Episode 9: The Language of Wa

So this is a bit of a different episode. This time around we are taking a look at the language of the people of the Japanese archipelago—the Wa. It could be taken that the language of the people is of little consequence. After all, it isn’t something we can easily find in a museum. However, I think it will help clarify some of the history here.

From here on out, you may want to first listen to the podcast episode.

A guardian statue at Horyuji, one of the oldest temples in Japan. His mouth is open as he utters one of the two sacred syllables: “A” and “UN”.

A guardian statue at Horyuji, one of the oldest temples in Japan. His mouth is open as he utters one of the two sacred syllables: “A” and “UN”.

So about the language. What I really take from all of this research is that if the Yayoi people—the Wa—brought Japonic with them, then by tracing the path of Japonic we have a better idea of where they came from. From the Shandong peninsula to the Korean peninsula and then to the archipelago would appear to be the path of migration, though over the course of hundreds of years. This seems to match what we see in the archaeological record as well.

It is also fascinating that we see Japonic on the Korean peninsula as well. It is easy to assume that all of the people of the Korean peninsula must have been speaking ancient Korean. But that is us assuming that the nations of today are the same as the people who were there thousands of years ago.

A rough map of the Korean peninsula in the first century CE. The Shandong peninsula is in the lower left, and northern Kyushu can be seen in the lower right corner. By Historiographer at the English Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=6606974

On the Korean peninsula, we see several different polities over the years. We are currently talking about the Samhan—Chin-han, Pyon-han, and Ma-han. Eventually these give way to Baekje (Paekche), Silla, and Goguryeo (Koguryeo), as well as the Gaya Confederacy. It is unsurprising that there are some material similarities between all of them, since they were in such close proximity. Comparatively speaking, if we looked at Medieval France, Spain, Italy, and Germany, you would also see plenty of similarities there, as well. After all, they are all in proximity to one another. But they are not the same, something you don’t really see unless you look at all of them. In particular, Baekje and Goguryeo both claimed descent from the Buyeo (Puyo) people for the Manchurian Basin, making them relatively latecomers to the peninsula. Silla is thought to have grown up out of one of the three Han, the Chin-han. However, the languages of the people up in the northern parts of the Korean peninsula are likely still related to these more northern groups that came in. I suspect even Silla may have been influenced by some of these immigrants, and it is hard to know if the language we know as the Sillan language was even there to begin with, or if it was something that was brought in and then became dominant among some of the Chin-han people.

Sillan royal tombs in Gyeongju, South Korea.

And then there are the lack of historical sources on the peninsula. Besides the Gwanggaeto Stele, from 414 CE, we have the Samguk Yusa and the Samguk Sagi to tell us the history, both of which were written well after the fact. Much of the early written works on the peninsular are in some form of Chinese, and so mostly we are assuming languages based on various placenames. We have only a few fragments of writings in Sillan, and we believe that language is similar to the language of Baekje, and Goguryeo. It is thus easy to assume that all of the lands used the same language, but that doesn’t seem to be the case. For instance, the Gwanggaeto stele specifically mentions renaming many places, indicating the original names may have been in another language. And we have a specific note of a word from the Gaya, which is all we really have to go on.

Whether Japonic comes from Koreanic, or Korean borrows from Japonic, are not only linguistic discussions, but are also enmeshed in more recent relations between the two modern nations, as well as nationalist ideas and identities. In fact, one of the things we have to be careful of in studies of this period are nationalist bias, which may be geared to serve a specific modern political narrative, rather than just objectively looking at the facts.

This will be especially important to remember when we get into the Japanese chronicles, where we’ll talk about the Japanese “colonies” on the peninsula as well as the sovereign Jingu’s invasion. From the standard Japanese viewpoint, Jingu must have crossed from Japan and into Korea. However, some Korean scholars suggest that Jingu and her husband, Chuai, were actually from the peninsula, and worked their way across the strait to conquer Japan. Whether or not the “Wa” were simply on the islands or if the “Land of Wa” included the peninsula and thus was involved in peninsular politics is all tied up in this. That narrative is potentially strengthened if Japonic was spoken on the peninsula, and to what extent.

Oh, and as a bit of a postscript, I know we only touched on Ryukyuan. Ryukyuan seems to have branched off from what became modern Japanese somewhere in the first millennium. That means that some time between the time we are discussing and the early to mid-Heian period, people moved south from Kyushu into the Ryukyuan island chain, likely bringing aspects of their life and culture with them and mingling with the life of the islanders.

