CHAPTER XVII
Culture Mixing in Japan
Races and Archæological Ages—The “Pit-dwellers”—Ainu Myths and Legends—Mummification—Sacred Animals, Herbs, and Trees—Ainu Cosmogony—Ainu Deluge Legend—Pearl-lore in Japan—Mandrake in Korea, Japan, and China—The Japanese “Dragon-Pearl” as Soul—Links with America—Medicinal Herbs and Jewels—The “God-Body”—Sanctity of Beads—The Coral, Shells, Coins, Fruit, and Feathers of Luck-gods—Jade in Japan—No Jade Necklaces in China—Japanese Imperial Insignia the Mirror, Sword, and Jewel—Shinto Temples and Artemis Gateways—Mikado as Osiris—The Shinto Faith—Yomi—Food of the Dead—The Souls of Mikados and Pharaohs—The Kami as Gods, &c.—Gods of the Cardinal Points.
There was not only “culture” mixing but also a mixing of races in ancient times throughout the Japanese Archipelago. Distinct racial types can be detected in the present-day population. “Of these,” says the Japanese writer, Yei Ozaki,[1] “the two known as the patrician and the plebeian are the most conspicuous. The delicate oval face of the aristocrat or Mongoloid, with its aquiline nose, oblique eyes, high-arched eyebrows, bud-like mouth, cream-coloured skin, and slender frame, has been the favourite theme of artists for a thousand years, and is still the ideal of beauty to-day. The Japanese plebeian has the Malayan cast of countenance, high cheek-bones, large prognathic mouth, full, straight eyes, a skin almost as dark as bronze, and a robust, heavily-boned physique. The flat-faced, heavy-jawed, hirsute Ainu type, with [[325]]luxuriant hair and long beards, is also frequently met with among the Japanese. Such are the diverse elements which go to comprise the race of the present time.”
The oblique-eyed aristocrats—the Normans of Japan—appear to have come from Korea, and to have achieved political ascendancy as a result of conquest in the archæological “Iron Age”, when megalithic tombs of the corridor type, covered with mounds, were introduced.[2] They brought with them, in addition to distinctive burial customs, a heritage of Korean religious beliefs and myths regarding serpent- or dragon-gods of rivers and ocean, air and mountains. After coming into contact with other peoples in Japan, their mythology grew more complex, and assumed a local aspect. Chinese and Buddhist elements were subsequently added.
There was no distinct “Bronze Age” in Japan. “Ancient bronze objects are,” says Laufer, “so scarce in Japan, that even granted they were indigenous, the establishment of a Bronze Age would not be justified, nor is there in the ancient records any positive evidence of the use of bronze.”[3] Although stone implements have been found, it is uncertain whether there ever was, in the strict Western European sense, a “Neolithic Age”. The earliest inhabitants of the islands could not have reached them until after ships came into use in the Far East, and therefore after the culture of those who used metals had made its influence felt over wide areas.
As we have seen (Chapter III), the most archaic ships in the Kamschatka area in the north, and in the Malayan area in the south, were of Egyptian type, having apparently [[326]]been introduced by the early prospectors who searched for pearls and precious stones and metals. In the oldest Japanese writings, the records of ancient oral traditions, gold and silver are referred to as “yellow” and “white” metals existing in Korea, while bronze, when first mentioned, is called the “Chinese metal” and the “Korean metal”.[4] “The bronze and iron objects found in the ancient graves have simply,” says Laufer, “been imported from the mainland, and plainly are, in the majority of cases, of Chinese manufacture. Many of these, like metal mirrors, certain helmets, and others, have been recognized as such; but through comparison with corresponding Chinese material, the same can be proved for the rest.”[5] At the beginning of our era, the Japanese, as the annals of the Later Han Dynasty of China record, purchased iron in Korea. The Chinese and Koreans derived the knowledge of how to work iron from the interior of Siberia, the Turkish Yakut there being the older and better iron-workers.[6]
The racial fusion in ancient Japan was not complete. Although the Koreans, Chinese, and Malayans intermarried and became “Japanese”, communities of the Ainu never suffered loss of identity, and lived apart from the conquerors and those of their kinsmen who were absorbed by them.
An outstanding feature of Japanese archæology is that Culture A appears to have been a higher one than Culture B, which is represented by Ainu artifacts. Culture A is that of a pre-Ainu people whom the Ainu found inhabiting parts of the archipelago, and called the Koro-pok-guru. The name signifies “the people having depressions”, and [[327]]is usually rendered by Western writers as “Pit-dwellers”. In the Japanese writings the Koro-pok-guru are referred to as “the small people” and “earth spiders”.