宗良親王
PRINCE MUNENAGA
1
Around ten years ago I spent two months in Bologna helping young Italian documentary makers translate subtitles and publicity materials for their films. It was fun being in a different culture and I met a few interesting people. Among them was an American woman who had relocated to Italy, where she eked out a living by translating magazine articles. I used to encounter her at a cafe near my apartment where idealistic New Agers and others tended to congregate, though she didn't really fit into the mould of the average customers, who were well-meaning and gentle. In contrast she was bitter and judgemental, but she liked to talk and what she said was interesting. One of her obsessions was the Japanese Imperial court of the Heian era, which she knew a lot about. She said that she was writing a novel set in the reign of the Emperor Ichijō. She idolized this particular monarch, who ascended the throne at the age of six and enjoyed popularity until his premature death twenty-five years later. If you have read The Tale of Genji, you will be familiar with the ambiance and artistic accomplishments of the age over which he presided. In fact, Murasaki Shikibu, the author of the work, served one of Ichijō's empresses.
Over coffee in the New Age cafe this American friend would enthusiastically tell me about her novel, one theme of which was how the pure Ichijō valiantly endeavoured to counter the degenerate influence of the power-hungry Fujiwara regents. I can't remember the exact details, but she talked about it with such conviction that it seemed more real to her than what was currently going on in the world.
What's the meaning of history? For the professionals history is largely historiography - the use of the best methods and sources to establish the indisputable facts of a bygone age. This is what I studied back in the late 1960s at university in London. But there is another history, which, unlike historiography, does not aim at objectivity. Here we draw upon something that happened in the past to enrich our own lives. It may be quite personal, or it may add to our experience of life by making the present-day world more meaningful.
The tiny community in which I live has one of the area's most important historical sites - the grave of an imperial prince. Prince Munenaga lived during a time when the country was ruled by rival emperors. His father Go-Daigo had challenged Ashikaga Takauji, the most powerful samurai warlord of the time, who responded by putting his own candidate on the throne in Kyoto. Go-Daigo fled south to Yoshino, where he set up a rival court. For six decades the Southern and Northern Courts waged war against each other.
Militarily speaking, the Southern Court was the underdog. Emperor Go-Daigo tried to undermine the Ashikaga clan and its many allies by creating a network of his own. He kept close control by making his sons the top military commanders. Prince Munenaga became the general with responsibility for the eastern provinces, and Okawara in present-day Oshika-mura was one of his strongholds.
Unsurprisingly, given the dangers of the situation, many of Munenaga's brothers met violent ends. Munenaga himself, however, survived into old age.
Now, after thirty years of living here in Oshika-mura, I want to find out exactly who Prince Munenaga was, and what, if anything, he means to me today.
2
The scholarly style since Meiji has been mainly to work at searching out facts. This is called scientific research. The research method is analytical. Analysis is autopsy. Autopsies are for the dead. The opposite, searching for the truth, is unifying. Unifying is life. But it is not science, it is rather art, and, taken to its end, faith. It goes without saying that a cool scientific attitude and meticulous research are necessary. But if history is analysed by that alone it dies. What makes history live is the mysterious spiritual power of living people who believe in it. By this spiritual power fact becomes truth.
This is Japanese historian Hiraizumi Kiyoshi writing in 1925 in a fashion reminiscent of Benedetto Croce. Though, in contrast to the liberalism of the Italian philosopher, Hiraizumi, a professor at Tokyo Imperial University, was a staunch nationalist who espoused the benefits of totalitarianism and viewed the emperor as the defining element in the development of Japan as a nation.
We are all familiar with the ultra-nationalism and emperor-worship that led Japan to the tragic consequences of the Pacific War, which began with the ill-advised attack on Pearl Harbour and ended in the atomic destruction of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Hiraizumi was one of the thinkers whose theories underpinned the actions of the politicians and military leaders responsible.
But how does this relate to 14th-century Prince Munenaga? Well, I came across Hiraizumi in Yoshino Jidai no Kenkyū, a collection of essays by a young academic named Hirata Toshiharu published in 1943. By the way, the Yoshino in the book's title (it's called 'Research on the Yoshino Era') is the name of the mountainous area in present-day Wakayama where Emperor Go-Daigo installed his Southern Court. The volume contains a long chapter dealing with the controversy over Prince Munenaga's death site and grave. For those who are interested I will go into the details of that later, but here I want to explain why the Yoshino era - more commonly known as the Nanboku era - was so important for imperial historians like Hiraizumi.
In short, Go-Daigo, the father of Prince Munenaga, was their hero. His claim that the emperor is the natural head of the nation and protector of the people comes from the 8th-century Kojiki, which reveals the imperial family to be descendants of Amaterasu, the sun goddess. Based on this claim, Go-Daigo attempted to wrest power back from samurai warlords (first the Hōjō, then the Ashikaga) who, according to him, had usurped it. Despite the superior military clout of his opponents, Go-Daigo and his two successors, Go-Murakami and Chōkei, held out for nearly sixty years until reaching an accord with the Northern Court that went a long way to recognising their position.
Even in 20th-century Japan, Go-Daigo was making headline news. In 1911 a Ministry of Education textbook controversy raised the subject of the two imperial lines and which of them should be seen as the rightful one. The consequent decision recognised the Southern line of Go-Daigo in Yoshino against the Northern emperors in Kyoto.
'Revere the emperor' was a rallying call of the campaign to topple the Tokugawa shoguns, who had closed the country for over two centuries, banning Christianity and severely limiting trade. When, in 1868, the Tokugawa shogun finally ceded power, the political backers of the victorious Meiji emperor needed to redefine Japan's identity. The emperor was chosen as the embodiment of the traditions and history of the country in the hope that the charisma of the symbol would inspire people and hold the nation together.
This way of re-evaluating history and using it as a tool to strengthen national identity was something that Japan learnt from Europe. France did it after the Revolution by aspiring to become a model for universal human rights, while Germany did it a couple of decades later through idealistic philosophers like Fichte who glorified the German will. History becomes the basis for action by strengthening the national spirit and encouraging citizens to create their own reality. This ideology may sound outdated today, but it has been basic to nation states all over the world.
3
So, who was Prince Munenaga?
He was born in 1311, one of Emperor Go-Daigo's many children. His mother was the poetess Nijō Tameko. In 1325, he was sent to live in the Mt Hiei temple Myōhōin, later becoming abbot and in 1330 being appointed head of the Tendai sect. This fast-lane promotion was motivated by his father's need for the support of the Mt Hiei warrior monks in his ambitious plans to reassert imperial authority.
However, Go-Daigo's first challenge to the authority of the Hōjō regents in Kamakura was unsuccessful and, in 1331, led to exile for him in the Oki islands and for his son in Shikoku.
This struggle for power between the emperor, nobles and samurai is at the centre of all Japanese history, whether in the early medieval period, when the Fujiwara advisors became the dominant force, or later with the emergence of samurai clans like the Minamoto, Taira, Hōjō and Ashikaga, all of whom established strong power bases in the east of the country.
Still, unlike Emperor Go-Toba, who a century before had also been sent to Oki and died there, Go-Daigo managed to return from exile and, with the help of Ashikaga Takauji and Nitta Yoshisada, destroyed the Hōjō. This was in 1333 and should have been the beginning of a glorious new imperial age. Unfortunately Go-Daigo's attempt to construct a new political system - known as the Kenmu Restoration - was badly planned and administered. He may have seen himself as the father of the nation, but the opposition of the samurai chieftains to the Hōjō had been based on self-interest rather than idealism. Takauji withdrew his support and became the emperor's enemy.
The result: civil war.
Go-Daigo's sons became warriors. Priest and poet Munenaga exchanged Buddhist robes for the armour of a military commander. But he retained his pen, which was to become a subtle weapon against the Northern rivals far more effective than a sword.
In 1335 Munenaga's brother Morinaga was executed by Takauji's brother Tadayoshi, and the next year Takauji took Kyoto, forcing Go-Daigo and his supporters to flee south to the mountains of Yoshino. In the capital Takauji installed a new emperor - Kōmyō. Thus begins the age of the Southern and Northern Courts. It will last until 1392.