References

  • 2019; Miyamoto, Kazuo. “The Spread of rice agriculture during the Yayoi Period: From the Shandong Peninsula to the Japanese Archipelago via the Korean Peninsula”, The Japanese Journal of Archaeology, http://www.jjarchaeology.jp/

  • 2017; Robbeets, Martine. “Austronesian influence and Transeurasian ancestry in Japanese, Language Dynamics and Change, 7(2), 210-251.” doi: https://doi.org/10.1163/22105832-00702005

  • 2017; Shinoda, K., & Adachi, N. “Ancient DNA Analysis of Palaeolithic Ryukyu Islanders”. In Piper P., Matsumura H., & Bulbeck D. (Eds.), New Perspectives in Southeast Asian and Pacific Prehistory (pp. 51-60). Acton ACT, Australia: ANU Press. Retrieved from http://www.jstor.org/stable/j.ctt1pwtd26.10

  • 2015; Barnes, Gina L. Achaeology of East Asia: The Rise of Civilization in China, Korea and Japan

  • 2013; Vovin, Alexander. “From Koguryo to T’amna: Slowly riding to the South with speakers of Proto-Korean”, Korean Linguistics 15:2, University of Hawai’i at Mānoa

  • 2011; Lee, Sean and Hasegawa, Toshikazu. Bayesian phylogenetic analysis supports an agricultural origin of Japonic languages 278 Proc. R. Soc. B http://doi.org/10.1098/rspb.2011.0518

  • 2011; Crawford, G. “Advances in Understanding Early Agriculture in Japan.” Current Anthropology, 52(S4), S331-S345. doi:10.1086/658369

  • 2008; Bentley, John R. “The Search for the Language of Yamatai”. Japanese Language and Literature (42-1). 1-43.  Retrieved from https://www.jstor.org/stable/30198053

  • 2007; Palmer, Edwina. “Out of Sunda?  Provenance of the Jōmon Japanese.”  Japan Review, (19), 47-75.  Retrieved from http://www.jstor.org/stable/25791309

  • 2005; Hong, W. “Yayoi Wave, Kofun Wave, and Timing: The Formation of the Japanese People and Japanese Language.” Korean Studies 29, 1-29. doi:10.1353/ks.2006.0007.

  • 2000; Kumar, Ann and Rose, Phil. “Lexical Evidence for Early Contact between Indonesian Languages and Japanese”.  Oceanic Linguistics. 219-155.  Retrieved from https://www.jstor.org/stables/3623422

Episode 8: Bronze and Iron

Iron and Bronze make it to the archipelago. In this episode we’ll talk about the arrival of bronze and iron and what that means for the islands, as well as what it means for our understanding of them.

References

  • 2019, March  Miyamoto, Kazuo; “The Spread of rice agriculture during the Yayoi Period: From the Shandong Peninsula to the Japanese Archipelago via the Korean Peninsula”, The Japanese Journal of Archaeology, http://www.jjarchaeology.jp/

  • 2015 Barnes, Gina L.; Achaeology of East Asia: The Rise of Civilization in China, Korea and Japan

  • 2015 Kim, Bumcheol; “Socioeconomic Development in the Bronze Age: Archaeological Understanding of the Transition from the Early to Middle Bronze Age, South Korea” https://scholarspace.manoa.hawaii.edu/bitstream/10125/55550/07_AP_54.1kim.pdf

  • 2013  Mizoguchi, K.; The Archaeology of Japan: From the Earliest Rice Farming Villages to the Rise of the State. (Cambridge World Archaeology). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. doi:10.1017/CBO97811390342651996

  • 2007 Rhee, S., Aikens, C., Choi, S., & Ro, H.; “Korean Contributions to Agriculture, Technology, and State Formation in Japan: Archaeology and History of an Epochal Thousand Years, 400 B.C.–A.D. 600”. Asian Perspectives, 46(2), 404-459. Retrieved from http://www.jstor.org/stable/42928724

  • 2007 Shōda Shinya, “A Comment on the Yayoi Period Dating Controversy”, Bulletin of the Society for East Asian Archaeology, Vol 1 (2007)  https://seaa-web.org/sites/default/files/publications/bseaa-1/BSEAA1-Shoda.pdf

  • 2005 Hong, W.; “Yayoi Wave, Kofun Wave, and Timing: The Formation of the Japanese People and Japanese Language.” Korean Studies 29, 1-29. doi:10.1353/ks.2006.0007.

  • 1997  Imamura, Keiji; Prehistoric Japan: New perspectives on insular East Asia. doi:10.1017/S0003598X00085215

Episode 7: Rice comes to Japan

rice.jpg

Seven episodes in and we finally have conclusive proof of rice in Japan. This episode we take a look at the start of the Yayoi period, when rice came to Japan and brought with it the start of a new culture, the Yayoi culture.

