research from a Japanese scholar called Egami (1964) who claimed
that "Mimaki-iri-biko from Mimana" ( a Chinhan ruler with connection to Puyo
people) was "the leader of the horse riding invasion force". In contrast with
Egame, Hong claimed that it would be the Paekche who invaded Wa Japan and set up
the Yamato State. Hong believed that Egame could not divest himself from the
imperialist Japanese viewpoint that Japanese could never be subjugated by an
inferior race like the Koreans. In an academic article, Egami (1964) expounded
the 'Horserider Invasion' theory which was to say that "the alien people called
the gods of heaven were a North East Asian people related to the people of Fu-yu
[Puyeo] and Kao-chu-li [Koguryeo]... immediately prior to their invasion of
Japan, they [the horseriding invaders] were based on the Mimana area in south
Korea."
Egame's theories, however, were built on undisputable artifacts
excavated from the tombs of intermdiate and late Kofun periods. The tombs had
shown striking similarities to those in Korea, which made the Japanese into an
awkward position should they deny the sudden continental influx in the 4th
century. The biggest excavated Kofun tomb was purportedly that of Wa King Tsan
[Zan] , i.e., the first of legendary Five-succession Wa Kings of
Zan-Zhen-Ji-Xing-Wu of the 5th century A.D. [which conflicts with the fabricated
Japanese Yamato equivalent lineage of tenno Ninkotu (rende, r. 313-399); tenno
Hanzei (fanzheng r. 406-410 or rende); tenno Ingyo (yungong, r. 412-453); tenno
Anko (ankang, r. 453-456); and tenno Yuryaku (xionglve, r. 456-479) as recorded
in Kojiki (compiled by O no Yasumaro) and Nihon Shoki (compiled by
Toneri shinno)].
Though, archaelogical findings, though, pointed to
Kyushu as the land of advanced metallurgy, i.e., iron weapons and utensils,
which were more the product of the Chinese from the Yangtze River area or the
Chinese-lineage Qin-han people from the southern Korean peninsula. The
comparison of iron versus broze from the Kofun excavations is important in that
as of the cut-off time of the mid-5th century, the southern-ring of both Korea
and Japan remained the people who were associated with the iron-smith Chinese
with origin from the continent, i.e., Wa, Silla, Qinhan and Bianhan.
My
take is that you don't have to make the Japanese ruling history a continuous
line, and you don't have to use the soundex to make the later Yamato inherit the
Yamadui or Yamatai place naming of the Wa Japan of the 3rd century A.D. In my
view, the Yamato Japanese, before reaching the Yamato Plains in Honshu, still
carried on the same name Wa as was known from the 1st century AD. However, the
composition of the Wa Japanese in the 4th-6th centuries, or the 1st versus the
3rd centuries, had changed. While the input of immigration from the Yangtze and
iron-smith quasi-Chinese from the southern Korean tip had dwindled to nill, the
new blood from the Tungunsic [and mixed or misnomer Tungusic] invaders from the
mid-peninsula and the northern Korean peninsula kept arriving at Wa Japan.
During the continuous migration to Wa Japan, some of the new emigrants from the
Korean peninsula could have bypassed Kyushu to land at the waist of the Japanese
Honshu island for establishing colonies.
To find out what might have
happened, we would have to examine the traces of history from later times. My
deduction below was that initially, the Wa Japanese, for their host's role,
might still command the respect among the new immigrants. Yamato Japan, which
could consist of the invaders from Korea from later time periods, had inherited
the legacy of Wa Japan, as a consequence of the similar fate of the barbarian
invasion against northern China and southern Korea. The Chinese dynasties in
southern China apparently were not interested in investigating the lineage of
the new generation of Japanese rulers.
The Koreans claimed that it
would be the Paekche people who had set up the State of Yamato. This school of
thought had claimed that the Paekches, out of hatred for the Sillas who
conquered their country, had embarked on a mission to hide or destroy their
Korean identities. They basically wrote the "Kojiki" and "Nihon
Shoki" in the early 8th century to make the 'invasion' occur hundreds of
years earlier than it actually occurred. http://www.koreanhistoryproject.org -
which was apparently adopting Wontack Hong's "invasion" theory - stated that "in
the winter of 369 AD, Prince Homuda's expeditionary force landed on the northern
shore of Kyushu at Hakata Bay on the westernmost of Japan's large islands...
Prince Homuda's army pushed eastward for six years, encountering fierce
resistance from many of the clans in its path... finally halted on the rich
agricultural plain formed by the Yodo and Yamato Rivers at the head of Osaka
Bay... Prince Homuda proclaimed the creation of his new kingdom, taking its name
from the surrounding region and giving the country its first official 'name' -
Yamato. (Note previously we stated that "in A.D. 478, the Wa King sent an
emissary to Liu Song Emperor Shundi, claiming that their ancestor, Mi (Dei in
modern Japanese pronunciation, Yingshen [Ojin Tenno]), had campaigned at about
the turn of the 4th to 5th centuries against 55 eastern statelets of
hairy people (Ainu ?), 66 statelets in the east, and 95 statelets in the north."