Amid the strife and uncertainty Go-Daigo never doubts his mission, and the mental hold that he exerts over his son Prince Munenaga is strong.
4
Military successes for the Southern Court were few and far between after Takauji entered Kyoto and Go-Daigo escaped to Yoshino. In 1337 Munenaga was in Iinoya overlooking Lake Hamana under the protection of the local chieftain Ii Michimasa, and in March of the next year he made a rare visit to his father in Yoshino.
But the military situation was deteriorating, and he soon left, travelling east in search of allies. Takauji's troops were advancing and in June 1338 the defeat and death of the young general Kitabatake Akiie, whose father Chikafusa served as Go-Daigo's ideological brain, was a big blow.
In September of the same year the prince and his forces set out from Ise by boat to travel east, but suffered heavy losses after the fleet was wrecked off the coast of Shizuoka. Munenaga survived and, though we are not sure of his exact movements, he may have sought refuge with the samurai chieftain Kano Sadanaga in Abe Castle, located to the north of present-day Shizuoka City.
In 1339 his father Go-Daigo died in Yoshino. The new emperor was Go-Murakami, Munenaga's younger brother. The next year Michimasa's Iinoya Castle, which Munenaga had used as his base, fell to Kō no Moroyasu, one of Takauji's top generals.
Further north in Shinano (present-day Nagano prefecture) the Suwa, a priestly and warrior clan based around the lake of the same name, were trusted allies of the Southern Court, and it was there that Munenaga headed next, connecting with some of the many local chieftains in an attempt to gain their support. Later he went north to Teradomari in Echigo (Niigata) on a similar mission.
This is a conflict in which allegiances shift, with most of the small warlords pursuing their own interests in the face of local rivalries. Munenaga's cause was primarily ideological - his father's belief that it was the divine right of the emperor to rule and the duty of the samurai to obey. In such a confused situation how strong is an appeal to a distant emperor who claims to be a descendent of the sun goddess?
For the previous two centuries Japan had been run by samurai generals who understood how their military government worked. The talented Takauji, generalissimo of the Northern Court, attracted allies by his Machiavellian tactics and astute management.
A desperate search for support now took Munenaga to Nago in Etchū (present-day Toyama), where he was welcomed by the Ishiguro clan, a local family that owned an estate (shōen) received as a gift from a former emperor. Over the two years he resided here Munenaga also founded a temple, known today as Gokurakuji.
In 1344, with the support of the Southern Court diminishing at an alarming rate, it was decided that the safest place for the itinerant prince was Okawara, an imperial estate entrusted to the Suwa clan deep in the mountains to the south of Suwa. Okawara is one half of present-day Oshika. It was here, under the protection of the faithful local leader Kōsaka Takamune, that Munenaga would spend the majority of his years until his death in 1385.
5
In Okawara, Prince Munenaga was reliant on Kōsaka Takamune and his forces. Takamune was a samurai from Sarashina in the north of Shinano who had impressed the Suwa clan with his talents and commitment to the cause of the Southern Court. He was also active in neighbouring Okusa (present-day Nakagawa-mura), where the fortress that he constructed overlooking the Tenryu river valley is now a pleasant little park.
Takamune's main fort in Okawara was located in the hamlet of Wazo. Its remains are still visible, along with Takamune's grave. Five hundred years later the Taishō emperor rewarded Takamune for his services by posthumously awarding him the lower fourth rank.
Munenaga initially lived in Okawara Castle. At this time in his life, he was first and foremost a general with the task of mustering support for the Southern Court. From here, he made expeditions to the north of Shinano and to Echigo. He may have even travelled as far as Terao Castle in present-day Gunma, the home of the Nitta clan.
He probably also spent extended periods of time with his guardians the Suwa clan by the shores of Lake Suwa. Much of the evidence for these travels is found in the poems that he wrote whereever he went.
In 1350 rivalries and dissension within the forces of the shogun Ashikaga Takauji, the leader of the Northern Court, gave Emperor Go-Murakami and his brother Munenaga the opportunity for a renewed assault on their enemy.
The next two years saw a flurry of both military and diplomatic activity. In October 1351, needing time to consolidate his command, Takauji even initiated a truce with Emperor Go-Murakami. When this was broken, the forces of the Southern Court went on the offensive, and in February 1352 temporarily occupied both Kyoto and Kamakura. Munenaga led a force of twenty thousand men from Shinano, linking up with generals of the Nitta clan. However, over a series of engagements collectively known as the battle of Musashi the ever-resourceful Takauji proved superior, winning his decisive victory at Kotesashigahara near present-day Tokorozawa in north Saitama.
This was a turning point in both Munenaga's life and the political fortunes of the Southern Court. He escaped to Echigo, where over the next couple of years, along with Nitta Yoshimune, he attempted to rally support for the Southern cause. However, the message was clear - Takauji ruled. In 1355 Munenaga was involved in one last battle, at Kikyōgahara in the city of Shiojiri against the Northern Court-affiliated Ogasawara clan. The defeat here brought an end to his military activities. In the years that followed he returned to his first love - poetry.
6
Following his defeat at Kikyōgahara, Munenaga returned to Okawara. He relocated from Okawara Castle to Uchinokura (in the hamlet of Kamasawa), a safer spot deeper in the mountains. Today the place is known as Goshodaira, written with the characters for 'imperial palace/person' and 'flat piece of land'. It stands above a deep river valley running west with a three-thousand-metre mountain range to the east.
In 1357 Munenaga composed one hundred poems dedicated to the Kitano Shrine. One imaginative theory has the prince in northern Shinano, where there is a Kitano Shrine in the territory of the Southern-supporting Ichikawa clan (present-day Sakae). However, it is more likely that he was in Okawara and that the dedication was to the main Kitano Shrine in Kyoto. As we will see, the imperial capital remained a constant object of longing and reminiscence for the wandering prince.
The next year Munenaga sent one thousand poems to his former teacher Nijō Tamesada, who was compiling anthology Shinsenzai Wakashū. However, the collection, which had been commissioned by Go-Kōgon, emperor of the Northern Court, unsurprisingly included none of the Southern Court poet's works.
In the same year Shogun Takauji died, and in 1360 the army of the Southern Court enjoyed a temporary resurgence, even occupying the capital for a few months before retreating again.
During these years Munenaga exchanged poems with his younger brother Emperor Go-Murakami, who pressed him to visit the Southern Court. But, by the time it was possible to make the dangerous journey, Go-Murakami was dead. Finally, in 1373 Munenaga, now aged sixty-two, arrived in Yoshino to stay with the new emperor Chōkei at his residence in the temple of Eizanji.
The three years that Munenaga remained in Yoshino allowed him to compile his own individual poetry collection entitled Rikashū. He also took part in the poetry competitions that were a regular part of court life. It was important to the emperors and nobles of the Southern Court to continue, as best they could, the long-standing norms of palace life.
At the beginning of 1377 Munenaga set off on his return to Okawara. Having learnt of the death of a son, he shaved his head at Hasedera (a temple in present-day Sakurai) as an indication that he intended to devote the remainder of his life to Buddhist practice. However, two years later, he was back in Yoshino, this time staying at Yamada in the province of Kawachi, where he set about choosing the poems for a new imperial anthology called Shinyō Wakashū. Naturally, his selections - ninety-nine of the poems are his - were all by poets belonging to the Southern Court - people who had been ignored in the previous three collections commissioned by the Northern emperor.
In 1381 Munenaga presented the anthology to Emperor Chōkei.
Shinyō Wakashū thus became the main achievement of his long life.
7
After completing the Shinyō Wakashū what did Munenaga do?
So far the events of the prince's life have been pieced together from sources such as the detailed prefaces to his own poems, a biography entitled Shinanomiya-den, and war epics like the Taiheiki and Kamakura Ōzōshi.
Two old documents - Nanchō kōin shōunroku (ancient record of imperial lineage) and Yanagihara Motomitsu's 18th-century history Zokushi gushō - make the date of Munenaga's death 1385, while in contemporary poet Kazanin Nagachika's Koun kuden it is given as 1389. However, there is no record concerning what he did between 1381 and his death. As to where he died, the Dainihonshi, the great history produced by the Mito branch of the Tokugawa family, dryly notes 'the place of the prince's death is not known'.
