Dramatis Personae

Oke and Woke

For those who have been somewhat confused by the names I apologize, but this episode isn’t going to get any better—and it is possibly worse. Much of the narrative focuses on these two brothers, and I’ve seen their names transcribed in a number of ways, all very similar. Students of modern Japanese may note that “Wo” is really just pronounced “O” these days, and only used as a particle marker, but here I’ve chosen, along with others, to keep the archaic “Wo” instead of the modern “O” as a marker to help distinguish between the two.

The Kojiki has these as as 冨祁 (Oke) and袁祁 (Woke), and the Nihon Shoki has 億計 (Ohoke) and 弘計 (Woke) [Romanized transcription via Aston, though he claims to take it from his reading of the Kojiki]. In the Kujiki, Bentley tells us that it is 雄計 (Woke) for the younger brother, and transcribes the elder brother as “Oke” (Or, more appropriately, Okye and Wokye).

If Aston’s transcription is correct, then I can see this as Opoke (Big/Elder Ke) and Woke (Small/Younger Ke), though that still doesn’t tell us a lot, though we have seen that dichotomy elsewhere in the Chronicles. The fact that they don’t use 大 and 小, though, does make me wonder. Other explanations suggest that “Oke - Oke” is called out during a particular dance, and that this may be why their names are as they are. And so I guess as I spell it out we’ll content ourselves with Oke and Woke, with Oke being the elder, and Woke being the younger brother.

I am also still wondering about the names “Kume no Shimako” and “Kume no Wakako” that also seem to be applied to them. I considered using those, but honestly, it is not how you are going to encounter them elsewhere, and I think we have generally just given up with trying to make it “make sense” beyond what it is.

Iitoyo

Aka Ihitoyo, she is an interesting figure. She is either the sister or aunt to Oke and Woke, and some footnotes make her their maternal aunt, vice their paternal aunt. Either way, she is something of an interesting figure in that she appears to be a female ruler, even if just briefly. Some have suggested that she originates in the “Toyo” that followed Himiko in the Wei records, but I think that is a bit of a stretch. We definitely seem to be getting into more well-sourced history, here, even if things are still distorted by time and bias.

Speaking of bias, I’ll admit that what I read into the story of her decision to eschew sex certainly is colored by my own bias. On the one hand, I want to be careful reading too much into things and we should always be cautious about trying to assign someone else an identity. On the other hand, I think representation is important, and it is helpful to see beyond the heteronormative social structures that are built up around what society tells us a man and woman should do and be.

In fact, western views of gender roles and gender norms don’t exactly fit Japanese society through much of its history. This isn’t to say that they didn’t have cultural norms, just that we will see time and again where those constructed cultural norms may not be what we, ourselves, expect.

Locations

This entire episode, including the murder of Ichinobe, all takes place in an area from about modern Kobe in the west to the area around Lake Biwa, and, of course, down to the Nara Basin. Prominently mentioned are Ōmi (aka Afumi), Yamashiro, Tanba, Harima, and Settsu—as well as areas indicating Kawachi and Yamato. This is probably reflective of the area of more direct Yamato control at the time, including the strongholds of the families that made up the Yamato court.