This episode largely deals with the start of the Yayoi and much of the material culture that they brought with them, merging continental and insular styles. This includes not only the distinctive pottery, but also their architecture and even settlement styles. This would all merge and eventually become its own thing.

Episode 6: Emperor Horse Crupper and Other Continental Developments

Welcome back! As we come out of the general turkey-and-stuffing-induced comas here in the US, we’ll be taking a break from the Japanese archipelago this episode and looking out across the water at what has been going on over on the mainland. We are especially going to be looking at the Yellow River Basin through to the Korean Peninsula. See the maps here for more context on the geographic settings in this particular episode.

Modern saddle crupper showing the position on the horse… well, I suspect you get the idea. Original image from Wikimedia Commons by Una Smith [CC BY-SA 3.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0)]

By the way, on the “Emperor Horse Crupper”, I should note that some English texts refer to him as “King”. This is probably a more accurate translation, though the term “Emperor” does show up in the dynastic names of this time. By some accounts “Emperor” really doesn’t apply until the Qin dynasty. There are similar arguments about the Japanese imperial line when we get there. Oh, and in case anyone is wondering what a “horse crupper” refers to (besides the name of the emperor), here is a helpful illustration, on the left. For those wondering, the character is 紂.

Finally, some examples of various bronzes and other artifacts from the continent between the Shang and Zhou Dynasty periods, including artifacts from the Korean bronze age.

References

2018 Li, Dora (trans.); “Two Ancient Chinese Stories:  King Wen and King Wu”, Excerpt from Treasured Tales of China, trans. By Dora Li, https://www.theepochtimes.com/two-ancient-chinese-stories-king-wen-and-king-wu_2601618.html

2017 Barnes, Gina; Archaeology of East Asia: The Rise of Civilisation in China, Korea and Japan. Oxbow Books.

2015 Kim, Bumcheol; “Socioeconomic Development in the Bronze Age: Archaeological Understanding of the Transition from the Early to Middle Bronze Age, South Korea” https://scholarspace.manoa.hawaii.edu/bitstream/10125/55550/07_AP_54.1kim.pdf

2010 Ahn, Sung-Mo; “The emergence of rice agriculture in Korea: archaeobotanical perspectives” https://www.academia.edu/26244202/The_emergence_of_rice_agriculture_in_Korea_archaeobotanical_perspectives

2007 RHEE, S., AIKENS, C., CHOI, S., & RO, H. “Korean Contributions to Agriculture, Technology, and State Formation in Japan: Archaeology and History of an Epochal Thousand Years, 400 B.C.–A.D. 600”. Asian Perspectives, 46(2), 404-459. Retrieved from http://www.jstor.org/stable/42928724

2004 Kim, Seong-hwan, ed.; Atlas of Korean History. History Education Department, Korean National University of Education; and Skyejul Publishing, Ltd.

2000 Theobald, Ulrich; China Knowledge.de – An Encyclopedia on Chinese History, Literature, and Art; http://www.chinaknowledge.de/History/Zhou/personszhouwenwang.html

1989 Fairbank-Reischauer; China: Tradition and Transformation (Revised Edition).

Episode 5: Goggle Eyes and Wet Earwax

Reproduction of shakoki style figurine found at Kamegaoka.

This episode will be our final look at the Jomon Period in Japan.  Specifically we are focusing on the northern Jomon, in Tohoku and Hokkaido.  We'll take a brief overview of this northern area throughout the Jomon period, and then focus on the transition from the Middle to Late and Final Jomon periods.

As for the title, see our lovely friend right here—a shakoki, or goggle-style, figurine. Doesn’t she look like some kind of buff, angry alien? This one is a reconstruction of the original, which is actually missing its left leg—broken off in an apparent ritual. Below are some other examples of figurines from northern Japan, along with lacquerware and more.

We also included something we didn’t talk about in the podcast—clay masks, which we also find throughout the archipelago in various shapes and some not even made out of pottery.

And speaking of rituals, here is an article in Atlas Obscura about the Oyu Stone Circles.

We also have a treat this episode--we are getting our best glimpse yet of the people through the DNA of one of the women from Funadomari.  We'll take a look at what we know about her, including what is up with the whole "wet earwax" thing.

BTW, for those who want to better understand the whole “wet earwax” thing, here’s an article on the subject by Dr. John McDonald.

If you enjoy this episode, please feel free to reach out and Tweet or email us, or drop comments in the Comment section, below this post. 