Shinanomiya-den has Munenaga leaving Yoshino, travelling north to Iinoya, where he had lived in the late 1330s, and dying there. The biography, which 17th-century Shinto scholar Amano Nobukage claimed to have copied from an earlier document, however, has been called unreliable. Nevertheless, Munenaga's official grave is located in Iinoya, constructed a century and a half ago by the Meiji emperor to honour an illustrious ancestor.
Modern historians like Mori Shigeaki believe it more likely that Munenaga returned to Okawara. Iinoya Castle was in the hands of the Northern Imagawa clan, as was most of the land around Yoshino, along with large areas of Shinano. Protected by the faithful Kōsaka Takamune, however, Munenaga could feel safe in Okawara. There is a local legend that the prince died in Kamasawa, where a small stone pagoda (hōkyōintō) commonly used as a grave memorial during the Kamakura and the Muromachi periods formerly stood on Miyatsuka (mound of the prince). Nowadays you can find it on the west side of the hamlet's Hachiman shrine. Also, poems by Munenaga copied by a 16th-century priest of Buneiji, a temple in Iida, include a note clearly stating that the prince passed away in Okawara.
Hase, a village to the north of Oshika, is another place that claims to have Munenaga's grave. An Edo era document that fell out of an image of the prince in the Jōfukuji temple relates how he was killed by attackers while travelling north from Okawara to Suwa. There is also an oval-shaped tombstone bearing the prince's Buddhist name Sonchō. Both are fairly recent discoveries.
8
It was with the appearance of waka that the Japanese first became conscious that their poetry was a counterpart of Chinese or Korean, that it was their own possession and that it was the product of their civilisation. Earl Miner, An Introduction to Japanese Court Poetry
Munenaga had two high-flying brothers. Morinaga was a general who distinguished himself in the various battles leading to Go-Daigo's Kenmu Restoration. According to the Taiheiki, he also had the foresight to see the threat that Ashikaga Takauji posed long before his father did. By the time that Go-Daigo had noticed, it was too late. The outspoken Morinaga had been arrested by Takauji and taken to Kamakura, where he was executed by his Takauji's brother Tadayoshi. There was also Prince Kanenaga, who was appointed seiseitaishōgun (generalissimo in charge of pacifying western Japan) in 1336, and from then until his death in 1383 based himself in Kyushu, where he worked to gain the support of local warlords. By 1370 he was confident enough of his authority in Kyushu to establish relations with Ming China. In these negotiations he referred to himself as 'King of Japan'.
Following Morinaga's death, Munenaga held a similar role in the eastern provinces, although he did not officially receive the title tōseitaishōgun (generalissimo in charge of pacifying eastern Japan) until 1352. However, as we have seen, his efforts as a military commander yielded few lasting results.
Despite this, Munenaga remained an asset to the Southern Court as its representative poet.
Since the political ascendency of the Fujiwara chancellors during the Heian era, the imperial clan's best survival strategy had been its claim to be descended from the sun goddess. This was a powerful story indeed. It identified the clan with the birth of the nation itself, making the emperor a divine being, the undisputed head of the Shinto cult centred on Ise, as well as the greatest patron of the Buddhist religion. At his court the emperor also presides over artistic pursuits that contribute to the creation of a national culture. Among these is the ability to compose 31-sylllable waka poems, in which one talks about the world, feelings and moods, thoughts on life and death, dreams and disappointments. A man and woman developed romantic attachments by exchanging poems, and poetry competitions were an important part of court life.
In the Taiheiki Munenaga is introduced as a young monk with lyrical talents at least equal - perhaps even exceeding - the great Shinkokinshū poet Jien. Obviously a lot of expectations rested on him. And as the Southern Court found itself inferior in the military campaign against the Ashikaga shoguns, it increasingly appealed to its superiority as the true representative of Japanese culture. A subtle war was thus being waged in the field of poetry.
9
There is a book entitled The Aesthetics of Discontent by the late Michele Marra in which he considers the role of literature in Japanese history, challenging the view that it exists in a world of its own, divorced from politics and the run-of-the-mill concerns of daily life. In his readings of medieval texts from the 10th-century Tale of the Bamboo-Cutter (Taketori monogatari) to Yoshida Kenkō's Tsurezuregusa he claims to have found evidence that the authors were writing as political malcontents sidelined by the ruling class, rather than as fantastic storytellers or literary free spirits.
A couple of years later Marra published another book, Representations of Power, in which he widened the scope of his study to include the Muromachi period. Here Prince Munenaga is depicted as a poet with a political agenda. For anyone who is curious there is a free extract available on eBooks, so I don't need to go into detail here. His study of Munenaga is well researched, well written and quite persuasive. Still, Marra's conclusion is a little difficult to accept if one considers Munenaga's work as a whole. What has come down to us today is over two thousand poems - undoubtedly a small portion of his total oeuvre - yet enough from which to draw a fairly good portrait of who he was and the conditions under which he operated. At present I am reading Rikashū, Munenaga's personal collection, and, although not yet halfway, I can already say this: it contains very few ideological statements.
As a poet belonging to the conservative Nijō school of waka poetry, Munenaga is scrupulous in following the suggestions made by Fujiwara Teika - that the seasonal and emotional themes of the poems, along with the words and phrases selected for use, should reference the great anthologies of the early Heian period, particularly the Kokinshū. Teika's rule is 'old methods with new feeling', and Munenaga's poems observe this. Thus, we have spring poems on clouds, cherry blossom and the bush warbler, summer poems on the hototogisu (lesser cuckoo), autumn poems on moon-viewing and the colourful leaves, winter poems on snow, etc. Munenaga has been long admired for his hika (elegies), a genre of waka that often echoes the Buddhist impermanence of human existence, or simply expressed bitter discomfort, disappointment or frustration. There are also a few conventional love poems, along with a lot of nostalgia for the seasonal ambience and courtly traditions of Kyoto.
Here are a few of the poems:
霞めただいづれ都のさかひとも見ゆべきほどの旅の空かは
mist, cover the sky!
this same sky
under which lies the capital
somewhere
but oh so far away
かへる雁なにいそぐらむ思ひ出もなき故郷の山と知らずや
geese heading home,
with such haste
are you really unaware
what awaits?
you will find no memories
in your native place
朝日いでてのどけき峰の山ざくら花も久かた光なりけり
appearance of the morning sun
gently shining on the peak
turning blossoming wild cherries
into shimmering celestial light
春わけし跡にしをりを残しおきて桜はしるき夏木立かな
from a branch broken in spring
to mark the way
i can pick out the cherry tree
in this summer grove
今更に 我に惜しむなほととぎす六十(むそぢ)あまりの古声ぞかし
dont stop hototogisu!
ive come to know your old song
so well
over more than sixty years of life
へだてゆくゐな野の原の夕霧に宿ありとても誰かとふべき
faraway
in the hills of ina
with its evening mists
i have a place to stay
but who will visit?
いづかたも山の端ちかき柴の戸は月見る空やすくなかるらむ
on every side mountains
tower up around
my brushwood cottage
so narrow is the sky
in which i view the moon
都にも時雨やすらむ越路には雪こそ冬のはじめなりけれ
early winter
brings storms to the capital
but in the province of etsu
the season begins
with the snow
片敷のとふのすがごも冴えわびて霜こそむすべ夢はむすばず
cold and lonely
on my rough sleeping mat
i anticipate the frost
but have no expectation of dreams
山たかみ我のみふりてさびしきは人もすさめぬ雪の朝あけ
getting old in the mountains
how lonely it all is
when no one comes to visit
this snowy morning
山里の年の暮こそあはれなれ人のたてたる門の松かは
year-end in this mountain village
is the saddest season of all:
seeing a pine at the gate,
but not knowing if it was put there by anyone
(Note: a branch of pine is a traditional Japanese New Year decoration)
北になし南になしてけふいくか富士の麓をめぐりきぬらむ
fuji rises in the north
now in the south
how many days
have we travelled
in the foothills of the great mountain?