This means that the Japanese was still in the process of stabilizing the Honshu
territory, and were far from the possibility of establishing a so-called Yamato
[Da He Zhou] statelet in the Kinki area, or today's Kyoto-Tokyo area, at the
time of A.D. 369.) --Refer to the earlier discussion of the 120-year (two
sexagenary cycles) difference between the records of Nihongi and those of
Samguk-sagi in this period, which was cited by Wontack Hong (see Aston 1889, pp.
51-65).
Now, the question will be whether this 'Wa' State was the same
as 'Yamato'.
Yamato: http://plaza
14.mbn.or.jp/~sinkodai/efuruta/ikazuchi/ikazuchi.html provided a theory of two dynasties existing in Japan in the
7th century, simultaneously, namely, the Kinki Dynasty (Yamato Dynasty) versus
Kyushu Dynasty (Wa-state). It stated that "after the defeat of Battle of
Hakuson-Kou, Kinki Imperial Families as Great King Tenchi make a public
statement of being separate from Kyushu Dynasty (Wa-state) through the backing
of Tang. Tang gave Kinki Imperial Families a push that 'Now that you have us
behind you, you may absolutely rest assured that all'll go well, and if you get
it started, it's half a battle.' ...And as soon as Kyushu Dynasty defeated, they
announced an new augmentation and revision of the caps denoting themselves
official rank."
As far as the last sentence is concerned, I have not
found any Chinese literature ascertaining it yet. It would be calling the
Chinese emissaries all fools to say that they, during their missions to Wa State
in A.D. 664, 665, 669, 670 & 671, did not know whom they had fought against
in Hakuson-Kou.
http://plaza14.mbn.or.jp/
~sinkodai/efuruta/esss.html claimed on
basis of his interpretation of Chinese records that "since Wa attempted to
conduct its diplomatic relations with ... as an equal state, it had to fight a
great war against the Sui (should be Tang) dynasty at Hakusonko (in A.D. 663) in
the Korean Peninsula where it was completely defeated. All through these events
over the centuries, only one Wa-state was involved, and it was located on the
island of Kyushu." Hakusonko is called Jinjiang-kou or Jinjiang River Mouth.
I would question only one word here, namely, 'Kyushu'. Why? Because the
Japanese would contradict themselves by claiming different dynasties in Japan,
Kinki Yamato versus Kyushu Wa dynasties. According to http://www.wsu.edu:8080/~dee/A
NCJAPAN/TAIKA.HTM, "the two most
important political innovations in ancient Japan were the Seventeen Article
Constitution of Prince Shotoku (604 A.D.) and the Taika Reform Edicts of Emperor
Kotoku. The regency of Shotoku was followed by a coup against the ruling Soga
clan, from which Shotoku was derived. The new emperor, Prince Karu, together
with the Imperial Prince Naka no Ohoye, issued a series of reform measures that
culminated in the Taika Reform Edicts in 645 AD. These edicts were written and
sponsored by Confucian scholars in the Yamato court and in essence founded the
Japanese imperial system and government. The ruler, according to these edicts,
was no longer a clan leader, but Emperor (in Japanese, Tenno) that ruled by the
Decree of Heaven and exercised absolute authority. After the edicts, Japan
would no longer be composed of separate states, but provinces of the Emperor
that would be ruled by a centralized bureaucracy." Should Japan be a unified
country under one emperor, there could not have existed two authorities.
http://home.
earthlink.net/~dlturk/japanhistory/yamatohistory.html claimed that in A.D. 646, "The Imperial capital is set up in
Naniwa. A new era name (Taika) is announced... During this period, the capital
is moved from Yamato to Naniwa, then to Kyushu, then back to Yamato, and finally
settled in Omi..." This sounds like a good reconciliation, but needs the third
party corroboration. As far as Yamato itself is concerned, I would probably
claim that the name 'Yamato' is more a terminology for the regime which was
first set up in the Yamato area. Before the Yamato Invasion of A.D. 369 as
depicted in the controversial theories, Japan was apparently in a state of
loosely independent units. Chen Shou's "San Guo Zhi" mentioned about 100
states existing in Japan prior to the 3rd century.
The following will
be an approximate description of the locality of the Wa State: Chen Shou said
there were, in the 3rd century, 30 plus states in Japan which maintained
relations with China. Starting from Korea, about 7000 li by sea, you arrived at
the state of 'Yichi' (Izu State). Another 1000 li by sea would be the state of
'Weilu' (Matsuro?). Travelling by land for 500 li to the southeast would be
'Yidu' (Izu). Another 100 li by land in the same direction would get to 'Nu'.
Another 100 li to the east would be 'Bumi'. 20 days sailing to the south would
get to 'Touma'. Another 10 days by water and 30 days by land to the south would
get to a place called 'chimatai' (Qimatai) or 'yemaye (Yamaichi)' where the Wa
King or Queen dwelled. To the south of Yamaichi was the country of Kunu
[Gounu-guo] where a King ruled, and this country was not subject to the Queen.