Welcome to Sengoku Daimyo’s Chronicles of Japan, my name is Joshua and this is Episode 66: A Challenger Appears!
In this episode we’ll deal with murder and revenge, against both the living and the dead. We’ll also briefly discuss someone who may have been the first LGBTQ+ ruler of Yamato—or at least she is in my head canon; I’ll leave you to make your own judgments there. But of course, first off, we have to deal with where we left off last episode.
A brief recap: At this point, Yamato seemed to be in pretty good shape. Ohohatsuse Wakatake, aka Yuryaku Tenno, who we’ve spent several episodes talking about, had done well by Yamato, at least on the archipelago. He had expanded power by consolidating various industries into familial Be structures that reported to a head in the Yamato court. And sure, there were political differences with Kibi, but that state and others were copying Yamato’s kingly round-keyhole style tombs, at least, so clearly Yamato influence had spread. Even if they didn’t have direct control, they seem to have been at least primus inter pares—first among equals.
However, the royal family was not exactly in a great place. Even before coming to the throne, Wakatake had pruned the branches, killing his own brothers and his cousin in order to rule. And towards the end of his reign, he had no children with his queen, but he did have Prince Shiraga, his son with Kara Hime, who he made Crown Prince. He did have two other sons by Kibi no Waka Hime, but one of them, Prince Hoshikawa, tried to usurp the throne. Soon he and all of Waka Hime’s other children were wiped out, leaving only Shiraga, known to us as Seinei Tennou.
And now, here was Shiraga, childless, without any heir to succeed him. We talked about his brief and pretty uneventful rule last episode. It looked like the royal line was going to die out with him, leaving the throne of Yamato empty, and no doubt setting off a period of violent fighting for the throne.
And yet, we still have the royal line: the Imperial Household is still a thing, even to this day, and they claim an unbroken line of descent all the way back to the Heavenly Descendant. While some may question just how unbroken that line really is, the Chronicles, at least, support this claim, so what happened at this turning point in the succession? Was there a miracle birth? Did Shiraga finally find a woman and settle down?
Well, according to the Chronicles, what happened was thanks to a man by the name of Wodate of the Kume Be of Iyo, the lord of the land of Harima. In 481, he arrived at the court, fresh from a trip to the district of Akashi, and he had quite the story to tell.
You see, Wodate had been sent out to collect taxes in preparation for the Daijosai, the Feast of First Fruits. This is similar to the Ninamesai, which celebrates the first fruits of the harvest every year, except that the Daijosai was celebrated at the start of a new reign—in this case, the reign of Shiraga no Ohokimi.
When Wodate arrived in Akashi, the local lord was named Hosome, the chief of Oshinomi Be and the Obito, or head, of the granaries of Shijimi. Hosome welcomed Wodate and invited him to a house-warming feast in honor of his newly built muro—a large pit-house that seems to have been designated for communal gatherings of some kind. A fire was lit, probably in the center of the muro, and it was tended by two boys whose job it was to keep it lit.
Hosome and his guests feasted and reveled deep into the night. At one point, after all of the guests had taken turns dancing, Wodate came to notice the two boys keeping the fire. They were somewhat precocious, being extremely courteous, and Wodate offered to play music while they got up and danced.
At first the two boys—brothers, it turns out—deferred to one another, each offering the other the honor of going first. This went on so long that Wodate had to interrupt them and tell them to just go already.
First up was the older brother. He danced to the sound of the Wodate’s music, and when he was finished, his younger brother stood up.
At first he sang a song toasting the health of the new muro, and Hosome, the master of the house.
After that, he sang another song, accompanied with music, which impressed Wodate who asked for more.
And so the younger brother danced something that the Nihon Shoki calls a “Tatsutsu dance”, which meant that he stood up and sat down during the dance. During this he sang:
Of Yamato
The Rustling Reed Plain
The Reed Plain
The younger Prince am I.
And if you didn’t just catch that, yes, this young fire tender was basically making a claim that he was a Prince of Yamato.
