Japan: An Attempt at Interpretation

by Lafcadio Hearn

Material for the study of the old laws and customs have not yet been collected in sufficient quantity to yield us full information as to the conditions of all classes before Meiji. But a great deal of precious work has been accomplished in this direction by American scholars; and the labours of Professor Wigmore and of the late Dr. Simmons have furnished documentary evidence from which much can be learned about the legal status of the masses during the Tokugawa period. This, as I have said, was the period of the most elaborated regulation. The extent to which the people were controlled can be best inferred from the nature and number of the sumptuary laws to which they were subjected. Sumptuary laws in Old Japan probably exceeded in multitude and minuteness anything of which Western legal history yields record. Rigidly as the family-cult dictated behaviour in the home, strictly as the commune enforced its standards of communal duty,—just so rigidly and strictly did the rulers of the nation dictate how the individual—man, woman, or child—should dress, walk, sit, [164] speak, work, eat, drink. Amusements were not less unmercifully regulated than were labours.

Every class of Japanese society was under sumptuary regulation,—the degree of regulation varying in different centuries; and this kind of legislation appears to have been established at an early period. It is recorded that, in the year 681 A.D., the Emperor Temmu regulated the costumes of all classes,—"from the Princes of the Blood down to the common people,—and the wearing of headdresses and girdles, as well as of all kinds of coloured stuffs,—according to a scale."* [* See Nihongi Aston's translation, Vol. II, pp. 343, 349, 350.] The costumes and the colours to be worn by priests and nuns had been already fixed, by an edict issued in 679 A.D. Afterwards these regulations were greatly multiplied and detailed. But it was under the Tokugawa rulers, a thousand years later, that sumptuary laws obtained their most remarkable development; and the nature of them is best: indicated by the regulations applying to the peasantry. Every detail of the farmer's existence was prescribed for by law,—from the size, form, and cost of his dwelling, down even to such trifling matters as the number and the quality of the dishes to be served to him at meal-times. A farmer with an income of 100 koku of rice—(let us say 90 to 100 pounds per annum)—might build a house 60 feet long, but no longer: he was forbidden to construct it with a room containing an alcove; and he was not [165] allowed—except by special permission—to roof it with tiles. None of his family were permitted to wear silk; and in case of the marriage of his daughter to a person legally entitled to wear silk, the bridegroom was to be requested not to wear silk at the wedding. Three kinds of viands only were to be served at the wedding of such a farmer's daughter or son; and the quality as well as the quantity of the soup, fish, or sweetmeats offered to the wedding-guests, were legally fixed. So likewise the number of the wedding-gifts: even the cost of the presents, of rice-wine and dried fish was prescribed, and the quality of the single fan which it was permissible to offer the bride. At no time was a farmer allowed to make any valuable presents to his friends. At a funeral he might serve the guests with certain kinds of plain food; but if rice-wine were served it was not to be served in wine-cups,—only in soup-cups! (The latter regulation probably referred to Shinto funerals in especial.) On the occasion of a child's birth, the grandparents were allowed to make only four presents (according to custom),—including "one cotton baby-dress"; and the values of the presents were fixed. On the occasion of the Boy's Festival, the presents to be given to the child by the whole family, including grandparents, were limited by law to "one paper-flag," and "two toy-spears." … A farmer whose, property was assessed at 50 koku was forbidden to [166] build a house more than 45 feet long. At the wedding of his daughter the gift-girdle was not to exceed 50 sen in value; and it was forbidden to serve more than one kind of soup at the wedding-feast…. A farmer with a property assessed at 20 koku was not allowed to build a house more than 36 feet long, or to use in building it such superior qualities of wood as keyaki or hinoki. The roof of his house was to be made of bamboo-thatch or straw; and he was strictly forbidden the comfort of floor-mats. On the occasion of the wedding of his daughter he was forbidden to have fish or any roasted food served at the wedding-feast. The women of his family were not allowed to wear leather sandals: they might wear only straw-sandals or wooden clogs; and the thongs of the sandals or the clogs were to be made of cotton. The women were further forbidden to wear hair-bindings of silk, or hair-ornaments of tortoise-shells; but they might wear wooden combs and combs of bone—not ivory. The men were forbidden to wear stockings, and their sandals were to be made of bamboo.* [*There are sandals or clogs made of bamboo-wood, but the meaning here is bamboo-grass.] They were also forbidden to use sun-shades —hi-gasa—or paper-umbrellas…. A farmer assessed at 10 koku was forbidden to build a house more than 30 feet long. The women of his family were required to wear sandals with thongs of [167] bamboo-grass. At the wedding of his son or daughter one present only was allowed,—a quilt-chest. At the birth of his child one present only was to be made: namely, one toy-spear, in the case of a boy; or one paper-doll, or one "mud-doll," in the case of a girl… As for the more unfortunate class of farmers, having no land of their own, and officially termed mizunomi, or "water-drinkers," it is scarcely necessary to remark that these were still more severely restricted in regard to food, apparel, etc. They were not even allowed, for example, to have a quilt-chest as a wedding-present. But a fair idea of the complexity of these humiliating restrictions can only be obtained by reading the documents published by Professor Wigmore, which chiefly consist of paragraphs like these:—

"The collar and the sleeve-ends of the clothes may be ornamented with silk, and an obi (soft girdle) of silk or crepe-silk may be worn—but not in public." …

"A family ranking less than 20 koku must use the Takeda-wan (Takeda rice-bowl), and the Nikko-zen (Nikko tray).".. (These were utensils of the cheapest kind of lacquer-ware.)