木曾路河あらしにさえて行く浪のとどこほるまをしばし待たなむ
on the kiso river
the storm is bitter
freezing even the waves
for a while
i will have to wait
旅の空うきたつ雲やわれならむ道もやどりもあらしふくころ
a cloud
makes its lone way
across the sky
with no road, no shelter
the wanderer faces the storm
老の波また立ち別れいな舟ののぼればくだる旅のくるしさ
despite my accumulated years
i embark once more
like a boatman
travelling upstream downstream
on this journey of pain
10
Now I'm going to try to put the prince into better historical perspective. It will be helpful if you already know a little bit about Japanese history and literature. But for those that don't I will try to keep it simple.
First, let's take a look at the imperial family, to which Munenaga belongs. In the Yamato state that began to extend its power across Japan during the Kofun period (4th to early 6th century AD), the imperial family stood at the head of the aristocratic clans that governed the country. The Yamato people, who had originally come to Japan from the Asian continent, possessed their own spiritual beliefs and ceremonies, of which the emperor was the head.
But real power was a far more complex affair. All over the country there were strong clans that, while recognising the symbolic and religious ascendency of the emperor, still retained almost total political control over their own territories.
From around the time of the 7th-century Asuka period there is an attempt to gradually centralise power in the imperial court. However, this does not mean that power of the emperor himself necessarily increases. Ambitious clans close to the imperial family engage in rivalry, intrigue and murder. The winners of these contests become extremely powerful figures as advisors and regents. In fact, during the Heian period, although the emperor and his immediate family remain at the centre of the court and its activities, it is the officials belonging to the Fujiwara clan that are dominant.
So what did the emperor do? According to contemporary accounts, his days were occupied by Buddhist and Shinto ceremonies, state meetings to confirm appointments and plans drawn up by his advisors, over most of which he had little or no say, along with cultural pursuits such as the poetry contests, and so on. By all accounts, most emperors were so busy with official duties that they were only too happy to cede the throne to a younger heir when the time came. Thereafter, depending on their preferences, they could devote their retirement to pleasure, religious observances or behind-the-scenes political manoeuvring.
It was a system that actually functioned fairly well for two or three centuries, consolidating the Yamato state as a viable political, economic and cultural entity. The Heian period saw major advances in religion, literature and art - much of this initiated by the imperial court. In fact, the late Heian period of the 10th and 11th centuries - with the appearance of the Kokinshū imperial poetry collection and the Tale of Genji novel - is a golden age that defines literary directions for the next five hundred years.
But, as this was happening, other things were changing - particularly in the eastern provinces of the country, where the rise of politically and economically independent clans with large armies was to completely alter Japan's political landscape. These eastern clans were mostly branch families of aristocrats attached to the court. Squeezed out of power there, they had gone east to satisfy their ambitions.
Over the next five hundred years - from the late Heian period, when the Genpei war erupted, until Tokugawa Ieyasu came to power following the battle of Sekigahara - the political situation in Japan is extremely unstable. Although it sometimes looks like civil war, the alliances change so often that the Japanese term gunyū kakkyo (opportunistic rivalry of local warlords) is more fitting.
One particularly interesting thing is that, although the emperor often aligns himself with one of the warring factions, the respect for his position somehow survives. Imperial princes are assassinated or killed in battle, but the worst that ever happens to a seditious emperor is exile.
Likewise, through all the chaos the imperial court continues to function, observing the age-old rituals, continuing the religious and cultural events.
11
I have already said that Munenaga achieved more as a poet than as a general. Also, I have noted the central role that the imperial court played in the creation of a uniquely Japanese literary tradition.
As far as the poetry goes the 8th-century Manyōshū remains the most important, and to a lot of people the best, of Japan's many famous imperial poetry anthologies. Having said that, it is the later Kokinshū and Shinkokinshū that defined the rules of Japan's poetic tradition. If the Manyōshū inspired the imagination of Japanese poets it was the Kokinshū and Shinkokinshū that taught them the technique.
Japanese poetry has its seeds in the human heart.
Thus says Kokinshū editor Ki no Tsurayuki in his well-known preface. He looks back to the Manyōshū as the golden age of Japanese poetry. It is a collection rich in poetic form, emotion and expression. The poems have a vitality and 'manliness' (masura) not found in the later collections, while the poets range from emperors and nobles down to working people.
With the Kokinshū, the 31-syllable waka becomes the only acceptable form, and style-wise, we move towards elegance and sensitivity. The influence of the Heian court is clear. Feeling is more important than metaphysical or idealistic themes, and the range of accepted subjects is quite narrow - natural features and seasonal change, travels, love, nostalgia for the past, the fleeting nature of beauty and happiness. The joy of life found in many Manyōshū poems is replaced by a gentle pessimism, the result of Buddhism's growing influence. Great poets of the past are venerated and their poems held up as examples to be copied.
It is into this literary world that Munenaga fits, and as a poet he represents its most conservative strain. Thus we can find him composing a poem like
たち帰り又は見るとも鏡山ありしにも似じ年へぬる身は
tachikaeri
mata wa mirutomo
kagamiyama
arishi nimo niji
toshi henuru mi wa
returning
by the mirror mountain
i look again
but find no resemblance
to how i once was
my body burdened by the years
It is based on this honka (original verse) from the Kokinshū.
鏡山いざたち寄りて見てゆかん年へぬる身は老いやしぬると
kagamiyama
iza tachiyorite
mite yukan
toshi henuru mi wa
oi ya shinuru to
at the mirror mountain
let's make a stop
to see
if the burden of years
has yet made me an old man
Basing your verse on an older poem was all part of the tradition.
Here's another example.
東路やさやの中山こえくれば甲斐の白根ぞ雲かくれゆく
azumaji ya
saya no nakayama
koekureba
kai no shirane zo
kumo kakure yuku
taking the east road
we pass over
saya no nakayama mountain
but advancing into kai province
cloud covers the great mt shirane
The idea came from this Kokinshū verse:
甲斐がねをさやにも見しがけけれなく横ほり伏せるさやの中山
kai ga ne o
saya nimo mishiga
kekerenaku
yokohori fuseru
saya no nakayama
i so wanted to see
the great mt shirane of kai province
only to find it hidden
heartlessly
behind the saya no nakayama mountain
In my opinion Munenaga's is the better poem. Although my English translation won't have excited you, the original Japanese is simple and realistic - the small band travelling in secret over the remote terrain hope that their exhausting journey will be relieved by the chance to view a famous peak. Unfortunately, like the poet four centuries previously, they too are disappointed.
Munenaga's appeal seems to lie in his ability to present the bare facts by a skilful balance of feeling and words. He generally avoids the unexpressed depth (yūgen) or lingering emotions (yojō) of Fujiwara Teika's Shinkokinshū, as well as the smart wordplay that was so common in earlier collections.
The century preceding Munenaga's birth sees the appearance of poets such as the samurai-turned-Buddhist priest Saigyō, whose sad and beautiful waka have the appeal of Romanticism, and Dōgen, the founder of Sōtō Zen, who also wrote waka that aim to transmit the truth of a sophisticated 'new religion' in a disarmingly natural way. It is also the time of Kamo no Chōmei, whose Hōjōki is a classic of hermit literature', along with Kenko's Tsurezuregusa (Essays in Idleness), another account - this written during Munenaga's own lifetime - by someone who opted out. Despite being deeply conservative, both Chōmei and Kenkō live their solitary, sometimes quirky, existences on their own terms, their inner worlds a mix of learning, imagination and deep feeling. Meanwhile the iconoclastic Zen priest and poet Ikkyū is born less than a decade after Munenaga's death.
All of these developments indirectly challenge the imperial court. Wealthy samurai who aspire to become literati themselves are the patrons of poets like Kenkō. The same century also sees the emergence of Zeami's Nō, which was supported so enthusiastically by the Ashikaga shoguns.
In short, everything - politics, religion and culture - is in transition. Munenaga, whose Shinyō Wakashū was the last but one of the imperially commissioned poetry anthologies belongs to the old world of court culture that is about to be replaced by the currents of the new culture and its samurai patrons. These will develop and dominate for almost half a millennium before another sharp shift occurs, replacing the shogun with the emperor. The dream of Munenaga's father Emperor Go-Daigo is thus finally realised in the Meiji Restoration.