Well, now, this was quite the turn. Wodate was astonished—floored, I dare say—and yet also intrigued. He asked him to go on and give another song.
Without even hesitating, the younger brother obliged:
The sacred cedar
Of Furu in Isonokami--
Its stem is severed,
Its branches are stripped off.
Of him who in the Palace of Ichinobe
Governed all under Heaven,
The myriad Heavens,
The myriad lands--
Of Oshiha no Mikoto
The august children are we.
There was no mistaking it this time. This young servant was claiming that he and his brother were, in fact, the children of Ichinobe no Oshiha no Mikoto, and thus they were princes of royal blood, and potential heirs to the throne.
Now to dig into this a bit we are going to have to go back in time somewhat—back to just before Wakatake came to power, which we covered in episode 57. At that time, Wakatake’s older brother, Anaho, had been sovereign, known to us today as Ankou Tennou. He was killed by his own stepson who blamed Anaho for killing the boy’s father and then taking his mother as his wife. This kicked off a chain of events, during which Wakatake, claiming to seek justice, killed his other brothers as well as the young boy and those who harbored him. But that wasn’t enough, because Wakatake was guilty of that same crime of which Brutus accused Caesar, at least according to the bard—he was ambitious. And if he wanted to attain the highest position in the land it wasn’t just his brothers he had to contend with. No, there was one more obstacle in his way: Ichiniohe no Oshiha.
Ichinobe—probably Itinobe, at the time—was the son of Izaho Wake, aka Richuu Tennou, Anaho and Wakatake’s uncle – so, he was their cousin, basically. Izaho Wake, Ichinobe’s father, was the first successor to his father, Ohosazaki no Mikoto, aka Nintoku Tenno, so the senior of the three brotherly sovereigns. When Izaho passed away, his son, Ichinobe, was still a young boy, and so the throne passed to Izaho’s brother, Midzuha Wake, also known to us as Hanzei Tenno. But even Midzuha’s reign was short, only four years or so, and he had no sons of his own and Ichinobe was still a young boy, so the throne passed again, this time to the younger brother, Woasatsuma, aka Ingyo Tenno. Unlike his brothers, he had quite a few children, and a reign of forty years or more—at least according to the Nihon Shoki, at least. And so he passed the throne onto his son, Anaho.
Anaho had no children of his own by the time he died, but he did have a cousin, along with his many brothers. If the Nihon Shoki is to be believed, he had chosen this cousin, Ichinobe, as his successor. After all, Ichinobe, while of the same generation, was the son of the senior of the three previous sovereigns, so this would seem to make some logical sense. Thus, theoretically, Ichinobe should have succeeded Anaho—and it is quite possible that he did. In fact, in the Kojiki’s telling of the story of the two brothers, the younger brother—who is named Woke, by the way—makes the express claim that Ichinobe did, in fact, rule the country at some point. In the Chronicles, however, it is made clear that Ichinobe hadn’t quite ascended by the time that Wakatake, with the help of a man named Karabukuro, invited Ichinobe out on a hunt. There, on the moors of Karano, Wakatake shot and killed Ichinobe, burying him and his servant in an unmarked grave, without even a tomb mound to mark his resting place.
Now as it happens, word of Ichinobe’s death had made it back to his household before Wakatake had returned. Immediately, the household became worried—especially Ichinobe’s two sons. After all, if Wakatake came back and found them, he might decide to completely finish the job. And so they took off, fearing for their lives.
These two sons were Ohoke, the elder brother, and Woke, the younger brother—and don’t worry, I’ll do my best to keep them straight in the narrative. In truth, at the time, they were probably known more as Opoke and Woke, which was at least a little more clear—which I assume was meant as something like “Ke the Elder”, that’s Ohoke, and “Ke the Younger”, that’s Woke. There are two other names—Wakako and Shimako—but to be honest I see them referred to as Ohoke and Woke so much I think we’ll stick with that.
These two brothers were accompanied by their attendant, Kusakabe no Muraji no Omi—where Omi was a name, not a kabane—as well as Omi’s son, Ada Hiko. According to the Kojiki, as they fled together they came to Karihawi in Yamashiro. There they paused to eat when a man with a tattoo on his face came by and seized their food. He was Ikahi, the boar-keeper, of Yamashiro.