(Professor T. Furuta said the "li" used by Chen Shou was not 435 meters as used
during the Qin or Han dynasties, but rather the unit adopted by the Wei and
Western Jinn dynasties, which is that one "li" is approximately 77 meters.
Looking at Japan's map, people will say this conclusion was quite sound.)
In "Wei Zhi", the name of the place was 'Yematai' (disputed by
the Japanese to have copied from an error in "Hou Han Shu", and in
"History of the North" , it was called 'Yemuodui'. What is to be noted
here is that none of the mutations imply the Chinese characters 'Da He Zhou'
which would denote Yamato in "New History Of Tang Dynasty". The sounding
of the pronunciation, however, is almost the same as the later 'Yamato'. Wontack
Hong, at http://gias.snu.ac.kr/wthong/, claimed that Chen Shou used the two words 'tai' and 'ichi'
more than dozens of times in his book, and in none of those appearances did Chen
Shou ever confuse the word of 'ichi' for 'tai' or vice versa.
You may
ask why the Japanese made a big deal out of this? This is because the later
Japanese state of Yamato posed a lingering historical dispute till today. In the
Chinese history, the records in regards to 'Ri Ben' or Nippon are often marked
with the word 'suspicion'. Before the word 'Ri Ben' or Nippon appeared in Tang
records, the Chinese used the Chinese character of 'Wa' indiscriminately for
designating Japan. The Japanese, however, pronounced the same character
differently, as 'Wa' and 'Yamato' at the turn of the 7th-8th centuries A.D.,
till 'Nippon' was adopted by Yamato Dynasty as the official name in the early
8th century A.D. Today's Japanese claimed that Nippon or Nihon was corrupted
from the word Hinomoto, namely, Chinese 'Ri Ben', the origin of sun, and they
further claimed that the Hinomoto was a state that existed at the time of
legendary emperor Jimmu. The Chinese TV drama depicted Tang Empress Wu Zetian as
making up the name of 'Ri Ben' for the Japanese emissary. (I found an entry in
history book supporting the Empress Wu Zetian claim.)
Adding further to
the complexity will be the fact that the Chinese character used for Yamato would
be switched from 'wo' to 'he'. The character 'he' meant peaceful or 'mixing-up'
in Chinese. In Fang Zhiping's opinion, 'he' or yamato originally meant for
the mix-up of Ainu natives and Japanese colonizers. In the opinion of this
webmaster, the Japanese corrupted the original word "Wo" (Wa in the Japanese
pronunciation) to the character "he", with the same 'crop' part. (The 'wo'
character, which was misused today by the Chinese to mean people of lower
height, could originally just mean a peaceful and obedient people, with
compositions of 'human', 'crop' and 'women' parts, while the character 'he' had
the parts of 'crop' and 'mouth' (meaning people). As to why the new Japanese
generation from the 6-7th century A.D. called the Japanese 'newfoundland' by
Da-he, it could be merely an imitation of the Chinese way of calling the country
by adding the 'grand' prefix. "The New History Of Tang Dynasty" recorded
quite some claims by the Japanese such as the migration to the place called 'Da
He Zhou', namely, Da (Great) He (Yamato) Zhou (Prefecture). The ancient Japanese
then called the Ainu land to the east by the name of "Hitagami no kuni", meaning
the country where the sun was seen rising above the highland. This migration
could not be any earlier than what was recorded in the 'Five Japanese Wa Kings'
era. In another word, this webmaster believed that what the ancient Japanese
tried to forge was to call their country by Da-he (grand 'he' - which was
pronounced Yamato) instead of Da-wo (where wo was purportedly called by Yamato
as well). DaHe would also be the name used by the Japanese for designating their
race today. Similarly, as Venerable Master Dongchu (1908-1977) pointed out what
Wei Tingsheng had discovered, the Japanese 'tenno' (emperor) was a copycat of
the Tang Chinese invention as well. In A.D. 674, Tang Emperor Gaozong first
coined the words "tian [heavenly] huang [emperor]" for himself, and the Japanese
hastily copied over the title to name their emperor by a similar name,
pronounced tenno. In another sense, there was no chance that the Japanese invented the title
tenno in A.D. 645 and the Chinese emperor copied the Japanese, and it had to be
a new invention sometime around A.D. 720 when the Nihonshoki was written.
The Five Japanese King Era of the 5th Century A.D.
"Song Shu" and "Liang Shu" had no differentiation of Yamato
Japan from Wa Japan. "Liang Shu" stated that after the death of Queen Iyo
or Toyo (Yiyu in Wei Zhi or Taiyu in Liang Shu and Bei
Shi), male kings were erected again and they were conferred titles by China.
