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The Kudara-Yamato Model, proposed by Wontack Hong [1], traces the origin of the Yamato (=Wo/Wa 倭) dynasty in the Japanese Islands to the Kingdom of Kudara (=Paekche 百濟) in the Korean Peninsula. The evidence itself is generally well known, extending from historical records to obvious cultural and archaeological parallels, but the problem is that the relevant facts have never been recognized by the Japanese national historiography.

[1] Wontack Hong is the author of The Relationship between Korea and Japan in the Early Period: Paekche and Yamato Wa, Seoul: Ilsimsa, 1988; Paekche of Korea and the Origin of Yamato Japan, Seoul: Kudara, 1994; Kudara Yamato: History of Ancient Korea-Japan Relations, in Korean, Seoul: Iljisa, 2003; “Yayoi Wave, Kofun Wave and Timing: the Formation of the Japanese People and Japanese Language,” Korean Studies, University of Hawaii, Volume 29, 2005, pp. 1-29 (U.S.); Korea and Japan in East Asian History, Seoul: Kudara, 2006; “Ancient Korea-Japan Relations: Dating the Formative Years of the Yamato Kingdom (366-405 CE) by the Samguk-sagi Records and Reinterpreting the Related Historical Facts,” The Open Area Studies Journal, 2009, No. 2, pp. 12-29 (U.S.), and Ancient Korea-Japan Relations: Paekche and the Origin of the Yamato Dynasty, Seoul: Kudara, 2010. Wontack Hong’s study is focused on the proto-historical period, though it also has a modern political dimension. The principal objective of Hong’s study is to bring forth evidence in favor of his “Kudara-Yamato Model” by analyzing the available historical records, archeological traces, and linguistic and cultural parallels (http://www.HongWontack.com).

Relationship between Korea and Japan in Early Period: Paekche and Yamato Wa was reviewed as: “Wontack Hong goes a step beyond the horserider theory in this scholarly and provocative work, which sheds new light on early Korea and Japan through … From the perspective of Korean archaeology the arguments ring true. I hope Japan specialists will not dismiss the book as a mere polemic …” Sarah M. Nelson, University of Denver, Journal of Asian Studies, Vol. 48:4, 1989. “… offers an enlightening and relatively concise overview of historically critical process. These features alone are sufficient to make … worthy of reading … it does contribute a fresh and intellectually rewarding perspective on one of the most significant and problematic issues in northeast Asian history.” Jonathan W. Best, Wesleyan University, Journal of Japanese Studies, Vol. 16:2, 1990.

Paekche of Korea and the Origin of Yamato Japan was reviewed as: “Hong does make explicit the political ramifications of the present interpretation of Japanese and Korean ancient history, which is an important contribution in itself. This book should be taken seriously by western scholars.” Sarah M. Nelson, University of Denver, Journal of Asian Studies, Vol. 54:3, 1995. “Reading this book has me nearly convinced that Hong’s main thesis, namely, that the Paekche royal house … conquered and unified Japan … Even for those who would not for a minute believe the horserider hypothesis in any form, the book has gathered in one place a great many of the main arguments on either side … Further, Hong can muster creditable, almost convincing arguments for his central hypothesis.” Leon Serafim, University of Hawaii, Korean Studies, Vol. 19, 1995.

Ancient Korea-Japan Relations: Dating the Formative Years of the Yamato Kingdom (366-405 CE) by the Samguk-sagi Records and Reinterpreting the Related Historical Facts was commented as: “No one else has put all this together for an English-reading audience. His paper is completely documented, and to me quite persuasive. This paper provides a wealth of historic information and instructs (the reader) while it reconstructs a chronology that makes sense for some questionable years of the Yamato Kingdom. The style is erudite, the sentence formations replete with crafted phrases that layout the situation of which records are trustworthy, and the end-product is an explanation that establishes formative years of the Yamato Kingdom. Enjoyment from reading the paper is much like being treated to a drama, where history provides the key players and we anticipate what will happen next and what is the motivation, based on what has happened and how forceful it may have been within the overall trajectory of events.” Sarah M. Nelson, University of Denver, 2009.

Ancient Korea-Japan Relations: Paekche and the Origin of the Yamato Dynasty was reviewed as: “The role of Paekche in the early history of Japan is beyond any doubt. … The political and military ties between Paekche and Yamato suggest an intimate partnership that is best explained by assuming an ethnic affinity. Hong must be right when he claims that “a member of the Paekche royal family – carried out the conquest of the Yamato region – in the late fourth century”, thus laying the foundations of Japan as a political state.” Juha Janhunen, University of Helsinki, “Correctness and Controversies in Asian Historiography, Studia Orientalia, 109, 2010, pp. 128-45.

