Japan. Various

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СКАЧАТЬ character, so that learning occupied a high place in popular esteem. But unfortunately the scholarship of the age drifted into superficialities of style to the neglect of practical uses. Writers of verses applied themselves to imitating Chinese poets, and writers of prose thought only of constructing their phrases in such a manner that combinations of four ideograms should in regular alternation be followed by combinations of six—a form of composition known as the Shirokuheirei (four-and-six order). But despite this slavish adherence to valueless forms, a notable literary achievement has to be placed to the credit of the era; namely, the elaboration of the syllabaries, the hira-kana and the kata-kana. The first syllabary ever used in Japan had been the manyō-gana, in which the Chinese ideograms were used phonetically with little attention to their original meaning. But to write a Chinese ideogram for each syllable of a Japanese word involved much labor, since in many cases a single ideogram was composed of numerous strokes and dots. The difficulty was gradually lessened during the Nara epoch by the simplification of Chinese characters to such an extent that only a rudimentary skeleton of each ideogram was symbolically used to represent its sound. The syllables thus obtained were arranged in a table of fifty sounds, constituting the kata-kana. Thenceforth, instead of the pain of committing to memory thousands of ideograms, and employing them with no little toil, it became possible to record the most complex thoughts by the aid of fifty simple symbols. Nevertheless, since the nation had come to regard Chinese literature as the classics of learning, scholars were still compelled to use Chinese ideograms and to follow Chinese rules of composition, so that the cursive forms of the Chinese characters became the recognized script of educated men. These cursive characters possessed one advantage: they were capable of considerable abbreviation within certain limits. Naturally, the facility they offered in that respect was more and more utilized, until at length their forms were modified to comparative simplicity. When the great prelate Kūkai composed, for mnemonic purposes, the rhyming syllabary which comprised all the necessary sounds without repetition, the forms of the simplified characters may be considered to have finally crystallized into the syllabary known as the hira-kana.

      The invention of these two systems of kana syllabaries gave a powerful impetus to the growth of prose writing. Many varieties of composition, fictions, diaries, travels, and fugitive sketches, were added to the literature of the time. But as men who aspired to the title of scholar continued to write in Chinese ideograms, the domain of Japanese prose was occupied, almost exclusively, by women. It is recorded of the Emperor Ichijō (987–1012 A. D.) that he boasted that, although his own abilities did not entitle him to wear the crown, his reign was not less rich in talented subjects than had been the reigns of even Daigo and Murakami, historically regarded as the best sovereigns of the whole imperial line. The boast was not unwarranted, for in that era flourished great writers of both sexes, the charm and grace of whose diction have been vainly imitated by later generations. Of these, Mura-saki-shikibu especially attracts attention, on account of her celebrated work, the "Genji-monogatari," a romance in fifty-four volumes. Sei-Shōnagon's name is remembered for her "Makura-no-sōshi," as peerless a production in literary sketches as was the "Genji-monogatari" in fiction.

      Even more energy was expended on the production of verses than on prose writing. In the last part of the ninth century after almost a century of the sway of Chinese poetry, the tide flowed once more in the direction of Japanese verses, and they soon engrossed the minds of the noble classes. Beginning with the "Kokinshū," poems compiled by imperial order by Ki-no-Tsurayuki, himself a celebrated poet, no less than seven poetical compilations were made by order of the sovereigns during the rest of the Hei-an epoch, to which were still later added others to the number of twenty-one. The art of versification made a wonderful progress, but the rustic vigor and grandeur of the poems of the "Manyō-shū" gave place to tricks of phraseology and flowers of speech in the later poetry. Nor were poems with many stanzas approved any longer, for it became the pride of the later poets to embody clever wit and hidden charm in the space of thirty-one syllables. Thus poetry was stunted, and literary terms and the speech of everyday life unnecessarily separated each from the other.

      As was so clearly reflected in poetry, the rude and unpolished but frugal and industrious habits of the Nara age disappeared as the Hei-an epoch grew older. Instead of vigor and simple strength, luxury and effeminate gaud became the fashion. Society grew more and more enervated and self-indulgent. The metropolis was the center of magnificence and the focus of pleasure. Reference has already been made to the spaciousness and grandeur of the imperial palace. The princes and great nobles were scarcely less superbly housed, every aristocratic dwelling consisting of a number of artistically arranged buildings. There had also grown up among nobles and men of affluence the habit of choosing in the suburbs some spot noted for scenic charms, and there building for themselves retreats on which all the artistic and decorative resources of the time were lavished. As for the imperial palace, however, from the time when it was destroyed by a conflagration (960 A. D.), it suffered a steady diminution in size and splendor, whereas the mansions of the ministers of the crown grew constantly larger and more magnificent, their inmates wearing gorgeous garments of rich brocades and elaborately embroidered silks. Officials, courtiers, and their families emulated one another in the richness of their apparel. When they went abroad, they rode in carriages resplendent with gold and silver. By and by, the active discharge of official and administrative functions began to be despised by the higher classes, military training and the rude exercises of arms falling into especial disfavor. Thus it fell out that the nobles of the court, having abundant leisure, were enabled to devote their time to literary culture, the elaboration of etiquette, and the pursuit of luxurious pleasures. In the imperial court, at pleasant times in the fair seasons, on fine spring mornings or under the soft moonlight of autumn, gatherings were held at which the guests vied with one another in making music and composing poetry. There were also specially appointed festive occasions: as, for example, entertainments in April (third month of the old calendar) when wine-cups were floated down stream; or in February (first month of the old calendar) when young pines growing on the hills or in the fields were pulled up by the roots; or in the fall, to view the changing tints of the maples; the most aristocratic of all these festivities being one in which three picturesquely-decorated boats were launched upon some river or lake and filled exclusively with persons who excelled in some one of the "three accomplishments," namely, Chinese poetry, Japanese poetry, or music. In the reign of the Emperor Uda five fête days were established: New Year's Day, the third of the third month, the fifth of the fifth month, the seventh of the seventh month, and the ninth of the ninth month; to which were also added the festival of the "late moonlight" (13th of the ninth month), and the festival of "the last chysanthemums."

      Of games played in-doors checkers (go) and a kind of dice (sugo-roku) were much in vogue; while the favorite outdoor sports were foot-ball, polo, and hawking, together with horse-racing and equestrian archery. At wine-feasts, various kinds of songs, some classical, some popular, were chanted with dancing, and Chinese and Japanese stanzas were composed and sung. From the end of the eleventh century personal adornment was carried so far that even men began to imitate women in the matter of painting their eye-brows and blackening their teeth, much as though they sought to disguise themselves in the likeness of the puppets set up at the festival of the third month. Not inaptly did the wits of the time dub these mummers "lunar courtiers," or "elegants from cloud-land." On such occasions of festival and sport, men and women of noble rank mixed freely, and laxity of morals ensued. The ceremony of marriage had been duly established, but wives still continued to live in their own houses, where they received the visits of their husbands. In short, the gratification of the senses was the first object of the time, and if men thought of anything more serious, it was only the building and endowment of a temple where prayers might be said and litanies sung for the prosperity of themselves and their children in this world and their happiness in a future state.

      All these circumstances should be viewed only in conjunction with the progress of the political power of the Fujiwara family. The great deeds of Kamatari and the scarcely less distinguished services of his son Fuhito established the renown of the family, and in the marriage of the Emperor Shōmu with a daughter of Fuhito we have the first instance of a procedure which afterward became common, namely the elevation of a subject to the position of imperial consort. СКАЧАТЬ