VILLAGERS
Oshika People in Their Own Words
Collected, translated and edited by Simon Piggott
c.1900 ♂
I never met K-san, but did hear people in Kamasawa, where I live, talking about him. This is a translation of a story that I found it in a Japanese book called Kari no kataribe (Hunter Storytellers) by Yoshio Matsuyama.
Incidentally, Goshodaira is the former hideaway of medieval Prince Munenaga.
Back in the old days, the K. family lived in a house that stood quite alone in the deep mountain forests of Goshodaira, an area four kilometres to the east of Kamasawa. Today a good road runs to Goshodaira, but before that the only way there was by a small path cut into the side of the mountain that would take you through an enchanted forest. In autumn, for example, you could pick and eat ripe akebi fruits hanging from vines in the trees above. It was like a kind of fairyland.
This is something that happened there around thirty years ago. One early evening in autumn the father of the house, accompanied by his fifteen-year-old son, went to get some wasabi horseradish for dinner from a small mountain field that he cultivated. It was while he was crouching down there digging out the root that he noticed something large and shadowy moving downstream. His attention was now drawn to three bears, who were no more than five metres away. When the eyes of the animals and the human met, the mother and her young bear quickly left. But the male bear, adopting a combative posture, stood up on his hind legs and raised his arms, revealing the characteristic white ring around his neck. Climbing the slope he attacked father K., who, having the advantage of the high ground pushed the bear away with all his strength. The bear fell back, landing on its backside, but in no time at all was up again and on the attack.
Watching the protracted struggle, the boy took a rock from the wasabi field and threw it towards the bear. It failed to reach the animal, but, as the rock rolled down, the bear instinctively tried to jump on it. While this was happening, father and son were able to beat a hasty retreat home. However, among his injures the father had suffered some quite serious gashes on his arms.
It is easy to explain why the bears were at the wasabi field. Cultivation of wasabi requires abundant supplies of the purest water. So it's the kind of place where birds and animals all come to drink. Bears can also find freshwater crabs there, which are a favourite food. And not far away was a wood of sweet chestnut trees. Having encamped there, the bears were obviously taking advantage of the day's last light to enjoy a drink and a snack. Father K. had overlooked this danger, but luckily his position on the higher ground to the bear had enabled him to survive. Had their positions been reversed, the bear would have soon killed him.
For reasons of personal safety, before shooting a bear, hunters always make sure that they are positioned above the animal. Hikers too should remember this.
For K-san the injuries that he received from the bear became infected and, although he sought medical treatment, he died a year later. However, the doctor's certificate gave neurasthenia as the cause of death. So perhaps it was the lingering result of the terrible struggle. One can only imagine how great the shock must have been.
A year after the death of the father, the family's eldest son returned from the war. That autumn he observed a bear drinking from a small rock pool that he had made in the Goshodaira forest. Having decided that due to the location it must have been this bear that had killed his father, he made three morning visits to the pool before finally shooting the animal, thus settling the score. The dead bear was 120 kilograms, a big weight for a Japanese black bear. The bear's skull was mounted by K-san's eldest son on the front of the house - a decoration perhaps, but also an offering for the repose of his father's soul, as well as a charm to ward off evil spirits. Later he and his family moved away from their Goshodaira home. The bear's skull remains - I've seen it myself - the sad symbol of another deserted village.
The postscript to this story, which I heard from A-san, is that after moving from their mountain home to the town of Tatsuno things did not go well for K-san's family.
Their house still stands, though the bear's skull is gone. I have heard a rumour that my neighbour Bane helped himself to many of the possessions, but can't say whether or not it is true.
1908 ♂
Japan changed from the old lunar calendar to the new solar (Gregorian) calendar in 1872. So, from this time Oshika was using the new calendar for all public matters. But the new calendar didn't really suit the traditional way of doing things - the round of agricultural activities or the seasonal festivals - so in the Okawara hamlet of Kamasawa we were still using the lunar calendar as late as the mid-1920s. For example, by the old calendar, everything is just over a month later. So the New Year comes in early February. In late December and early January the weather is still fine, so there is the feeling that it is wasteful not to be outside doing something.
In Kamasawa, farming was the main occupation, but it was impossible to make a living by farming alone. So, when the farming season finished at the end of autumn, people transferred to other activities. What did they do? Well, first, they cut timber from the forest and brought it down to the river for transportation. In winter the level of the river is at its lowest so this is the best time for floating logs down. It becomes very difficult after a heavy rainfall. The other main occupation was charcoal-burning. In the old days there was an enormous demand for charcoal. Selling charcoal was an important source of income for us. During the charcoal-burning season the scenery would change. There would be thin trails of smoke coming from all over the mountain forests across the valley, where the men were burning their kilns. From their homes the men could judge by the colour of the smoke if all was going well. If it seemed that the fire might go out or that the charcoal was ready to be removed, they would hurry back to their kilns.
People also tried to have a craft skill - for example bucket-making, roofing, carpentry and so on. This skill became their winter occupation. For women, the main winter occupation was sewing. This was a skill which all women acquired before marriage. Farming was, of course, a job which men and women did together. So was the annual cleaning of the house which took place as a preparation for the New Year. This was done sometime between the 20th and 28th of December. When this was finished, preparations for the New Year would begin in earnest - the making of rice cakes, the putting up of pine and bamboo decorations. In the old days, we used a young pine sapling and were careful that the number of branches was auspicious - 3, 5 or 7. Due to the wartime frugality measures this custom was ended, and people came to make do with just a branch.
There were all sorts of New Year rituals, many of which we no longer observe today. At every seasonal change or when beginning something new Japanese people like to make a dedication to the appropriate deity. So at New Year each house set up a shrine for the Year God in a position facing the most appropriate direction. Also, on 1st January, all the members of the community would worship at the community shrine which is dedicated to the god Usa-Hachiman. There they would greet each other and exchange mutual wishes of goodwill. At the New Year, there would also be household ceremonies for various other gods: Ebisu and Daikoku, who are two of the 'seven gods of luck', and Amaterasu the goddess of the sun from which the imperial family is said to have descended. Another important event of the New Year was the meeting of the Young People's Club on 2nd January. In this case, 'young' meant all males between the ages of 15 and 30. The community depended on them as its driving force - important jobs such as management of the mountain forests and fire-fighting activities were left in the hands of the young men. So their New Year meeting was an occasion for them to get into mental shape for another busy year, and they marked it with some pretty heavy drinking! New Year decorations would be taken down on the morning of 7th January But then the preparations for koshōgatsu ('little new year') would soon begin. Since the pine, bamboo and straw decorations were sacred, the purest, most appropriate way of disposal was by burning. So they would put them on a bonfire (called 'a shrine') and here too there would be a god, the god of fertility, represented as a carved wooden phallus, symbolizing prayers for a good harvest and for protection against disease and disaster during the coming year.
I remember koshōgatsu as a really enjoyable festival, with all sorts of things happening. We used to make decorations on which were written our prayers for a good rice harvest or a good harvest of millet. Then there was the hatsu-uma ('first horse') festival, in which the horse became the object of worship. I also remember enjoying the preparations for the 'tango no sekku (Boys' Festival). In those days people did not have expensive samurai dolls, like today. But we were very busy helping put up carp streamers at houses all over the hamlet. When we had finished the flowing streamers were a beautiful sight.
1910 ♀
My kabuki teacher's name was Kojima Yoshie and his house was just below Ichiba Shrine in Kashio - at present no-one lives there. The house has a tiled roof and is called Shiogawaya. It was probably the house of the headman (shōya), though after the war one didn't use such terms. My grandfather married a girl from the family. It was a well-off family and Yoshie was the eldest son. As he didn't have to work much for a living, he travelled a lot and indulged his hobbies, one of which was kabuki. He was a fine performer - the best in the village. He married a woman from Nishi on the other side of the river by the suspension bridge on the way to the middle school. He was a wonderful dancer and the best jōruri performer I've ever heard. Katagiri Noboru-san often came to see him and sometimes stayed at his house. I think that they were also related by blood. Yoshie-san was one of the teachers of Noboru-chan, but Noboru also learnt by his own efforts and from other teachers and by travel and observation.