Thereafter, during the reign of Eastern Jinn Emperor Andi (Sima Dezong, reign
397-418), a male king by the name of Zan was erected. (Eastern Jinn was usurped
by Liu Song Dynasty in A.D. 420.) "Song Shu" recorded that in A.D. 421,
Wa King Zan (San in modern Japanese) sent over tributes; in A.D. 425, Wa King
dispatched a 'sima' called Cao Da to Liu Song court. After Tsan [Zan, San in
modern Japanese] would be brother Zhen [Chin in modern Japanese]); after Zhen
would be son Ji (Sai in modern Japanese); after Ji would be son Xing (Ko in
modern Japanese); after Xing would be brother Wu (Bu in modern Japanese or
Yuryaku). Wa King Wu (Bu) continued the renewl of titles till A.D. 502.
Available records did impress me that Japan's Wa ruling house was continuous
at least during the fifth century A.D. The Japanese attempted to match the
Five Kings of Zan-Zhen-Ji-Xing-Wu to i) San, Ninkotu (rende or lvzhong, with a
fabricated reign of A.D. 313-399); ii) Chin, Hanzei (fanzheng [with a fabricated
reign of A.D. 406-410] or rende); iii) Sai (Sei), Ingyo (yungong, with a
fabricated reign of A.D. 412-453); Ko, Anko (ankang, with a fabricated reign of
A.D. 453-456); and Bu, Yuryaku (xionglve, with a fabricated reign of A.D.
456-479).
What remained dubious was after that. Because the future
Japanese emissaries, who no longer carried the accounts about the
Five-Succession Wa Kings as recorded by China's southern dynasties, fabricated
the myth of the Jimmu Tenno dating to the 1st millennium B.C.E. and his
migration to the Yamato (Da-he-zhou) Plains. --For the approximate date of the
migration to the Yamato Plains, I will take the report of the Wa King in A.D.
478, to Liu Song Emperor Shundi, as the approximate time of the eastern
expedition, i.e., the early 5th century. In the report to the Chinese emperor,
Wa King claimed that their ancestor, Mi (Dei in modern Japanese pronunciation,
Yingshen [Ojin Tenno]), had campaigned against 55 eastern statelets of
hairy people (Ainu ?), 66 statelets in the east, and 95 statelets in the north.
Mi (pronounced Dei in modern Japanese) was the father of Tsan [Zan, San in
modern Japanese] and Zhen [Chin in modern Japanese]). This historical entry is
also significant in that up to A.D. 478, the Wa Japanese had respect for China
in contrast with later evasion, fabrication and disrespect. Remember in A.D.
631, Tang Dynasty emperor Taizong ordered to have Xin-zhou 'ci shi' Gao Renbiao
return a visit to Japan; however, the Japanese king (i.e., tenno) argued with
the Chinese emissary about the 'minister' or vassal protocol. Hence Gao Renbiao
returned to China without relaying emperor Taizong's decrees. Why the later
evasion, fabrication and disrespect? It could mean the Five Wa King lineage
and the Yamato Japanese lineage could be totally different. Especially so
when the reign years of the Five Wa King do not match with Ninkotu (rende, r.
313-399); Hanzei (fanzheng r. 406-410 or rende); Ingyo (yungong, r. 412-453);
Anko (ankang, r. 453-456); and Yuryaku (xionglve, r. 456-479) - as recorded in
Kojiki (compiled by O no Yasumaro) and Nihon Shoki (compiled by
Toneri shinno)].
What was missing from China's history was the elapse
during the later years of Liang Dynasty (AD 502-557), Chen Dynasty [A.D.
557-589] and the early years of Sui Dynasty. Ouyang Xiu said the Wa Japanese did
not establish contacts with Sui China till close to A.D. 600, after last record
of pilgrimage to China's Liang Dynasty (AD 502-557). "Liang Shu" recorded
that King Wa was further promoted to Zhengdong Da Jiangjun (i.e., the general
who campaigns in the east) in A.D. 502. From the Korean records, we could tell
that Silla established the first contact with the Southern Chinese Dynasty of
Liang in A.D. 521 by sending an envoy in the same embassy as the Paekche envoy,
but after that, Silla had declined the Wa Japan's attempt to piggyback their
envoy to China in the same mission as the Silla's. It was right in the second
half of the 7th century, when Japan was in the process of promoting Buddhism or
banishing Buddhism - which was simultaneously going in on the Chinese continent
-- that we saw the conflicts emerging in Japan's history, with a difference of
about 20 years for the reign of Kimmei (Qinmin) Tenno. The New History of Tang
Dynasty recorded that Yomei (Yongming) Tenno [i.e., Du-li-si-bi-gu or
Mu-du-li-si-bi-gu in the New History of Tang Dynasty] sent an emissary to Sui
China at the end of the Kaihuang era of Sui Dynasty, i.e., about A.D. 600, while
the Japanese claimed that this tenno [Yommei (Yongming) Tenno] had a reign of
A.D. 585-587, at least 13 years earlier, while Shotoku's aunt, empress (tenno)
Suiko was said to have a reign of A.D. 554-628. (Did the Chinese mix up tenno
[Yommei (Yongming) Tenno, reign A.D. 585-587] with Regent Shotoku who
purportedly served under aunt-empress [tenno] Suiko [reign of A.D. 554-628]?)