References

  • 2019 Geggel, Laura “Freckled Woman with High Alcohol Tolerance Lived in Japan 3,800 years ago” (https://www.livescience.com/65536-ancient-japanese-woman-genetics.html), Live Science, 22 May 2019

  • 2019 Kanazawa-Kiriyama, Hideaki, et al; “Late Jomon male and female genome sequences from the Funadomari site in Hokkaido, Japan.”  Anthropological Science, 15 April 2019 (https://www.jstage.jst.go.jp/article/ase/advpub/0/advpub_190415/_pdf/-char/en)

  • 2011 McDonald, J.H., Myths of Human Genetics. Sparky House Publishing, Baltimore, Maryland. https://udel.edu/~mcdonald/mythearwax.html

  • 2003 (June) Togawa, Minako; “The Jomon Clay Figurines of the Kaminabe Site, Kyushu, Japan”

  • 2002 Mizoguchi, Koji; An Archaeological History of Japan: 30,000 B.C. to A.D. 700

  • 2000 Naumann, Nelly; Japanese Prehistory: The Material and Spritual Culture of the Jōmon Period

  • 1988 Barnes, Gina L.; Protohistoric Yamato: Archaeology of the First Japanese State

  • 1996 Aikins, C. Melvin and Akazawa, Takeru, “The Pleistocene-Holocene Transition in Japan and Adjacent Northeast Asia.” In: Straus L.g., Erksen B.V., Erlandson J.M., Yesner D.R. (eds) Humans at the End of the Ice Age: Interdiciplinary Contributions to Archaeology, pp 215-227, Spring, Boston, MA

  • 1996 Imamura, Keiji; Prehistoric Japan: New Perspectives on Insular East Asia

Episode 4: Jomon vs. the Volcano

Map by:Yug Changed by:Pekachu [CC BY-SA 3.0 ], via Wikimedia Commons
Extent of the Kikai Akahoya eruption ash deposits about 7300 years ago.

In this episode we take a look at the Jomon period down in southwest Japan. Although Kyushu appears to have been the birthplace of much of what we consider Jomon culture, the Akahoya Eruption of the Kikai Caldera devastated Kyushu, wiping out the earliest cultures. Life would eventually return, bringing with it cultural artifacts from Honshu.

The Kyushu Jomon culture would move through several different types of settlement patterns and evolve over time, possibly even learning some form of rudimentary agriculture. We’ll talk about the possible connection between the enigmatic figurines and early agriculture.

Towards the end of the Jomon period, we see a new player on the scene: a new culture that we call the Yayoi, from the place in Tokyo where the first pottery from this period is found. This culture, influenced by the mainland, would compete with and eventually overcome or absorb the local Jomon culture, spreading north across Honshu.

By 名古屋太郎 [CC BY-SA 3.0] via Wikimedia Commons.

Iojima island, part of the Kikai Caldera

References

  • 2013 Pearson, Richard; Ancient Ryukyu. University of Hawai’i Press.

  • 2007 Kaner, Simon and Ishikawa, Takeshi, “Reassessing the concept of the ‘Neolithic’in the Jomon of Western Japan”, Documenta Praehistorica XXXIV (2007) https://revije.ff.uni-lj.si/DocumentaPraehistorica/article/view/34.1/1809

  • 2006 Shinto, Koichi; “Jomon Culture in Kagoshima and Uenohara Site”, Archaeological Center of Kagoshima Prefecture, Kokubu, Kirishima, 899-4461 Japan

  • 2003 (June) Togawa, Minako; “The Jomon Clay Figurines of the Kaminabe Site, Kyushu, Japan”

  • 2002 Mizoguchi, Koji; An Archaeological History of Japan: 30,000 B.C. to A.D. 700

  • 1996 Imamura, Keiji; Prehistoric Japan: New Perspectives on Insular East Asia

  • 1996 Aikins, C. Melvin and Akazawa, Takeru, “The Pleistocene-Holocene Transition in Japan and Adjacent Northeast Asia.” In: Straus L.g., Erksen B.V., Erlandson J.M., Yesner D.R. (eds) Humans at the End of the Ice Age: Interdiciplinary Contributions to Archaeology, pp 215-227, Spring, Boston, MA

Episode 3: Boom and Bust in the Middle Jomon

Welcome to Episode 3, and part 2 of our series on the Jomon era. In this episode we discuss the boom and bust of the Jomon period, when the Jomon population hit its highest point, especially in the Kanto plain and Chubu highlands. This was the area of the Katsusaka and Otamadai cultures. We’ll discuss the evidence for what we see and what might have happened. Below, find photos taken at the National Museum of Japanese History, with actual and replica pots and figurines. You can see the type of decoration that gave this period its name and some of the wild artistic flourishes that became popular during this period. Also check out the lacquered pots, indicating that it was more than just cord impressions. Finally, the figurines give you a sample of some of the variety found.

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