An Introduction to the History of Japan

by Katsuro Hara

In the history of Japanese art, the introduction of Buddhism is a noteworthy event. For, along with it, works of Chinese painting and sculpture, both pertaining mainly to Buddhist worship, were sent as presents to our imperial court by rulers of the peninsular states. Not only articles of virtu, but also artists themselves, were sent over to this country from the continent, who displayed their skill in building temples, making images, decorating shrines with fresco paintings, and so forth. Instructed by them, some gifted Japanese, too, became enabled to develop themselves in several branches of art and artistic industry. Among the plastic arts, painting was very slow in making progress, though a few examples of that age which have remained to this day are very similar in style to those pictures and frescoes recently excavated out of the desert in northwestern China, and have a high historical value, giving us a glimpse of the T'ang painting. Architecture was perhaps the art most patronised by the court. We can see it in the construction of numerous palaces. It is a well known fact that before the Empress Gemmyo, who was one of the daughters of the Emperor Tenchi and ascended the throne next after the Emperor Mommu, each successive emperor established his court at the place he liked, and the residence of the previous emperor was generally abandoned by the next-comer. From this fact we can imagine that all imperial palaces of those times, if they could be named palaces at all, must have been very simply built and not very imposing. The locality, too, where the residence was established, was hardly apt to be called a metropolitan city, although it might have served sufficiently as a political centre of the time. It was in the third year of the said empress, 710 A.D., that Nara was first selected as the new capital which was to be established in permanence, contrary to the hitherto accepted usage, and in fact it remained the country's chief city for more than eighty years. For the first time a plan of the city was drawn, a plan very much like a checkerboard, having been modelled after the contemporary Chinese metropolis. The architectural style of the new palaces was also an imitation of that which then prevailed in China. The only difference was that wood was widely used here instead of brick, which was already the chief building material in China. Nobles were encouraged by the court to build tiled houses in place of thatched. Tiles began to come into use about that time, and not for roofing only, but for flooring also, though the checkerboard plan of the metropolitan city of Nara might never have been realised in full detail, and though among those palaces once built very few could escape the frequent fires and gradual decay, yet judging from those very few which have fortunately survived to this day, we may fairly imagine that they must have been grandiose in proportion to the general condition of the age. What gives the best clue to the social life of the higher classes of that time is the famous imperial treasury, Shô-sô-in, at Nara, now opened to a few specially honoured persons every autumn, when the air is very agreeably dry in Japan. The treasury contains various articles of daily and ceremonial use bequeathed by the Emperor Shômu, who was the eldest son of the Emperor Mommu and died in 749 A.D. after a reign of twenty-five years. Being so multifarious in their kinds, and having been wonderfully well preserved in a wooden storehouse, these imperial treasures, if taken together with numerous contemporary documents extant today, enable us to give a clear and accurate picture of the social life of that time.

As tatami matting was not yet known, and the houses occupied by men of high circles had their floors generally tiled, it may be naturally supposed that the indoor life of that time might have been nearer to that of the Chinese or the European than to that of the modern Japanese. Accordingly their outdoor life, too, must have been far different from that of the present day. For example, modern Japanese are fond of trimming or arranging flowers, putting two or three twigs into a small vase or a short bamboo tube, by methods which, however dainty, are very conventional after all. What they rejoice in thus is to produce a distorted semblance in miniature as tiny as possible of a certain aspect of nature. In the age of the Nara emperors, on the contrary, large bunches of flowers must have been used profusely in decorating rooms and tables, and perhaps to strew on the ground. A great many flower baskets, which are kept in the said treasury, and are of a kind to the use of which the modern Japanese are not accustomed, prove the above assertion. Again, while modern Japanese ladies play exclusively on the koto, a stringed musical instrument laid flat on the tatami when played, Nara musicians seem to have played on harps, too, one of which also is extant in the treasury. Carpets seem to have been used not only in covering the floor, but were put down on the ground on occasions of some ceremonial processions. Hunting, rowing, and horsemanship were then the most favourite pastimes of the nobles. Unlike modern Japanese ladies, women of that time were not behind men in riding. This one fact will perhaps suffice to attest the jovial and sprightly character of the social life of the Nara age.