Hungry and without provisions, Ohoke and Woke and their crew made their way across the land, finding what food they could. The Nihon Shoki claims they traveled to Yosa district, in the province of Tamba.
Here, as they were essentially in their own version of witness protection program, their attendant, Omi, took on a new name, Tatoku. But the threat of being found out continued to weigh on him. The Nihon Shoki tells us that he ran away to a cave on Mt. Shijimi, where he strangled himself, so as to remove the possible threat. The two brothers, who didn’t know where Omi had gone off to, went searching for him. They called themselves the Tamba no Waraha, or the Boys of Tamba, and eventually they wound up in Akashi, working as servants for Hosome – you know, the guy who built the fancy new muro and held a party, at the beginning of this story. Meanwhile, Ada Hiko, Omi’s son, continued to serve and support them in their exile.
The Harima Fudoki, compiled from stories about the places in Harima, has a slightly different take on all of this. In the section on Shijimi, in the district of Minagi, it has several stories that connect the area to the princes Ohoke and Woke’s grandfather, Izaho Wake, but it also tells the story of how they came there, to Shijimi, in their youth. This was after the murder of their father, whom the Fudoki goes so far as to name as “Sumera Mikoto”, a title seemingly reserved for an actual sovereign, lending a little more credence to the idea that Ichinobe was more than just the Crown Prince.
Their attendant, Omi, secured shelter for the boys in a stone cave near the village of Shijimi, where Omi let go of their horses and burned all of their belongings, so that they would have nothing that might alert people as to their status. After doing all of that, he strangled himself, as in the Nihon Shoki, although the Harima Fudoki claims he did so because of the grave offense he was committing in hiding the boys from the sovereign, Ohohatsuse Wakatake, and the Yamato court.
The young boys went from place to place, changing where they stayed, until they finally sought refuge with Itomi, the village chief of Shijimi, offering to be his servants. Here it would appear that Itomi and Hosome are one and the same person, or at least play the same role as the lord of Shijimi.
From there the story of their discovery is very similar to what is told in the Nihon Shoki. During the dedication of a new muro for their lord, the two princes-in-hiding are set the task of making sure that the fire stayed lit. As the night dragged on, they were called on to sing and dance, and each deferred to the other until finally the younger brother, Woke, sang a song that revealed their status as sons of the rightful sovereign, Ichinobe. In the Harima account, Wodate, of the Yamabe no Muraji, was simply a guest of Itomi, the head of Shijimi village, but when he heard their song he spoke up. He offered to take the princes back to their mother, who is named here as princess Tashiraga, possibly another name for their mother in the Nihon Shoki, Princess Haye-Hime.
In any case, it is still Wodate who revealed the existence of the young princes, Ohoke and Woke, to the Yamato court, which quite conveniently solved the current succession crisis that was keeping Shiraga (and everybody else) awake at night. After all, if Shiraga passed away before an heir could be found, who knows what kind of violence could have erupted with the throne up for grabs. As Wodate sent word back to the court, he also sprang for a temporary palace for the two boys, made, we are told, of brushwood—likely an indication of how hastily it was put together, probably similar to those temporary palaces made for visiting sovereigns when they traveled. This must have been quite the surprise to the people of Akashi, who had known these two merely as servants of Hosome—the lost boys of Tamba.
When news of the two princes reached Shiraga, he was over the moon. He exclaimed how he suddenly had two children, where he had previously had none. He had them brought to the court. At Settsu they were met by the Omi and the Muraji, who escorted them the rest of the way to the court, where they were welcomed back.
According to the Nihon Shoki, the older brother, Ohoke, was designated as Crown Prince and successor to Shiraga, and the younger brother, Woke, was restored in status to a royal prince. Presumably they were also reunited with their family—their mother whom the Harima Fudoki claimed was still pining for them, as well as their sister, Ihitoyo, whom I assume had remained—she is mentioned consistently in the various Chronicles, although not always exactly the same. For instance, the Nihon Shoki and the Sendai Kuji Hongi claim she was their sister while the Kojiki has a slightly different narrative, claiming she was their aunt. In either case, she isn’t mentioned as part of their exile, which merely references the two young boys and their attendants.
