Page:Things Japanese (1905).djvu/235

Rh  peak issuing from the clouds. The great Shimazu family of Satsuma has the cross within a circle.

 History and Mythology. To the eye of the critical investigator, Japanese history properly so-called opens only in the latter part of the fifth or the beginning of the sixth century after Christ, when the gradual spread of Chinese culture, filtering in through Korea, had sufficiently dispelled the gloom of original barbarism to allow of the keeping of records.

The whole question of the credibility of the early history of Japan has been carefully gone into during the last five-and-twenty years by Aston and others, with the result that the first date pronounced trustworthy is A.D. 461, and it is discovered that even the annals of the sixth century are to be received with caution. We ourselves have no doubt of the justice of this negative criticism, and can only stand in amaze at the simplicity of most European writers, who have accepted, without sifting them, the uncritical statements of the Japanese annalists. One eminent German professor, the late Dr. Hoffmann, actually discusses the hour of Jimmu Tennō's accession in the year 660 B.C, which is much as if one should gravely compute in cubic inches the size of the pumpkin which Cinderella's fairy godmother turned into a coach and six. How comes it that profound erudition so often lacks the salt of humour and the guidance of common sense?

Be this as it may, criticism is not at all a "Japanesey" thing; and as Japanese art and literature contain frequent allusions to the early history (so-called) of the country, the chief outlines of this history, as preserved in the works entitled Kojiki and Nihongi, both dating from the eighth century after Christ, may here be given. We include the mythology under the same heading, for the reason that it is absolutely impossible to separate the two. Why, indeed, attempt to do so, where both are equally fabulous? 