Dozens of years later, when the Japanese came to Tang China, they had a
totally different tenno lineage, inserting eight imaginary emperors' reign
to push the legendary Kimmu Tenno to the 6-7th century B.C.E.
Sui
Emissary's Visit To Japan in A.D. 608: Ryukyu was first mentioned in "Bei
Shi" (History of Northern Dynasties) as an island country in the East China
Sea, which could be reached by sailing by boat for five days. "Bei Shi"
stated that Ryukyu was full of caves; that it had three circles of
defence-purpose fences, with water flowing by the fences; that its king was
named Huan-si-shi, with a first name of Ke-ci-dou and 16 palace rooms decorated
with inscriptions of animals; that their people were in constant fightings with
each other; that various villages were ruled by a chief called Niao-lian-shuai;
that it had 4-5 marshals in charge of various caves; and that they were
cannibals eating dead bodies of enemies and family members.
"Bei
Shi" and "Sui Shu" (The History of Sui Dynasty [AD 581-618]) recorded
that the coastal Chinese people often noticed smoke or mist rising in the East
China Sea during spring and autumn time periods and that Sui Emperor Yangdi
confirmed the identity of Ryukyu via the Japanese emissary. In A.D. 607, Wa
Japanese King Duo-li-si-bi-gu sent an emissary to Sui China, stating that they
had heard that the new 'buddha' emperor to the west of the sea had revived
buddhism and they would like to have a dozen monks study Buddhism in China.
Emperor Yangdi at first refused to hear about the Wa State (Japan) because the
Japanese king wrote the sentence "The Son of Heaven from the sunrise wish good
health for the Son of Heaven at the sunset...." However, Emperor Yangdi sent an
emissary, Pei Shiqing, to the Wa State the second year, i.e., A.D. 608. Pei
Shiqing crossed the sea to Paekche, arrived at Zhu-dao (bamboo island) Island,
watched Dan-luo-guo statelet to the south, passed through Du-si-ma-guo statelet,
crossed sea again to Yi-zhi-guo statelet, arrived at Zhu-si-guo statelet, went
eastward to Qin-wang-guo (Qin King Country which was commented to be similar to
Chinese) statelet [which could still be in Kyushu], travelled through another
dozen countries to reach the coast of Wa Japan [then in today's Nara]. Pei
Shiqing recorded that the domain east of Zhu-si-guo belonged to the vassalage of
Wa Japan. Wa King welcomed Pei Shiqing with over one hundred people, displaying
ceremonial courtesy and beating the drums and horns. Within the next ten days,
Wa King dispatched 200 cavalry to fetch Pei Shiqing at the outskirts of the
capital. After arriving at the capital, Pei Shiqing and Wa King exchanged gifts
and tributes. The Japanese asked another emisary to accompany Fei Qing back to
China. It was from the mouth of this Japanese emissary that Emperor Yangdi
confirmed the existence of Ryukyu, an island to the southwest of Japan. (During
Sui Dynasty, Japan dispatched four delegations to China. This was like after an
elapse of over 50 years, counting the last Japanese visit to southern China.)
Nippon (Nihon): "The Old History Of Tang Dynasty"
, claimed that 'Ri Ben' or Nippon could be an alternative race of the Wa State,
and it cited two points: 1) The Japanese did not like the ugly name of 'Wa'; 2)
Nippon was probably a small statelet that was swallowed by the Wa State and the
Wa State just borrowed their name. It also claimed that the numerous Japanese
students who went to Tang Dynasty had also been recorded to have been ambiguous
about their origin. It said that those 'overseas students' (namely,
lyu'ngakusei, the same exact term used by Japanese to designate the Chinese who
obtained student visas to study in Japan today) often saved the money given by
Chinese emperors and then bought huge amounts of Chinese classics for shipping
back to Japan. It also said numerous times that those Japanese students often
exaggerated description about 'Nippon' and their words were very doubtful.
Further, "The Old History Of Tang Dynasty" said the first Japanese
emissary who used the name 'Ri Ben' came in A.D. 703 (the third year of Chang'an
under Tang Empress Wu Zetian). Subsequent visit would be A.D. 713 when Tang
Emperor Xuanzong was in rein.
Ouyang Xiu of Song Dynasty,
in his book "Xin Tang Shi" [The New History Of Tang Dynasty], said that
Tang Emperor Gaozong had ordered in A.D. 650 that the Wa King Xiaode send armies
to aid Silla in the wars against Koguryo and Paekche. Wa King Xiaode, earlier,
sent in opal and precious stone to the Tang court. After the death of Xiaode,
son Tian-feng-cai was erected. After Tian-feng-cai will be son Tian-zhi. The
next year, a Wa [Wo] emissary came to China with "Xia [shrimp] Yi [barbarian] Ren [people]" (i.e., the Ainu people with long whisker or beard or
mustache) who, with hair dangling as long as 4 Chinese feet, were good marksmen
who could shoot arrows accurately. After Wa King Tian-zhi would be son Tian-wu.