If we turn to the literature of the time, the progress was remarkable, more easily perceivable than in any other department. We had now not only ballads as before, but short epics also. Such a change must of course be attributed to the influence of the Chinese literature assiduously cultivated. In the year 751 a collection of 120 select poems in Chinese, composed by the 64 Nara courtiers since the reign of the Emperor Tenchi, was compiled and named the Kwai-fû-sô. These poems are quite Chinese in their diction, rhetoric, and strain, resembling in every way those by first rate Chinese poets, and may fairly take rank among them without betraying any sign of imitation or pasticcio. If we consider that no kind of Japanese literature in its own mother tongue could be committed to writing, save only in Chinese ideographs, the influence of the Chinese literature, which flourished so rampantly at that time in Japan, cannot be estimated too highly. No wonder that, parallel to the compilation of the Chinese poems, a collection of Japanese poems, beginning with that of the Emperor Yûryaku in the latter half of the fifth century, was also undertaken. This collection is the celebrated Man-yô-shû. The long and short poems selected, however, were not restricted, as in the case of the Kwai-fû-sô, to those by courtiers only. On the contrary, it contained many poems sung by the common people, into which no whit of Chinese civilisation could have penetrated. The Man-yô-shû, therefore, is held by Japanese historians to be a very useful source-book as regards the social history of the time.

It is hardly to be denied that some of the Japanese poems of that age were evidently composed and committed to writing with the object of being read and not sung, as almost all modern Japanese poems are accustomed to be. There were still many others at the same time which must have been composed from the first in order only to be sung. Men of the age, of high as well as of low rank, were singularly fond of singing, generally accompanied by dancing. Many pathetic love stories are told about those gatherings of singers and dancers, the utagaki, which literally means the singing hedge or ring. This kind of gleeful gathering used to take place on a street, in an open field, or on a hill-top. In one of the utagaki held in the city of Nara, it is said that members of the imperial family took part too, shoulder to shoulder with citizens and denizens of very modest standing. As to dances of the time there might have been some styles original to the Japanese themselves. At the same time there were to be found many dances of foreign origin, imported, together with their musical accompaniments, from China and the peninsular states. These dances have long ago been entirely lost in their original homes, so that they can be witnessed only in our country now. A strange survival of ancient culture indeed! Of course even in our country those exotic and antiquated dances do not conform to the modern taste, and on that account are not frequently performed. They have been handed down through many generations, however, by the band of court musicians, and at present these dances, dating back to the T'ang dynasty, are performed only at certain archaic court ceremonies.

From what has been stated above, one can well imagine that, in certain respects, Japan of the Nara age had much in common with Greece just about the time of the Persian invasion. In both it was an age in which a vigorous race reached the first flourishing stage of civilisation, when the national energy began to be devoted to æsthetic pursuits, but was nevertheless not yet enervated by over-enlightenment. Whatever those Japanese set their minds on doing, they set about it very briskly and cheerfully, nor was their enthusiasm dampened by any fear of probable mishap. Being naïve, and therefore ignorant of obstacles inevitable to the progress of a nation, they always soared higher and higher, full of resplendent hope. How eager they were to essay at great things may be conjectured from the size of the Daibutsu, the colossal statue of Buddha, in the temple of the Tôdaiji at Nara. The statue, more than fifty-three feet in height, was finished in 749 A.D. after several successive failures encountered and overcome during four years, and is the largest that was ever made in Japan. That such a great statue was not only designed, but was executed by Japanese sculptors, whether their origin be of immigrant stock or not, should be considered a great credit to the enterprising spirit and the artistic acquirements of the Japanese of that epoch.