The reason that kabuki was so popular in Oshika was that there was no other entertainment. People here were passionate kabuki fans. There's an interesting story. At the beginning of this century kabuki was banned by decree (gohatto). However, Kashio people continued to perform kabuki in secret. They would place lookouts on the mountain passes, and if the police came along that person would become the scapegoat by causing a rumpus and getting himself arrested.
There was no cooperation between kabuki players in Kashio and Okawara - the two distinct halves of the village - far from it! Actually there was a strong sense of rivalry. I don't know so much about kabuki in Okawara, but there was a jōruri player called Yoneyama-san who was related to my husband.
To go back to Yoshie-san, he was a very strict teacher. He could be rather frightening. He would correct you only once. If you made the same mistake twice he would simply glare, but say nothing.
My interest in kabuki stretches a long way back. When I was a child, a troupe of travelling players came to give a performance at the Ichiba Shrine. Among them was a beautiful woman actress. My mother took me to see the play, but when we got home later I was still excited. I was probably about eight at the time. But I remember saying to my mother that I wanted to join the troupe and become a kabuki player. This made my mother very angry. She said that if that was what I wanted I could collect my belongings and go. And then she pushed me out of the house.
As a result of this experience I didn't ever dare to talk about kabuki to my mother again. Still, I did go to see performances of the village kabuki, and used to follow my father when he went backstage.
(Incidentally, later, I was adopted by a couple of relatives who were childless. So I had two sets of parents.)
It wasn't until after I was married that I actually
performed on the kabuki stage myself. While I was working in the Food Agency. I heard that one of the plays in the kabuki programme for the next day was going to be cut because they didn't have a woman to play the leading part. The role was Okaru in a scene from Chūshingura. It was one of my favourite pieces. When I heard, I got permission to leave the office early, and rushed home. I explained the situation to my adoptive mother and said that I wanted to take on the part. Her reaction was 'If you want to, then go ahead!' and she added 'I'll go and see the teacher.' So she went off up to Yoshie-san's house, and the next minute she was coming down the step with Yoshie-san. And he was carrying his samisen. Anyway, after Yoshie-san taught me the movements, my father said, 'Come on, I'll help you. It's a big part and we don't have much time.' I wasn't confident that I could learn the lines. All I knew was that I really wanted to do it. So my father gave me the cues while I tried to learn the lines.
The next day was the day of the performance. I played Okaru opposite Yoshie's Heimon (Okaru's elder brother). The piece is from Chūshingura but stands on its own. The dialogue between Heimon and Okaru forms the main part of the play. Somehow I managed it. Afterwards everyone praised me - not so much the quality of the performance, but the enthusiasm I put into it. However, my biological mother was angry. In fact, she apologized for my selfish behaviour and scolded me. Still my adoptive mother supported me. That was the beginning of my amateur kabuki career. I still feel grateful to my adoptive parents for their help, and, of course, to my husband - he has always let me do as I like.
1911 ♂
When I was a child living in the Okawara community of Kamasawa the Sanshobo Shrine still existed. The festival day was in summer - 20th August. The main image of the shrine was a fine figure. When the shrine was pulled down the image was brought up to the Usa-Hachiman Shrine, but later it was stolen. There was also a fine standing figure of the Buddhist saint Kobo Daishi, and that was stolen too. This happened at the same time and was probably the same person. We've got a good idea who did it.
In the old days, Oshika was quite a flourishing place. In the generation before me there was the copper mine. They dug holes into the mountain to mine the ore, which was also refined there. Things were lively then. There was even a policeman stationed at the mine and a branch school for the children. Oshika is an out-of-the-way place, but there was a lot going on then. The mine was in operation through the Meiji era, but by the time of my birth it had already closed down.
There were also itinerant woodworkers (kijishi) living in the mountain forests. They made a living by splitting timber for boards. The areas where they lived were by the Shozawa stream. They stayed here for a few years and then moved on. There were two houses by Shozawa and two more by Terasawa. There was also another below Ōshima Miyota-san's place. But these woodworkers didn't have much to do with the residents of Kamasawa, apart from buying vegetables and other things from here.
Segi-san of Wazo was a priest of the Ontake sect. He was different from a Shinto priest. He would visit Kamasawa in order to perform ceremonies in people's homes in January and at other times. For example, if you were going to make a stone wall you would get him to come and do a purification ceremony (shiobarai). In other words, he would seek the permission of the god for whatever was going to be done. Someone wanting to become an Ontake priest would go into the mountains to pray and to perform ascetic practices, while eating roasted buckwheat and other simple food. Nowadays, there are no real Ontake ascetics anymore. Segi-san was a disciple of an Ontake priest called Matsuo who lived and had a small house below the Matsudaira Shrine in Bunman. This priest had amazing powers. He could tell fortunes and if you were ill you could go to him and he would say a prayer and give you some medicine. My family went to the Ontake priest for various help. He was very busy with requests from all sorts of people, each of whom would make small offering - whatever they could afford. There are no people like him anymore. He probably died in the late 1920s. When I was a child he was fairly old. I remember that he had a white beard.
The house where I live stands on its own, but there used to be a house known as 'Shinbee's residence' (Shinbee no yashiki) in the next field. It was built by someone called Shinbee who came to work in the mountains and went away after living here for a few years. Grandpa Miyashita would come to the house to look at the moon. There was a platform where you could sit. It was a perfect site for viewing the moon, especially the autumn moon. There weren't that many ways of enjoying oneself in those days but that was one of them. We spent most of our lives working. There were hardly any pleasures - just the annual festivals. Apart from that it was all work.
Kashio people are mellow. Compared to them, Okawara folk are more excitable. When the Kuhara company was operating in Aoki, Okawara was a bustling place. There used to be a trolley car railway to carry the timber going all the way down the valley to the Tenryu river. The guard would blow a horn to warn people. The trucks would set off in the morning and return later in the day. Children from the Kuhara settlement would hitch a lift to school on the trolley cars. In the afternoon they could often get a ride back home too.
Quite a lot of people who came to Oshika with Kuhara stayed on even after the company left. Most of them settled in Shimo-Ichiba. The family at the Marugo shop were among them. Some of the people who came with Kuhara were from as far off as Aomori.
1913 ♂
To give you an idea of a typical farmer's day in prewar Nakao, we would get up at first light, have a quick snack and then do some work before breakfast. After breakfast there was more work until lunchtime, but we would stop at around ten o'clock for a snack. From midday until one, we rested, but then it was back to the fields or mountains. We would have another snack - a bowl of mixed rice or something - at three. This snack was called ocha-no-ko. Then more work until the evening. Once dinner was over there would be more work indoors - perhaps the men making straw rope, while the women sewed. And often we would have something else to eat before going to bed. So it was a life of work, eating and sleep! Perhaps we ate so much because the mixed grains were relatively low in calories. In those days we economized on electricity by using very low wattage bulbs. So the inside of the house was very dimly lit.
As regards footwear, in the cold weather the children (and adults) wore rubber boots. I remember getting my first pair of rubber boots in the second or third year of primary school. But the main footwear was straw sandals and wooden clogs. We wore straw sandals for working in the fields. Wooden clogs were made by a craftsperson. I have never made a pair of clogs myself, but I used to make my own straw sandals, sometimes ten pairs in one day. After beating the straw to soften it, the strands are twisted to make rope. The sandals are crafted out of this rope. In spring and summer we worked until late outdoors, so straw rope and sandal-making were jobs for the autumn and winter. Straw sandals soon wore out, so you always needed new ones. Coats called mino were also made from straw. There were two types - one for protection from the sun and the other for protection from the rain. But these were difficult to make - only a few people could do it. We used to buy ours from people who came around selling them. We also bought kasa (hats).
In those times there was a landowner-tenant system (jinushi kosakunin seido). After paying the landlord, a tenant perhaps had only half of his or her crop left. Then there were other expenditures for agricultural tools and such like. This landowning system was reformed after the war by the occupation forces. Land not being farmed directly by its owner was bought up by the government and sold very cheaply to the tenants. The families hardest hit were those like the Maeshima house, which were in business as sake brewers and doing very little farming themselves. Although we were landowners, we directly farmed a lot of our own land, so our loss wasn't so great.