After Tian-wu would be son Zong-chi. After the Tang success in Korea, the Wa
State sent emissary to congratulate Tang in A.D. 670 on the victory in Korea.
Ouyang said that after A.D. 670, their emissary used the name of 'Ri Ben' or
'Nippon' (namely, Chinese 'Ri Ben', the origin of the sun), saying they derived
the name from the fact that they lived close to sunrise. Possible causes cited
by Ouyang would be the same as what "The Old History Of Tang Dynasty"
said: 1) They did not like the ugly name of 'Wa'; 2) Nippon was probably a small
statelet that was swallowed by the Wa State and the Wa State just borrowed their
name. Ouyang further said that the Japanese emissary did not want to give
the details as to the two names, and hence the question mark lingered on. (Note
that Ouyang Xiu's "New History" should be discounted while the "Old History of
Tang Dynasty" should be judged more authentic.)
"The New History Of
Tang Dynasty", better than "The Old History Of Tang Dynasty" ,
recorded quite some claims by the Japanese emissaries, such as their first claim
of 'Heaven Emperor' for their lord and the migration to a place called 'Da He
Zhou', namely, Da (Great) He (Yamato) Zhou (Prefecture). Please note that the
Japanese had switched Chinese characters here, and the old way of using the same
character for Wa and Yamato would be discarded. The Wa character (pronounced
'wo' in Mandarin) will be for Wa, while the Chinese character 'He' (meaning
peaceful or mixed-up) would be used for Yamato.
Ouyang Xiu said the Wa
Japanese did not establish contacts with Sui China till close to A.D. 600, after
last record of pilgrimage to China's Liang Dynasty (AD 502-557). This was due to
the nomadic groups ravaging northern China, which caused a disruption of trade
and communications between China and the rest of the world.
Reading
through the sections on Japan in both books, my conclusion would be that the
name change to "Ri Ben' or Nippon (Nihon) occurred well after A.D. 670.
It won't be too much erroneous to use the year A.D. 703 as the official date for
the name of Nippon to be known to the Chinese. This certainly contradicts the
Japanese theory of the existence of Kinki Yamato Dynasty in addition to the
Kyushu Wa Dynasty around the time when the Wa State was defeated by the
Silla/Tang armies in A.D. 663. Professor T. Furuta said "Hinomoto lately
corrupted to Nihon, and from 700A.D. Yamato Dynasty adopted it for the official
name of their nation."
Japanese versus Korean Claims: The
Japanese side claimed that their Yamato Dynasty had lineage from the legendary
emperor of Jimmu Tenno who, according to Kojiki and Nihon Shoki (all written by
Koreans in the Chinese language), had the "trek of Kamu-yamato-ihare-biko no
Mikoto from south Kyusyu to the Yamato plain accompanied by hand-chosen clan
(uji) heads." That was the so-called "Eastern Invasion" around the fabricated
6-7th centuries B.C.E. The validity of the claim is usually a dispute because
Japan did not possess the metallurgy for producing the kind of bronze or iron
swords that Emperor Jimmu had used in the 1st millennium B.C.E. See http://www.os.xaxon.ne.j
p/~sinkodai/efuruta/esss.html for
details about Jimmu Tenno Legends.
Professor T. Furuta, in http://plaza14.mbn.or.jp/
~sinkodai/efuruta/esss.html did propose
a non-conventional assertion, namely, " 'Kojiki and Nihonshoki take a moral
position that the Kinki Imperial House was in control of Japan from the
beginning to the present time. He authenticated the existence of the Wa State
via Jinn China's emissary Chang Cheng, Tang China's emissary Kuo Wu-yuan, and
Nakamaro the Japanese student who was dispatched to China in the 8th century.
The Koreans claimed otherwise, saying that it would be the Paekche
people who had set up the State of Yamato. This school of thought had even
claimed that the Paekches, out of hatred of the Sillas who conquered their
country, had embarked on a mission to hide or destroy their Korean identity.
They basically wrote the Kojiki and Nihon Shoki to make the 'invasion' occur 900
years earlier than it actually occurred. http://www.koreanhistoryproject.org stated that "in the winter of 369 A.D., Prince Homuda's
expeditionary force landed on the northern shore of Kyushu at Hakata Bay on the
westernmost of Japan's large islands... Prince Homuda's army pushed eastward for
six years, encountering fierce resistance from many of the clans in its path...
finally halted on the rich agricultural plain formed by the Yodo and Yamato
Rivers at the head of Osaka Bay... Prince Homuda proclaimed the creation of his
new kingdom, taking its name from the surrounding region and giving the country
its first official 'name' - Yamato" --This was a made-up in the opinion of this
webmaster as we just discussed the origin of the word 'Yamato' as a switchover
of the original character 'Wa [or 'Wo' in Mandarin pronunciation], a word used
in China's prehistory for designating the ancient Japanese as courteous and
obedient or docile, but mutated today into a meaning for the lower-height
people. (Note previously we stated that "in A.D. 478, the Wa King sent an
emissary to Liu Song Emperor Shundi, claiming that their ancestor had campaigned
[possibly in the early 5th century] against 55 eastern statelets of hairy
people (Ainu ?), 66 statelets in the east, and 95 statelets in the north." This
means that the Japanese was still in the process of stabilizing the Honshu
territory, and were far from the possibility of establishing a so-called Yamato
[Da He Zhou] statelet in the Kinki area.)