Lacuna in the Records of the Chinese Chronicles on the Japanese Islands between 266-413: Thirty Town-States Became the Unified Yamato Kingdom
The Weishu (魏書 Record of Cao Cao’s Wei, 220-65) forms part of the Sanguozhi (三國志 History of Three Kingdoms, 220-80) compiled by Chen Shou (陳壽 233-97) of Western Jin (265-316). The record on the Japanese Islands in the Dongyi-zhuan (Accounts of the Eastern Barbarians) was apparently based on the reports made by Chinese envoys to the northern part of Kyūshū around the nine-year period of 239-48. It begins with the following statement: “The people of Wo (Wa in Japanese) dwell in the middle of the ocean southeast of Daifang [commandery]. Around the mountains and islands, they form town-states, formerly comprising more than one hundred states. During the Han dynasty [Wo] envoys appeared at the court. Today, thirty of their town-states maintain intercourse with us through envoys and interpreters.” There also appears the record on Queen “Pimihu of the Yama-ich town-state” (called “Himiko of the Yama-tai State” by the Japanese historians) from 238-47, and her relative Iyo who became queen after Pimihu passed away.

According to the Jinshu (History of Western and Eastern Jin compiled during 646-8), an envoy and interpreters from the Wo people came to the court of Western Jin with a tribute sometime early in the period of 265-74. According to the Nihongi (that quotes a Jin chronicle), it most likely was the year 266. The “Wo Queen” recorded in the quotation of Nihongi (日本紀 traditionally called Nihon-shoki 日本書紀 in Japan) as having sent interpreters bearing tribute to the Jin court in 266 mostly likely was Iyo.

The Jinshu (History of Jin, 265-317-420) records the envoy of Yamato State presenting local products to the Eastern Jin (317-420) court in 413. The Japanese Islands are never mentioned in the Chinese dynastic chronicles from 266 to 413. According to the Songshu (History of Liu-Song, 420-79), Wendi (r.424-53) of Liu-Song granted the king called Zhen the title of “General Pacifying the East, the King of Yamato” sometime between 425-442. The Kojiki (古事記) and Nihongi, compiled in 712 and 720 respectively, read the Chinese character Wo (倭) as Yamato (夜麻登/耶麻謄). In China, the pronunciation of the character 倭 has changed from uar/ua/uo/uə/wo. In Kojiki, the Chinese character Wo 倭 is read as Yamato and transcribed in Chinese characters as 夜麻登 (古事記 中卷: Iwanami edition, p. 162). Formerly the name of the Yamato province was written in two Chinese characters 大倭 and were read O-ho (Great) Yamato. In 737 the two characters were changed to 大和 but were also read O-ho (Great) Yamato. The Suishu (History of Sui, compiled between 629-36) still writes the Yamato Kingdom as Wo State 倭國 in Chinese characters. In the month of December 670, the Silla Pon-ki (the Annals of Silla in the Samguk-sagi) reports that the “Yamato State 倭國” changed its name to “Nippon 日本” implying “Sun-Origin.” 文武王 十年十二月 “倭國更號日本 自言 近日所出以爲名” 隋書 卷八十一 東夷傳 倭國 “其國書曰 日出處天子致書日沒處天子無恙” In Nihongi, the Chinese characters Nippon 日本 (niĕt-puən) is also read as Yamato 日本 此云耶麻謄 (日本書紀上 神代上: Iwanami edition, p. 81). Among the Chinese dynastic chronicles, it was the Jiu Tangshu (Old History of Tang, compiled between 940-5) that writes the Yamato Kingdom as “Nippon” for the first time. 舊唐書 卷百九十九上 列傳 東夷 “日本國者 倭國之別種也 以其國在日邊 故以日本爲名 或曰 倭國自惡其名不雅 改爲日本 或云 日本舊小國 倂倭國之地” In China, the pronunciation of the Chinese character 日 has changed from niet-niĕt-riĕt-riəi-rï-ri, and 本 from puən-pən-běn. Marco Polo (1254-1324) gives the Chinese name of Cipangu or Zipangu for Japan. Japan appears first in a European map, Fra Mauro’s map of the world which was composed around 1450, in the name of Ixola (island) de Cimpagu. Some linguists believe that Iapam-Iippon-Jippon-Giapan-Japan derives from the Portuguese recording of the early Wu dialect (呉語) for Nippon, i.e., Cipan-Zeppen. The modern Shanghainese pronunciation of characters 日本 is still Zeppen.

Historians speculate that the lacuna between 266-413 may imply that some sort of chaos prevailed in the Japanese Islands. Hence it is said that “the Yamato period has long been considered a dark and puzzling stretch of prehistory.” The most important fact may be that there were, according to the Chinese dynastic chronicles, at least thirty Wo town-states in 266, but then there emerged one Yamato state by 413. This period coincides with the Yayoi-Kofun transition, and apparently also with the birth of the first unified state in the Japanese Islands. The objective of Hong’s study is to build a plausible model for the origin of the Yamato dynasty and the roots of the imperial family, focusing on this gap of 147 years.