There are a number of differences between Okawara and Kashio folk. In Kashio there's not one member of the Communist Party to my knowledge, but Okawara is full of them! Okawara and Kashio have different histories. Okawara had the Kuhara timber business in Aoki and Kohikage copper mine in Kamasawa. These businesses made Okawara more urban in outlook. There was even a geisha house in Bunman. Compared to this Kashio was really quiet. The Okawara Young Men's Association (seinen kaigi) used to have a library at the community centre in Kami-Ichiba. It was full of leftist literature. They would get Communist teachers from Tokyo to lecture to them. Communism flourished in Okawara. They had some very bright people. One of them was Imai Binzō, who later became the village mayor.
In the Nakao shrine there used to be a kabuki stage where we put on plays. There was also a kabuki teacher called Kobayashi, who travelled around the village giving people instruction (he would stay for a time in each hamlet). He had no wife and no children and he wasn't a landowner - still, he had a fine house. I suppose that he lived for his art. I can still see him walking along the road carrying a bundle of books with his samisen slung over his back.
There are various things in Oshika which remain mysteries. For example, why does salt water spring from the middle of the mountains in Kashio? Nobody knows. Then there's another thing. One hears stories of evil spirits (mamonono, mashin) coming in the middle of the night to take people away. In one Kashio hamlet I can think of seven or eight people who have committed suicide by hanging - and for no apparent reason. The people who did it weren't in trouble, seemed to have peaceful family lives. One of my friends from there was a soldier who came back from the war. His wife would say 'Don't leave a rope lying around!' But in the end he hanged himself too. He wasn't in any trouble and he was a hard worker. There was a man from Wazo who went there as an adopted son. He even became a chief of the volunteer fire brigade. But, in the end, he hanged himself from a tree on the river bed. It's a tragic business. Is there some sort of evil spirit there?
1914 ♂
I was born, brought up and lived in Koshio, a part of the Kitairi community of Kashio. There were seven families there, all of whom farmed their own land.
In those days Japan was an agricultural economy. We grew rice in the fields near the river and barley, wheat and other crops on the slopes of the mountains. We raised silkworms for cash, and in winter we made charcoal. The community had a small waterwheel, where we would grind our wheat into flour to make noodles. We grew most of the food we ate, made our own miso and soy sauce and only bought oil, tea and a few other things.
In winter we also used to hunt wild boar, rabbits and pheasants. I've never hunted deer or monkeys. There'd be a group of about seven or eight hunters, and when we killed an animal we'd share out the meat between us. It gave our diet a bit of protein. In those days meat wasn't available in the village shops. During the war we sent rabbit and raccoon skins to make winter clothing for the soldiers in Manchuria.
In those days there were few problems with animals causing damage to crops, even though the fields reached up high into the mountains (tagayashite ten ni itaru). When did the problems begin? I remember that from around 1975 wild boar caused havoc in our rice fields at harvest time. One of the reasons I left Oshika and came to live in the town was the disappointment of losing crops which I had put so much effort into raising.
In the old days the emphasis wasn't on planting sugi and larch for timber, but rather on maintaining the oak forests where the trees could be cut to make charcoal. These mixed deciduous forests produced wild grapes, acorns and other food for the animals. The situation changed after the war due to the national government's five-year and ten-year plans to encourage forestry. That's why the animals started appearing in our fields. If there had been sufficient food in the forests, they wouldn't have needed to come down into the village, where, moreover, they were likely to be shot at.
Kitagawa in the extreme north of Kashio used to be a thriving community. Every year we would go to a festival there held at a shrine dedicated to Kodama-sama, a deity patronized by silkworm farmers. The whole community was destroyed in the 1961 disaster. I think that the festival day was 3rd May. We would go along to get a flag, which would be returned at the beginning of the next year for a new one. This flag was said to ensure a good harvest of silk thread. It was a lively festival - the Kitagawa folk were known for their ostentatious ways - and attracted people from all over Kashio. As there weren't cars or bikes everyone walked. The girls would be dressed in kimono and perhaps be carrying parasols. It was a charming sight (fūzei ga atta).
Compared to other Oshika communities, Koshio was an easy place to live. The water supply for our paddy fields was close to the house. And we lived in the top house, so we could flood our fields before our neighbours. During a year when the rainfall was scarce this sometimes caused a bit of friction, but nothing too bad. For hay, we could cut the grass from our own lands. Still, it was quite a job. I remember getting up before sunrise to put in a full day's work. This would be in October after the rice harvest. Work, and more work. There was always work to do. This is what life consisted of.
Our main festival was in spring. Sometimes we'd put up a stage to perform kabuki in the grounds of the branch school. I appeared in plays from when I was seventeen to around the age of thirty, often playing the handsome young hero. The kabuki teacher Kojima Yorito was our nextdoor neighbour.
In those days, there was no kabuki organization. Things would start moving about a week or ten days before a festival. Someone would say, 'How about doing a play?' And if all agreed, then we just got on with it. We didn't rehearse during the winter months or anything like that.
In Japanese the words mashin or mamono refer to a rather frightening spirit or god (kowai kamisama). When I was a child I was sometimes sent on errands to the neighbouring hamlet of Ginaiji, where there was a general store. For a child it was rather frightening to go along that dark narrow road, where people told you to beware of the evil spirits. But the Kashio stories I remember best are about the water goblin (kappa) of Oike, who lent people dishes for special occasions, and the hunter who came across seven deer in the forest and shot one, but then discovered that there were still seven. Of course, one can't believe that such things ever happened.
Japan's defeat in World War II was a big shock. Until 1945 the country believed that it could win the war. The military government didn't allow anyone to mention the word 'defeat'. So it was a big shock. From the end of the war until the 1961 disaster was sixteen years - not so long, but during that time we went from severe food shortages to a time when people were beginning to feel materially well off. During the war and directly after we hardly ever had new clothes. Everything we wore was patched. But by the late 1950s we were at last beginning to feel that we were living like ordinary humans again.
Then came the 1961 disaster. That was another big blow. Many people died and their fields were washed away or buried beneath landslides. After the disaster, no one knew what to do. In Koshio, no houses were destroyed, but some people lost their paddy fields near the river.
After the disaster I lived in Oshika until 1979. That is twenty years ago, but I still feel nostalgic about it - not so much Okawara, but Kashio in particular. For a time I worked for the Kashio community center, so I got to know almost everyone in the area. Even when I go back now people will say hello to me and we'll have a chat.
1915 ♀
I was the eldest child (sōryō) of the family. Although my father's house is in Kami-Aoki, I was born in Wazo. I came here when I was a month old after my first visit to the shrine (miya-mairi). It was the custom for a woman to return to her native family for her first birth. The other children would be born at her own home. My mother was from the Matsushita family of Wazo, so she returned there. But, the Wazo house is not the Matsushita honke (main house), although Yoshitoshi says that it is. My ancestors belonged to the Matsudaira house of Okazaki, the clan of the great shogun Tokugawa Ieyasu. Our name changed at the time of Meiji Restoration, and there have been five generations of Matsushita since then. But before that the name was Matsudaira. Yoshitoshi says that the Wazo Matsushita are the main family and that we are a branch family, but he doesn't know what he is talking about. This Matsushita and the Matsushita of Wazo are two of the biggest landowners in the village, but we are related only by the marriages that have taken place between our members.
How did the family come to settle in Oshika? The forests here belonged to the shogun, and the first member of the family came as an official to supervise the collection of the timber tax. He brought seven men with him and they first settled in Okeya. From there, he saw this flat piece of land, and decided to build a house here. The year before last was the 510th anniversary of his death. According to the name on the grave he is known as Matsudaira Iga-no-kami. All the land around here belonged to this family. The Buddhist temple and the Shinto shrine were ours too, but we donated them to the hamlet. The popular name (yago) of this house was Hikinota, and that became the name of this community. My ancestors were in charge of collecting and sending cut wood (kureki) to the shogun in Edo.