Both the Japanese and Korean
accounts did not solve the questions we raised here. The Japanese legend is
certainly no history. The Tang Chinese of the 7th century could not determine
the origin of 'Nippon'. How could today's people authenticate it? The Paekche
Koreans did not account for the original 'Wa' state in their colonial action of
the 4th century. The closest picture we could get about the Korean-Japan link
would be the fact that the Paekche Koreans and the Japanese were more than
allies and more likely kinsmen as claimed by the Korean school.
One
Paekche prince was in Japan when their country was defeated by the Tang Chinese.
In mid-600 AD, the Korean peninsula was undergoing increasing turmoil as Silla
had just requested China's Tang court for assistance in the wars against Paekche
to the west and Koguryo to the north. The Tang Chinese came to Korea at the
invitation of Silla. The Paekche prince, Fuyu Feng (please note the family name
of Fuyu, a bearing of their ancestral Fuyu or Puyo statelet in Manchuria), was
picked up in A.D. 661 from Japan by two Paekche generals. Wars were waged
between Paekche and Tang/Silla armies for the next 2 years. General Liu was
re-enforced by 7000 soldiers who were dispatched from today's Shandong Province,
and Prince Fuyu Feng requested relief with Wa. http://plaza
14.mbn.or.jp/~sinkodai/efuruta/ikazuchi/ikazuchi.html claimed that in A.D. 663, "this year, in order to assist
Paekche, arms were out put in order, ships fitted out,... Generals of the Rear
Division, were sent in command of 27,000 men to invade Silla."
In this war, the 400 Japanese ships were burnt by Tang General Liu
Ren'gui and his Paekche ally Fuyu Rong, during the Battle of Bailongjiang (White
River [Baijiang-kou or Baekgang in Korean]), known as Hakusuki-no-e no Tatakai or Hakusonko no
Tatakai in Japanese. (Fuyu Rong
was a Paekche royal family member who was loyal to China)
As to the
Fuyu lineage, the Chinese history said the Tang Chinese captured the Fuyu family
and brought them to China. Liu made Fuyu Rong, a royal family member who was
loyal to China, swear with the Silla king that they would not war against each
other, and further buried the sworn testaments underneath their royal palaces,
respectively. Liu designated Fuyu Rong as governor-general of Paekche and then
sailed home. Shortly thereafter, Fuyu Rong fled to mainland China out of fear
for Silla. The Tang court later ordered the Fuyu prince to go back to Korea in
A.D. 677, but Fuyu Rong was still afraid of going home. Tang China continued on
to conquer Koguryo. This Fuyu prince was afraid of going back to Korea because
Silla armies were in full control of his old land, and he was conferred some
Chinese titles as an official in the Tang court. Fuyu Rong was ordered to go to
Korea again, but he stopped short of the Korean peninsula and stayed in the old
territory of Koguryo and he died there. This would mutate into a history riddle
for many historians in the fallacious belief that two Fuyu (Paekche) kingdoms
had existed, one to the south of Goguryeo, and the other to the north of
Goguryeo. (The Paekche remnants certainly fled to Japan as well.
http://plaza14.mbn.or.jp/~sinkodai/efuruta/ikazuchi/ikazuchi.html claimed that
"Prince Syon-kwang of Pekche and his people were given a residence at Naniha" of
Japan in A.D. 664.)
In A.D. 664, 665, 669, 670 & 671, the Tang
court sent to Japan numerous missions, some in hundreds and some numbering 2000.
Those missions were either sent by General Liu Renyuan who were in charge of
Paekche affairs or sent direct by the Tang court, and some of the mission
included former Paekche generals. It would be a real puzzle should the Chinese
records fail to tell whether there had existed a different dynasty, the Kinki
Yamato against the Wa State.
The
Taika Reform, Kojiki and Nihon Shoki
Taika Reform Edicts
in 645 A.D., as detailed at http://www.wsu.edu:8080/~dee/A
NCJAPAN/TAIKA.HTM, purportedly had laid
the foundation for Japan to develop into a Confucian-style imperial society
mapping that of China. This is an important piece of work in the Japanese
history. We could not doubt it simply because the Chinese history chronicles had
no record of it.
History, however, is usually compiled by
someone of a later time period. Inconsistency, perjury, modification and
revision often occurs, and it would be up to some later historians to
authenticate it by double checking alternative sources. In China, concurrent
history accounts had been important source for the later historians. In Spring
& Autumn time period, there were three brothers who worked as royal
chronicler for Qi Principality. The elder brother wrote that prime minister, Cui
Zhu, killed the king and hence got killed by the usurper, the second brother
continued his brother's version and got killed, and the third brother did it
again, which made Cui Zhu frustrated at it and hence left the record unchanged.