Of course, the sovereign’s own joy was short-lived, as was his reign. Some three years after the discovery of Ichinobe’s lost heirs, Shiraga himself passed away.
And as tragic a moment as that was, at least there shouldn’t be any question about the transition. After all, Shiraga had nominated the elder prince, Ohoke, as his successor. So that should be pretty cut and dried.
Right?
Right?
Yeah, it still wasn’t that easy. Not that there was anyone challenging them, necessarily, but rather it had to do with their nature. Just like during the dinner at Hosome’s banquet, the two brothers couldn’t stop deferring to each other, much as Ohosazaki and Wakairatsuko did after the death of Homuda Wake—see Episode 49 for details. The elder brother, the Crown Prince Ohoke, actually relinquished his right to rule. He claimed that if it were not for his younger brother, Prince Woke, Wodate never would have known it was them. He was the one that had suggested that they reveal themselves, and then he actually did it—through poetry and song, nonetheless.
Since neither of them would take the throne, a third person stepped in: their sister, Ihitoyo. Well, again, the Kojiki says she was their aunt—and even claims that she stepped in before the two were rediscovered, and that she was on the throne until they could be brought back and then she handed over the reigns of power to them.
In both cases, Ihitoyo is described as basically being a sovereign in all but name—perhaps because she ruled for less than a year—according to the Nihon Shoki, at least—something she seems to have had in common with Prince Ichinobe, though in her case she does seem to have at least been recognized for her time on the throne, even if she doesn’t merit an entry in the “official” list of sovereigns
There is one other interesting note about Ihitoyo in the Chronicles. It was actually one of those episodes that Aston found a little too salacious to just put out there in the open in plain English, and so he wrote his version of it in Latin. We also have the same story in Sendai Kuji Hongi—the Kujiki—where Bentley does not treat it as quite a scandal. For my part, I’ll let you decide.
So Ihitoyo was dwelling in the Tsunozashi palace when she first had intercourse—it is unclear if it was with her spouse or if she was unmarried at the time, and whether it was with one person, or more than one. However, apparently she was unimpressed by this socially expected act, and made up her mind that since she had known the ways of a woman she no longer needed to have sex with a man ever again.
Now, that’s it. It is just one small part of the story and they could easily have left it out. Perhaps they were using it to justify why she didn’t have any offspring of her own, or perhaps it was something like Elizabeth being a virgin queen—giving up female things to take on a male role in society. Or perhaps it was meant as some kind of slander, or even to explain why she didn’t have offspring of her own to pass the throne on to. Personally I like to think that maybe heteronormative relationship dynamics just weren’t her thing, and after trying it out, as was culturally expected of her, she decided that was it, and she didn’t need to do that anymore.
If that is the case, does that mean that, at least for a short time, Yamato was possibly being run by a queer female ruler? I like to think so. At the very least, though, it begs the question: Why wasn’t she on Wakatake’s hitlist, like so many other people were?
It is possible that she wasn’t as much of a threat—the Kojiki suggests that she was a maternal aunt, not an elder sister, which brings up even further questions, though she was still a direct descendant of a previous sovereign, it seems.
Now, even if she was clearly considered a possible candidate for the throne, I suspect that there was enough patriarchal sentiment that, even if there wasn’t necessarily a clear precedent between siblings and nephews, there was probably a preference for male heirs—a far cry from the time of Queen Himiko.
Regrettably, her time on the throne was limited. According to the Nihon Shoki, she took the throne in the first month, but then died in the 11th month—of what we don’t know, but she was buried at Haniguchi hillin Katsuraki. This is currently identified by the Imperial Household Agency as Kitahanauchi Ohotsuka kofun, a kingly, round-keyhole shaped mausoleum, about 90 meters in length.