I married my husband Torao in 1939, and in 1941 he was drafted into the army and sent to Manchuria. He didn't return to Japan until December 1947. I'd heard nothing from him, so didn't know if he was dead or alive, but, then one day I got a telegram saying that he was arriving in Maizuru. It was like a dream. He'd been a prisoner of war in Siberia. He'd been taken prisoner by the Russians and when they asked him what his job was, he said that he was a director of Japan National Railways. Before the war he had worked for the railway in Iida. So they sent him to Siberia. He was too honest. He should have said that he was from a farming family.
During the war I lived in Iida, and this house in Oshika was empty. But our tenants looked after our land while we were away. As a result of the postwar land liberation policy, tenants were allowed to buy the lands which they were cultivating. When my husband got back he called all the tenants together and said that they could have as much of the land as they wanted - not just the rice paddies, but also the mountain fields and the forests. In return, our former tenants have treated us well. In comparison, look at the Matsushita of Wazo. Their tenants took so much land that Yoshitoshi doesn't even have a place to park his car! That kind of thing didn't happen to us.
The old festivals were lively. There was kabuki and dancing. In those days everyone knew how to do kabuki. But I wasn't allowed to appear in the kabuki plays. My mother was strict that way. My mother died when I was fifteen, and after that I had to be like a mother to my younger brothers and sisters. My grandmother was still alive, but she lived in Ichiba. She used to teach sewing. She died the year before I got married.
The old story I most remember is Yakan korobashi. Mothers would tell their children that if they stayed out too late in the evening, they would meet the ghost who lived in the bamboo grove. Karan koron karan koron. That was the noise it made - like a kettle when it's knocked over. Because of Yakan korobashi we didn't stay out late at night. But I wonder why a ghost would make a noise like a kettle?
Every year I have an Ontake priest come to the old house to perform a ceremony (iematsuri). That reminds me. I must get this year's ceremony done before the spring equinox. All the houses used to do the ceremony, but now many people don't bother. Last year I didn't do the ceremony because I was ill and busy moving house, so this year I must do it. Perhaps I'm old-fashioned, but I don't feel at ease until it's done.
1916 ♂
I wasn't born into this house. My grandmother originally came from here. Later, when there was no male heir, I was asked to marry the only daughter. The Wazo house of Matsushita is one of the biggest landowners in Oshika, as well as being the head of a number of branch houses that originate from it, but quite frankly the prospect of living in the middle of the mountains didn't appeal to me. In the end though I had no choice. I married in 1937 or 1938 when the war against China had already begun, but before the Pacific War had broken out.
I spent my working life as a teacher and this was not originally my choice either - I wanted to travel abroad on merchant ships, but my father told me to become a teacher, like him, and I suppose that this pleased my mother, because if I was a teacher it meant that I didn't have to go off to the war. I began teaching in 1935 when I was twenty, and retired at the age of sixty. During that time I served in schools all over Nagano Prefecture as an instructor of elementary school children, middle school children and teacher trainees, and finally as a headmaster. Apart from two years at the middle school here and three years when I was head of an elementary school in the next village I lived away from home. My father or my wife looked after this house in Wazo in my absence.
To say a little about my father, he was a person who had more of a talent for spending money than making it. He was always going off to enjoy himself with geisha in the nearby city of Iida. At the time this style of life was common among the sons of landowners. The 'land liberalization' which followed World War II took away most of our fields, but we still retain many hectares of forest.
The independent character of Oshika people comes from the village's former status as tenryō - land directly under the control of the shogun. Now, take the village of Takagi, where I was born, this was run by a small samurai clan called Chiku - my original family were samurai retainers of this lord. Oshika people were proud of the fact that they were not responsible to a local feudal lord, but to the regional representative of the shogun, who resided in Iida. But, then, there was no one in Oshika with samurai status, that is, no one here had the right to wear a sword. If dissatisfied, their only course of action was hyakushō-ikki (farmers' rebellion).
The representative of the shogun would come from Iida to receive the yearly dues of the villagers. At that time he would stay in this house. There is a special entrance for him, and a special room with thin walls and a secret corridor for quick escape if he was attacked.
Ideas regarding education throughout southern Nagano were fairly uniform. There weren't any big differences between the attitudes of teachers here compared to those in other parts of the prefecture. After Japan's defeat in World War II, we realized that the educational system had to be completely changed. I was among the people from here who were sent to Tokyo to receive training from the Ministry of Education in order to instruct the local teachers in the new methods. Although I said that attitudes to education were more or less the same throughout the prefecture, there were teachers who were highly critical of the Ministry of Education. They would say things like, 'Don't listen to those Ministry of Education bureaucrats. It was they that got us into the mess in the first place.' Although we were trying to introduce democratic reforms, we were accused of being feudalistic. Their criticisms could be quite scathing.
I can't recall of any such teachers in Oshika, but I can recall a mayor, who was a bit of a radical. His name was Imai Binzō. Before this time the mayor of the village had always been selected from among the big landowners. Imai was the first mayor who wasn't a big landowner. Actually, he worked for the farming cooperative. He had a wife (she died recently) who had no official position, but really put on airs. I remember having a row with her when I was deputy headmaster at Okawara Middle School. She brought along a mattress - the Women's Association had made it by sewing together rabbit skins and stuffing it with raw cotton. She said rather condescendingly 'You'll be needing something for the teacher on night duty to sleep on. We've made this for you.' I said, 'Take it back.' I wasn't going to accept charity, but that led to an argument.
At that time the primary school and the middle school shared the same building. But the primary school always seemed to get the best of things. For example, when the primary school latrines were full, middle school pupils were always sent to empty them. I opposed that. If the primary school children couldn't empty their own toilets, then the village should pay someone to do it. I didn't mind the middle school pupils voluntarily helping out at certain times, but I opposed them being ordered to do it. The middle school pupils were expected not only to fetch the wood for the stoves to heat the primary school in winter, but also to cut it. Again, I said that I didn't think this was their job. It was the responsibility of the village office to provide the wood. I wouldn't have been able to say this before the war, but with Japan's defeat things became more democratic.
The Okawara Middle School was built from the timber of trees planted on Mt. Seida by the Young Men's Association (seinendan). It was constructed by the villagers themselves. In contrast, the timber for Kashio Middle School was bought from an outside contractor, and constructed using either the village budget or private contributions (I don't now which). Perhaps the Oshika mayor of that time was a Kashio man. Such things have been known to happen.
The Kohikage copper mine near Kamasawa was owned and managed by my family. However, the copper seam was of limited quantity, so before long the operation became uneconomic. It was quite a job to get the copper out, and to transport it, but the local labourers managed it. These kind of experiences gave Okawara people a tenacity, which perhaps Kashio people didn't have.
When I was sixty I retired from the teaching profession and have lived in this house ever since. During my short spell as teacher in Oshika I did succeed in getting the middle school pupils released from their tasks at the primary school. As I said before, they had been made to do things which were really the responsibility of the village office. It was negligence on the part of the mayor to allow such a state of affairs. The national laws concerning education were quite specific about a child's rights.
Recently I went to the Imperial Palace in Tokyo to receive an award. The Emperor appeared before us and said, 'Due to your great care and attention, the children of Japan have grown into splendid citizens. Thank you so much.' Here I was being thanked by the Emperor when all that I had done was my job. Then he stepped down from his dais, and walked among us. And, then for some reason, I don't know why, he stopped in front of me and said in a small voice 'Thank you.' I felt like crying.
Though I became heir to one of the biggest landowning houses in the village, I have never really had any of a typical landowner's privileges and responsibilities. That all finished with the end of the war and the abolition of the old hierarchical system. The only bekke (branch families which retain ties to the head family) which remain for this house are Minami-san and the Matsushita house, both in Aoki.
All my children have moved out of Oshika, and now there is only me left. My adoptive father's brothers all left the village too. The children of these brothers are all alive. They call me uncle, but, of course, I'm not - I'm really their cousin. Recently when I went to Tokyo I had a reunion with them - there were about ten of us. We had a great time. Of course, most of them spent the war years in this house, so they know the village. They might even regard it as their home, though I doubt if any of them will ever come back. One of my cousins brought me this piece of calligraphy. My father had it by his bedside during his final illness. I think someone famous wrote it, but I don't know who. I think it says寂, but I can't even be sure of that. Anyway, they said that it belonged in this house, so they gave it to me.