"Large farmers or chiefs of Kumi may use umbrellas; but small farmers and farm-labourers must use only mino (straw-raincoats), and broad straw-hats." …

These documents published by Professor Wigmore contain only the regulations issued for the daimiate of Maizuru; but regulations equally [168] minute and vexatious appear to have been enforced throughout the whole country. In Izumo I found that, prior to Meiji, there were sumptuary laws prescribing not only the material of the dresses to be worn by the various classes, but even the colours of them, and the designs of the patterns. The size of rooms, as well as the size of houses, was fixed there by law,—also the height of buildings and of fences, the number of windows, the material of construction…. It is difficult for the Western mind to understand how human beings could patiently submit to laws that regulated not only the size of one's dwelling, and the cost of its furniture, but even the substance and character of clothing,—not only the expense of a wedding outfit, but the quality of the marriage-feast, and the quality of the vessels in which the food was to be served,—not only the kind of ornaments to be worn in a woman's hair, but the material of the thongs of her sandals,—not only the price of presents to be made to friends, but the character and the cost of the cheapest toy to be given to a child. And the peculiar constitution of society made it possible to enforce this sumptuary legislation by communal will; the people were obliged to coerce themselves! Each community, as we have seen, had been organized in groups of five or more households, called kumi; and the heads of the households forming a kumi elected one of their number as kumi-gashira, or group-chief, directly [169] responsible to the higher authority. The kumi was accountable for the conduct of each and all of its members; and each member was in some sort responsible for the rest. "Every member of a kumi," declares one of the documents above mentioned, "must carefully watch the conduct of his fellow-members. If any one violates these regulations, without due excuse, he is to be punished; and his kumi will also be held responsible." Responsible even for the serious offence of giving more than one paper-doll to a child! … But we should remember that in early Greek and Roman societies there was much legislation of a similar kind. The laws of Sparta regulated the way in which a woman should dress her hair; the laws of Athens fixed the number of her robes. At Rome, in early times, women were forbidden to drink wine; and a similar law existed in the Greek cities of Miletus and Massilia. In Rhodes and Byzantium the citizen was forbidden to shave; in Sparta he was forbidden to wear a moustache. (I need scarcely refer to the later Roman laws regulating the cost of marriage-feasts, and the number of guests that might be invited to a banquet; for this legislation was directed chiefly against luxury.) The astonishment evoked by Japanese sumptuary laws, particularly as inflicted upon the peasantry, is justified less by their general character than by their implacable minuteness,—their ferocity of detail…. [170] Where a man's life was legally ordered even to the least particulars,—even to the quality of his foot-gear and head-gear, the cost of his wife's hairpins, and the price of his child's doll,—one could hardly suppose that freedom of speech would have been tolerated. It did not exist; and the degree to which speech became regulated can be imagined only by those who have studied the spoken tongue. The hierarchical organization of society was faithfully reflected in the conventional organization of language,—in the ordination of pronouns, nouns, and verbs,—in the grades conferred upon adjectives by prefixes or suffixes. With the same merciless exactitude which prescribed rules for dress, diet, and manner of life, all utterance was regulated both negatively and positively,—but positively much more than negatively. There was little insistence upon what was not to be said; but rules innumerable decided exactly what should be said,—the word to be chosen, the phrase to be used. Early training enforced caution in this regard: everybody had to learn that only certain verbs and nouns and pronouns were lawful when addressing superiors, and other words permissible only when speaking to equals or to inferiors. Even the uneducated were obliged to learn something about this. But education cultivated a system of verbal etiquette so multiform that only the training of years could enable any one to master it. Among the [171] higher classes this etiquette developed almost inconceivable complexity. Grammatical modifications of language, which, by implication, exalted the person addressed or humbly depreciated the person addressing, must have come into general use at some very early period; but under subsequent Chinese influence these forms of propitiatory speech multiplied exceedingly. From the Mikado himself—who still makes use of personal pronouns, or at least pronominal expressions, forbidden to any other mortal—down through all the grades of society, each class had an "I" peculiarly its own. Of terms corresponding to "you" or "thou" there are still sixteen in use; but formerly there were many more. There are yet eight different forms of the second person singular used only in addressing children, pupils, or servants.* Honorific or humble forms of nouns indicating relationship were similarly multiplied and graded: there are still in use nine terms signifying "father," nine terms signifying "mother," eleven terms for "wife," eleven terms for "son," nine terms for "daughter," and seven terms for "husband." The rules of the verb, above all, were complicated by the exigencies of etiquette to a [172] degree of which no idea can be given in any brief statement…. At nineteen or twenty years of age a person carefully trained from childhood might have learned all the necessary verbal usages of respectable society; but for a mastery of the etiquette of superior converse many more years of study and experience were required. With the unceasing multiplication of ranks and classes there came into existence a corresponding variety of forms of language: it was possible to ascertain to what class a man or a woman belonged by listening to his or to her conversation. The written, like the spoken tongue, was regulated by strict convention: the forms used by women were not those used by men; and those differences in verbal etiquette arising from the different training of the sexes resulted in the creation of a special epistolary style,—a "woman's language," which remains in use. And this sex-differentiation of language was not confined to letter-writing: there was a woman's language also of converse, varying according to class. Even to-day, in ordinary conversation, an educated woman makes use of words and phrases not employed by men. Samurai women especially had their particular forms of expression in feudal times; and it is still possible to decide, from the speech of any woman brought up according to the old home-training, whether she belongs to a Samurai family.