Though never an official sovereign in the Chronicles, she is remembered by some as Ihitoyo Tennou from at least the 12th century, and while generally not listed in any of the official regnal lists, various historians have added her in to their own. Mizuno Yu even went so far at one point to suggest that this entire period was actually her reign, and that all these stories of Ohoke and Woke were just to cover it up. Much as with Ichinobe, there are a lot of questions, and no clear answers.
Now, with Iitoyo’s untimely death, the court needed an actual answer from the two princes.At long last the elder brother, Ohoke, prevailed upon his younger brother, Woke, to take the throne, which he did, becoming the sovereign known as Kenzou Tennou.
Now sovereign, Woke took care of the required business of setting up his court, but then got straight into his first priority—getting justice for his father. First and foremost, that meant finding his unmarked grave—no easy task given all the time that had passed. He sent out word throughout the realm looking for anyone who might have information on his whereabouts.
From this missive, a woman named Okime came forward. She was an old woman, but she remembered the incident and she claimed to know where Ichinobe’s body had been buried. And so she took the two brothers, Prince Ohoke and the sovereign, Woke, out to the moor of Kaya—or Kayano—and sure enough they found an unmarked grave, and it had two bodies in it. After all, it wasn’t just Ichinobe who had been killed, but his servant, Nakachiko, as well. They were able to tell the skulls apart—the Kojiki claims that Ichinobe had “multiple teeth” like a sakikusa—a lily with three-pronged branches. Some of have suggested this may be a reference to some kind of tooth deformation, though we haven’t really found much evidence for that practice since the start of the Yayoi period, as far as I’m aware. Still, there were apparently enough distinguishing marks to prove that it was Ichinobe and his servant, though beyond the skulls it was impossible to sort out the rest of the remains.
And so they built twin tombs on a mountain east of the Kaya plain, burying remains in each of them, so that they were both honored. A tomb claiming to be Ichinobe’s can be found in Higashi-omi, east of Lake Biwa, in modern Shiga prefecture. It is one of two circular kofun that are said to date to the 5th century. To the east of that—still within Higashi-omi, there is another kofun that claims to be Ichinobe’s final resting place. It is Kuma-no-mori in the modern Myohoji district of Higashi-omi. While there appears to be only the one tomb, it is a kingly rounded-keyhole tomb, lending some credence to the idea that it would have been more fit for a royal prince—and possible sovereign.
I would note that neither of these are exactly on a “mountain” east of Kayano, but they are both in the general vicinity. Furthermore, there is a later note that the remains were dug up once more and eventually moved closer to Yamato, where the tomb could be more properly attended to, so it is possible that neither one is truly Ichinobe’s “last” resting place.
Wherever the tombs were built—or the remains moved to—Woke was pleased to see his father properly recognized at last, and for leading them to the spot he rewarded Okime. In fact, he had a house built for her near his palace, and he even put up a rope between her door and his so that she could use it to help walk to the palace. He even installed a bell that she could ring so that he would know she was coming. He supposedly had her visit quite frequently, but eventually, her age caught up to her, and even with the rope, Okime could no longer make the journey. She asked to be allowed to return to her home in Afumi, where she could spend the rest of her days in the place that she had lived for so long. The sovereign agreed, and sent her off with a small fortune to take with her.
Now, with Ichinobe’s remains properly buried, you might think that was it, but Woke still felt unsettled. There were a few more debts he felt he needed to take care of. For one, he had Karabukuro, Wakatake’s attendant during the whole father-murder thing, taken into custody, with the intent to put him to death. For his complicity in this act, Woke wished to put Karabukuro to death. But when Karabukuro no Sukune approached, he bowed his head, and appeared to show remorse for the part he had played, and this touched the sovereign’s heart, so that he decided he would not have him put to death. Instead, Karabukuro’s name was erased from the rolls. He was given the charge to oversee Ichinobe’s tomb, and was consequently placed under the charge of the Yamabe no Muraji.