Such a stride in the national progress, however, was only attained at the expense of other quarters not at all insignificant. On the one hand, it is true that Japan benefited immensely by having had as her neighbor such a highly civilised country as China of the T'ang. On the other hand, it should not be overlooked that it was a great misfortune to us that we had such an over-shadowingly influential neighbour. China of that time was a nation too far in advance of us to encourage us to venture to compete with her. She left us no choice but to imitate her. Who can blame the Japanese of the Nara age if they thought it the most urgent business to run after China, and try to overtake her in the same track down which they knew the Chinese had progressed a long way already? The glory and splendour of the Chinese civilisation of the T'ang was too enticing for them to turn their eyes aside and seek a yet untrodden route. That they strove simply to imitate and rejoiced in behaving as though they were real Chinese should not be a matter for astonishment in the least. Perhaps it may be said to their credit that the imitation was exquisite and the resemblance accurate. One of the brilliant students then sent abroad remained there for eighteen years, and after his return to this country he eventually became a prominent minister of the Japanese government, notwithstanding his humble origin, a promotion very rare in those days. Certain branches of Chinese literature, many refined ceremonies, various kinds of Chinese pastimes, many things Chinese, useful and beneficial to our people, to be found in Japan even to this day have been attributed to his importation. Another scholar who was obliged to stay in China for more than fifty years, distinguished himself in the literary circles of the Chinese metropolis, was taken into the service of a T'ang emperor as a very high official under a Chinese name, and at last died there with a life-long yearning for his native country.

Such an imitation, however useful it might have proved in behalf of our country at large, could not fail to exact from the nation still young, as Japan was at that time, a tremendous overexertion of their mental faculties. Having been strained to the last extremity of tension, the Japanese became naturally exceedingly nervous. From a lack of patience to observe quietly the maturing of the effect of a stack of laws and regulations already enacted, they hastily repudiated some of them as if they were of no use, and replaced them by new laws quite as confounding as the previous ones, and thus legislations contradictory in principle rapidly succeeded one another, none of them having had time enough to be experimented with exhaustively. Although along with this rage for imitation there was a strong countercurrent, very conservative, which struggled incessantly to preserve what was original and at the same time precious, yet to determine which was worthy of preservation was a matter of bewilderment to the contemporaries, for they were averse from coming into any collision with things Chinese to which they were not at all loth. Excitement and irritation, the natural result of this topsyturvy state of things, can best be estimated by the belief in ridiculous auspices. The discovery of a certain plant or animal, of rare colour or of unusual shape, generally caused by deformities, was enthusiastically welcomed as an augury of a long and peaceful reign, and was wont to call forth some lengthy imperial proclamation in praise of the government. Bounties were munificently distributed to commemorate the happy occasion, discoverers of these rarities were amply rewarded, criminals were released or had the hardships of their servitude ameliorated. Naturally, many of these auguries proved vain, and only served as a prop to sustain the self-conceit of responsible ministers, or as a means of soothing general discontent, if such discontent could ever be manifested in those "good old times." The greatest evil of this fatuous hankering for sources of self-satisfaction was the throng of rogues and sycophants thereby produced who vied with one another in contriving false or specious rarities and begging imperial favour for them. Superstitions of this kind would have suited well enough a people quite uncivilised, or too civilised to care for rational things. As for the Japanese, a people already on the way of youthful progress, radiant with hope, belief in auspices was but an intolerable fetter. If viewed from this single point, therefore, the régime ought to have been reformed by any means.