[*The sociologist will of course understand that these facts are not by any means inconsistent with that very sparing use of pronouns so amusingly discussed in Percival Lowell's "Soul of the Far East." In societies where subjection is extreme "there is an avoidance of the use of personal pronouns," though, as Herbert Spencer points out in illustrating this law, it is just among such societies that the most elaborate distinctions in pronominal forms of address are to be found.]

[173] Of course the matter as well as the manner of converse was restricted; and the nature of the restraints upon free speech can be inferred from the nature of the restraints upon freedom of demeanour. Demeanour was most elaborately and mercilessly regulated, not merely as to obeisances, of which there were countless grades, varying according to sex as well as class,—but even in regard to facial expression, the manner of smiling, the conduct of the breath, the way of sitting, standing, walking, rising. Everybody was trained from infancy in this etiquette of expression and deportment. At what period it first became a mark of disrespect to betray, by look or gesture, any feeling of grief or pain in the presence of a superior, we cannot know; there is reason to believe that the most perfect self-control in this regard was enforced from prehistoric times. But there was gradually developed—partly, perhaps, under Chinese teaching—a most elaborate code of deportment which exacted very much more than impassiveness. It required not only that any sense of anger or pain should be denied all outward expression, but that the sufferer's face and manner should indicate the contrary feeling. Sullen submission was an offence; mere impassive obedience inadequate: the proper degree of submission should manifest itself by a pleasant smile, and by a soft and happy tone of voice. The smile, however, was also regulated. [174] One had to be careful about the quality of the smile: it was a mortal offence, for example, so to smile in addressing a superior, that the back teeth could be seen. In the military class especially this code of demeanour was ruthlessly enforced. Samurai women were required, like the women of Sparta, to show signs of joy on hearing that their husbands or sons had fallen in battle: to betray any natural feeling under the circumstances was a grave breach of decorum. And in all classes demeanour was regulated so severely that even to-day the manners of the people everywhere still reveal the nature of the old discipline. The strangest fact is that the old-fashioned manners appear natural rather than acquired, instinctive rather than made by training. The bow,—the sibilant in drawing of the breath which accompanies the prostration, and is practised also in praying to the gods,—the position of the hands upon the floor in the moment of greeting or of farewell,—the way of sitting or rising or walking in presence of a guest,—the manner of receiving or presenting anything,—all these ordinary actions have a charm of seeming naturalness that mere teaching seems incapable of producing. And this is still more true of the higher etiquette,—the exquisite etiquette of the old-time training in cultivated classes, —particularly as displayed by women. We must suppose that the capacity to acquire such manners depends considerably upon inheritance,—that it could only have [175] been formed by the past experience of the race under discipline.

What such discipline, as regards politeness, must have signified for the mass of the people, may be inferred from the enactment of Iyeyasu authorizing a Samurai to kill any person of the three inferior classes guilty of rudeness. Be it observed that Iyeyasu was careful to qualify the meaning of "rude": he said that the Japanese term for a rude fellow signified "an other-than-expected person"—so that to commit an offence worthy of death it was only necessary to act in an "unexpected manner"; that is to say, contrary to prescribed etiquette:—

"The Samurai are the masters of the four classes. Agriculturists, artizans, and merchants may not behave in a rude manner towards Samurai. The term for a rude man is an 'other-than-expected fellow'; and a Samurai is not to be interfered with in cutting down a fellow who has behaved to him in a manner other than is expected. The Samurai are grouped into direct retainers, secondary retainers, and nobles and retainers of high and low grade; but the same line of conduct is equally allowable to them all towards an other-than-expected fellow."—[Art. 45.]