Speaking of the Yamabe no Muraji, here we see that it wasn’t all about retribution with Woke no Ohokimi. For Wodate, who had found the two brothers and helped bring them back to Yamato, was granted his heart’s desire. He was given charge of the Mountain Office—likely something akin to the Ohoyamamori, with jurisdication over the mountains and forests. This also placed him over the Yama Be no Muraji—the Be of the Mountains, which was likely tasked with overseeing the care of the forests for purposes of hunting and suchlike.
Of course, it wasn’t all rewards—there were still more people that Woke had grudges against, and, in another act of retribution, the sovereign sent out people looking for the tattooed bandit, Ikahi the boar-keeper, who had stolen the brother’s food when they were on the run. He was apparently still alive, and so probably an old man, but that didn’t matter to Woke’s sense of justice. According to the Kojiki, he had him executed by the bed of the Asuka River, and then they severed the tendons of all of his relatives. This kind of punishment—and reward—of an entire family for the act of one is something we’ve seen before, and goes along with the general system of kabane rankings, where it was more the family’s rank, not just an individual’s, that was affected by the actions of its members.
All of this done, something still did not sit right with Woke. Had Ohohatsuse Wakatake, aka Yuryaku Tenno, still been living then Woke would have likely had him put to death as well. And let’s face it, we’ve spent quite a few episodes talking about how Wakatake, while advancing Yamato’s interests, was an all-around jerk over and above being the murderer of Woke’s dad. But since Wakatake had died, that option for revenge was taken from Woke, and yet still he felt the need to do something. Since he couldn’t kill Wakatake, he decided the next best thing would be to destroy his memory. And so Woke ordered that men be assembled to dig up and destroy Wakatake’s tomb.
When Woke’s older brother, Prince Ohoke, heard what the sovereign wanted to do, he stepped in. At first, he tried to dissuade his brother, but, seeing that his younger brother was committed to this course of action, Prince Ohoke requested that he be put in charge of the destruction.
And so he went out there with the workers that had been gathered to the tomb of Wakatake, but when he got there he didn’t level the tomb. Rather, he went up to the side of the tomb, and he dug a hole in the side. After making this small hole he returned to his brother and told him that the tomb was “dug up” and that it had thus been demolished. But when Woke, the sovereign, asked his older brother how he had accomplished this feat, Ohoke told him how he had dug up a small amount of earth on the side.
The sovereign was likely dumbfounded at this point. I mean, technically I guess, yes, he did “dig up” the tomb, but how exactly was it demolished.
At this point Prince Ohoke laid out his case. He noted that yes, their desire for revenge was justified, no doubt about that. On the other hand, whatever beef they had with him, Wakatake was still an uncle and, on top of that, he had been sovereign of Yamato. To now fully demolish his tomb would set quite the precedent—one that the current sovereign of Yamato may want to consider the ramifications of. How would future generations judge them? And yet, by digging a hole and disrupting the shape of the kofun, even just a little bit, they had nonetheless placed a mark of shame upon their uncle. Ohoke suggested that, given everything else, this was a just punishment, and that Wakatake’s dishonour would be known for generations to come.
And, if you think about how the Chroniclers treated Wakatake’s reign, I can’t say that Prince Ohoke was so far off. His younger brother, the sovereign, agreed with his reasoning, and decided to leave it at that.
And with that last bit of revenge, Woke seems to have been satisfied. Next episode we can focus more on the other deeds and happenings during this period.
Before we go there, however, a quick discussion of a few things that I discussed. Obviously, it is impossible to fully sort fact from fiction in these stories, and much of it has no doubt been romanticized in the telling, fitting into the cultural narrative that the Chroniclers were espousing. Even though the general dating of events seems to be getting more reliable, there is plenty of reason to doubt much of this narrative.