Another and still greater evil of the age was the clashing of interests between the different classes of people. Chinese civilisation could permeate only the powerful, the higher classes. Though the chieftains and lords, who had been mighty in the former régime, were bereft of their power by the appropriation of their lands and people, a new class of nobles soon arose in place of them, and among the latter the descendants of Nakatomi-no-Kamatari were the most prominent. This sagacious minister, of whom I have already spoken in the foregoing chapters, was rewarded, in consideration of his meritorious services in the destruction of the Soga, as well as in the execution of the most radical reform Japan has ever known, with the office of the most intimate advisory minister of the Emperor, and was granted the honourable family appellation of Fujiwara. His descendants, who have ramified into innumerable branches and include more than half of the court-nobles of the present day, enjoyed ever-increasing imperial favour generation after generation. What marked especially the sudden growth of the family position was the elevation of one of the grand-daughters of the minister to be the imperial consort of the Emperor Shômu. For several centuries prior to this, it had been the custom to choose the empress from the daughters of the families of the blood imperial. An offspring of a subject, however high her father's rank might be, was not recognised as qualified to that distinction. The privilege, which the Fujiwara family was now exceptionally honoured with, meant that only this family should have hereafter its place next to the imperial, so that none other would be allowed to vie with it any more. The Fujiwara became thus associated with the imperial family more and more closely, and affairs of state gradually came to be transacted as if they were the family business of the Fujiwara. The worst evil of this aggrandisement was only prevented by the incessant and inveterate internecine feuds within the clan itself, which eventually served to put a bridle on the audacity and ambition of any one of the members.

This influential family of the Fujiwara, together with a few other nobles of different lineage, including scions of the imperial family, monopolised almost all the wealth and power in the country. They kept a great number of slaves in their households, and held vast tracts of private estates, too. As to the land, they developed and cultivated the fields by the hands of their slaves or leased them for rent. Besides, they turned into private properties those lands of which they were legally allowed only the usufruct. By the reform legislation, the usufruct of a public land was granted to one who did much service to the state, but the duration of the right was limited to his life or at most to that of his grand-children. None was permitted to hold the public land as a hereditary possession without time limit. It was by the infringement of these regulations that arbitrary occupation was realised.

Another means of the aggrandisement of the estates of the nobles was a fraudulent practice on the part of the common people. Those who were independent landowners or legal leaseholders of public lands were liable to taxation, as may be supposed, and as the taxes and imposts of that time were pretty heavy, those landholders thought it wiser to alienate the land formally by presenting it to some influential nobles or some Buddhist temples, which came to be privileged, or asserted the right to be exempted from the burden of taxation. In reality, of course, those people continued to hold the land as before, and were very glad to see their burden much alleviated, for the tribute which they were obliged to pay to the nominal landlord by the transaction must have been less than the regular taxes which they owed to the government. Moreover, by this presentation they could enter under the protection of those nobles or temples, which was useful for them in defying the law, should need arise. The number of independent landholders thus gradually diminished by the renunciation of the legal right and duty on the part of the holders, and consequently the amount of the levied tax grew less and less. The state, however, could not curtail the necessary amount of the expenditure on that account. The dignity of the court had to be upheld higher and higher, state ceremonies performed regularly, and the national defence was not to be neglected for a moment. All these were causes which necessitated a continual increase of revenue. In order to fill up the deficit, the burden was transferred, doubled or trebled, to those who remained longer honest, so that it soon became quite unbearable for them also. The hardships borne by the law-abiding people of that time could be compared to those of the Huguenots who, faithful to their confession, were impoverished by the dragonnade. In this way, more and more people were induced to give up their independent stand and take shelter under the shield of mighty protectors. Military service, too, was another grievance for the common people. They had to serve in the western islands against continental invaders, or on the northern frontier against the Ainu. Not only did they thereby risk their lives, but sometimes they were obliged to procure their provisions at their own cost, for the government could not afford it. If those people would once renounce their right of independence and turn voluntary vagabonds, then they could at once elude the military duty and the tax. No wonder this was possible since it was an age in which the national consciousness was not yet developed enough to teach them implicitly that it was their duty to be ready to expose themselves to any peril for the sake of the state. This underhand transaction is one exceedingly analogous to the process in which Frankish allod-holders gradually turned their lands into fiefs, in order to escape taxation and at the same time obtain protection from influential persons. If one should think that the census, which was ordained in the reform law to take place periodically, would prove efficient to check the increase of these outcasts, it would be a great mistake in forming a just conception of these ages. Soon after the enactment of the census law, it ceased to be regularly executed, and even while the law was observed with punctuality, the extent to which it was applied must have been very limited. It was at such a time that the great statue of Buddha was completed in the city of Nara, and ten thousand priests were invited to take part in a grand ceremony of rejoicing.