During China's South-North Dynasties, usurpation and killing had been the norm.
Often, the emperors would summon the historians and asked them to give them some
favor in their description about usurpation.
In case of Japan, we would
cast doubts on the authenticity of events described by Kojiki and Nihon Shoki.
Possible explanations for the ambiguity of the Japanese emissaries would be to
hide something. The original act of hiding the truth may not have to do with
later glorification. The Japanese ambiguity about the origin and history of
Yamato and Nihon could have much to do with their internal usurpation and
killings. Similar examples could be found in Ming China's relationship with
Koryo. Koryo regularly sent in tributaries to Ming emperors. When the tributary
was not regular or interrupted for some time, the Chinese emperor would conduct
an inquiry into the Koryo kings. At one time, when one Koryo king passed away,
Ming Emperor had worn mourning clothing for days when the Koryo emissary was in
the Chinese capital. When Ming Emperor was having doubts about the cause of the
death of the Koryo king, Ming Emperor would threaten to attack Koryo to punish
the usurper should that be the case. I would raise my suspicion here as to the
hidden secrets in the Japanese court in the 7th century.
http://home.
earthlink.net/~dlturk/japanhistory/yamatohistory.html mentioned the following usurpations: In A.D. 644, there was
the Taika Coup in which Naka no Ôe (son of Empress Kôgyoku and future Emperor
Tenchi [Tianzhi 626-672]) arranged for the assassination of the Soga clan
leaders [Soga no Iruka, i.e., Suwo-shi clan in Chinese]. Kôtoku (Empress
Kôgyoku's brother) became Emperor Xiaode [645-654] in A.D. 645 after Naka
[Prince Zhongda-xiong] killed Soga [Suwo] Rulu [Iruka]. on lunar calendar Jan
1st of A.D. 646, Emperor Xiaode [Kotoku] decreed the economic and political
reform with the help of returnee students and monks from the Continent and
Korea. In A.D. 647, eight provinces were stipulated by mapping Tang China's
system at the proposal of returnees Gaoxiang Xuanl; 100 officialdom system was
implemented, with 8 ministries, one censorship [inspector] department and five
garrisons; nationwide, capital, seven 'dao' [circuit], guo [state], jun
[commandary] and li [shire] were established; and taxation, land allocation, and
a military draft system was adopted. Emperor Xiaode and crown prince Naka
[Prince Zhongda-xiong], during the reign, participated in the war against
Silla-Tang, but got defeated at the Battle of Baijiang-kou (White River
[Baijiang-kou or Baekgang in Korean]) in August of A.D. 663, known as Hakusuki-no-e no Tatakai or Hakusonko no
Tatakai in Japanese. In A.D. 671,
Emperor Tenchi died. A succession dispute between his son and his younger
brother broke out. His son temporarily succeeded him as Emperor Kôbun, but was
later killed in battle. In A.D. 672, Temmu (Tianwu [631-686], Tenchi's younger
brother) became an emperor. In A.D. 673, Temmu ordered the compilation of the
Kojiki and the Nihongi (Nihonshoki) to justify his accession. By A.D. 701, Japan
completed the compilation of its first law, i.e., "Da Bao Luu Ling". In
A.D. 710, under Empeoress Gemmei (Yuanming), the capital city was moved to
Pingcheng-jing [Nara] from Asuka [feiniao, i.e., flying bird, Asuka, 538-710],
and would not move under Emperor Kammu (Hengwu or Huanwu) to Ping'an-jing
[Kyoto] till A.D. 794. From A.D. 702 to 894, Japan renewed its policy of
dispatching delegations to Tang China, a policy first started in A.D. 630-660
but revised during the A.D. 663 conflict with Silla/China. Delegations amounted
to close 500 personnel and four ships.
TO BE CONTINUED !!!!!
The Mongol Invasion of Japan
The Japanese Piracy, Shogunate Tallies, Korea & the Taiwan
Island
The Japanese Invasion of Ryukyu
The 1894 Sino-Japanese War
The Infamous Luushun Massacre
The First World War & China - Japan's Twenty-one
Demands
Russia, Britain & Japan - Tibet, Xinjiang, Mongolia &
Manchuria
The Ji'nan Incident & the National Humiliation Memorial
Day
KOREAN COMMUNISTS & THE
JAPANESE INVASION OF MANCHURIA - 1930-1931 [Modified : Saturday, 31-Mar-2012 04:14:16 EDT]
The Japanese Invasion of Manchuria [Modified : Saturday, 31-Mar-2012 19:29:38 EDT]
The Air Battle over
Shanghai-Suzhou-Hangzhou & Western Power Intervention - 1932 [Modified : Tuesday, 27-Dec-2011 22:27:06 EST]
The Japanese Invasion Of China
(1937-1945)
Resistance War Against the Japanese Invasion
The Defence Battle at Nanking
The Rape Of Nanking
written by Ah Xiang
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