Of course, my first question tends to be about the reign of Ihitoyo, and if it was truly as short as it was. There seems so little mention of her time on the throne, and yet there seems to be general agreement that she did sit and rule, even if she isn’t counted in the royal line. No doubt later historians would count her merely a regent, but I wonder if that doesn’t do her a disservice.
Similarly, I’ve been asking the question of Ichinobe, and we saw how some of the accounts grant him titles that would imply he was also a fully ranked sovereign, even though the Chronicles don’t exactly give him that due in any official capacity. Personally, I tend to view his reign has quite probable at this point.
Now, whether Ohoke and Woke were actually his sons—that is certainly up for debate. Theoretically they had servants with them and people who could vouch for their status, but still, Wakatake’s reign is counted as roughly 23 years, and it was roughly 25 years from the death of Ichinobe to the princes’ discovery by Wodate. Were they truly the sons of Ichinobe, or was this a convenient excuse to keep the royal line intact?
One clue here may be in the names. It seems that the other names given for Ohoke and Woke are Kume no Shimako and Kume no Wakako. Interestingly, Wodate is apparently of the Kume Be, which would seem to make him plausible a servant of Kume. Now this appears in some places to refer to simply men of the military, but there is also the village of Kume, and it is often referred to as a family name. Of course, the royal line is never given a family name—that is a tactic that will later be used when there are a few too many princes of royal blood floating around. Got a few spare princes? Remove them from the succession by giving them surnames, adding them to created clans like the Minamoto and the Taira. So why would these princes be “Shimako” or “Wakako” of Kume? That seems slightly suspicious to me. Is it possible that they were not of royal blood at all, but that somehow the Kume family had managed to take over after Wakatake’s line ran out.
It is, as I said, hard to really know. While there is, I would say, a growing body of archaeological evidence as we move forward, I’m not aware of any actual contemporary text that calls out anything too specific. It isn’t like there is a sword out there inscribed with “From the reign of Woke no Ohokimi, who was absolutely the son of Ichinobe no Ohokimi and by no means was he simply from a powerful family.”
As far as the tombs go, based on Kishimoto’s classification, it would seem that one line of tombs appears to end with Oka-misanzai, which he identifies with Wakatakeru, and though he identifies three tombs—Minegazuka, Shiragayama, and Bokeyama—as being in the same mold as what he terms the main line—a tradition going back to Hashihaka Kofun itself—there isn’t a clear line of succession after Maenoyama—which he attributes to Shiraga—down to Bokeyama, which he attributes to Oke. In fact, things seem generally muddied between the brothers here, Ohoke, and Woke, and their descendant, known to us either Buretsu or Muretsu Tennou, but as we shall see, this episode wasn’t the last time the royal line would have to work its way back up the family tree to find an heir to keep things going.
But that is for a future episode. For now, we have Woke in place, and the royal line would appear to be secured. With his filial duties out of the way, Woke is now ready to take on the job of sovereign, and rule Yamato. The chronicles say that his time on the lam, and working as a servant, gave him a unique perspective on the plights of the people, and so they attribute to him a certain amount of benevolence in his approach to issues of the people. How that plays out, I’ll let you judge as we continue with his reign, next episode.
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References

Ō, Yasumaro, & Heldt, G. (2014). The Kojiki: An account of ancient matters. ISBN978-0-231-16389-7.
Bentley, John. (2006). The Authenticity of Sendai Kuji Hongi: a New Examination of Texts, with a Translation and Commentary. ISBN-90-04-152253.
Chamberlain, B. H. (1981). The Kojiki: Records of ancient matters. Rutland, Vt: C.E. Tuttle Co. ISBN4-8053-0794-3.
Aston, W. G. (1972). Nihongi, chronicles of Japan from the earliest times to A.D. 697. London: Allen & Unwin. ISBN0-80480984-4
Philippi, D. L. (1968). Kojiki. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press. ISBN4-13-087004-1

Dramatis Personae

Oke and Woke

Iitoyo

Locations

Rough Transcript

References