At the Eastern End of the Eurasian Continent
The Paleolithic Ainu in the Japanese archipelago were bound to encounter the Malayo-Polynesian people arriving through the sea route of the Philippines-Taiwan-Ryukyu islands, giving rise together to the Neolithic Jōmon culture of hunting-fishing-gathering (c.10,000-300 BCE). They were eventually joined by the people coming from the Korean Peninsula and all of them together commencing the Bronze-Iron Yayoi era of rice cultivation (c.300 BCE-300 CE). The Yayoi period was followed by the Tomb period. The usual periodization for the Tomb Period is the Early (300s), the Middle (400s), and the Late (500-700). The early history of the Japanese Islands reveals some conspicuous parallels with that of the British Isles at the other end of the Eurasian continent. During the 600-year Yayoi period, Korean influences penetrated to the Japanese Islands as visibly as the influences of the Anglo-Saxon on Celtic Britain and, during the next 400-year Tomb period of 300-700 CE, changes came as swiftly and strongly as the Norman Conquest of England. Then the parallel with the British Isles fades away. The Korean influences on the Japanese Islands petered out thereafter, resulting in a brief period of active importation of the Tang culture by the Yamato court followed by a prolonged period of isolation, producing a fairly unique indigenous culture through internal evolution. As a cultural periphery in an anthropological context, old outmoded habits and institutions have been tenaciously preserved in the Japanese Islands, a spectacular example of which is, as Reischauer states, “the survival of the imperial family as the theoretical source of all political authority for a millennium after it had lost all real political power.”

Historical Stage for the Birth of the Yamato Dynasty
The fall of the Later Han dynasty (25-220) started with the Yellow Turban rebellion of 184, to be followed by the Three Kingdoms period (220-265) in mainland China. The Gongsun warlords consolidated their power in Liaodong from 172-7, sent an army to attack Koguryeo sometime between 205-19, and established the Daifang Commandery in the area south of Lelang from 196-220. Gongsun Yuan proclaimed himself the King of Yan in 237; Sima Xuan led an army to attack Gongsun Yuan; the Koguryeo king (Dong-cheon r.227-48) helped the Wei army by dispatching several thousand soldiers; and Gonsun Yuan was killed in 239. The Cao Cao’s Wei was replaced by the Western Jin (265-316) dynasty of the Sima family. Full-scale civil war, the War of Eight Princes, raged in mainland China from 291-305. The occupation of North China between 304-52 by the two Xiongnu Zhao states commenced the Era of Five Barbarians and Sixteen States (304-439). A member of the Jin imperial family founded the Eastern Jin dynasty below the Yangzi River in 317 that lasted until 420. At the time of Western Jin, we find a number of small Xianbei states in western Manchuria, including the state of the Murong (around Chaoyang), the Tuoba, the Yuwen, and the Duan. The Murong-Xianbei founded short-lived conquest dynasties in North China in the aftermath of the demise of the Han Chinese empires. Murong Huang proclaimed himself King of Yan in 337, and neutralized Koguryeo in 342, clearing the stage for his son to conquer North China. When the Xiongnu Later Zhao state collapsed from the Han Chinese rebellion in 349, Murong Jun (r.349-60), Huang’s second son, occupied North China and declared himself emperor in 352. The Murong Xianbei captured Luoyang in 365, only to be conquered in 370 by Fu Jian (r.357-85) of the Tibetan Former Qin, who could unify all of North China by 381. The death of Fu Jian in 385, however, opened the way for the re-establishment of various Murong Yan states. Murong Chui (r.386-96) established Later Yan (386-407). Tuoba Gui followed suit proclaiming himself King of Wei (386-534). Challenged by Tuoba Gui, Chui’s son Bao (r.396-8) had to flee to the Murong’s home base in Liaoxi in 397. The Later Yan kings kept fighting against Koguryeo. King Kwang-gae-to (r.391-413) apparently occupied the Liaodong area sometime between 392-9. Tuoba Gui’s grandson, Tai Wudi (r.423-52), accomplished the unification of North China by 439.

During the third century, Koguryeo was still entrenched in the Hun-Yalu river valleys. There were frequent armed conflicts between the Koguryeo and the Murong Xianbei from 293 to 296. In 311, the Xiongnu sacked the Western Jin capital at Luoyang, and Koguryeo took over the Lelang commandery in 313. In 319, Koguryeo, in coalition with two Xianbei tribes, Yuwen and Duan, attacked Murong Hui (r.285-333), but was defeated by the troops led by Hui and his son Huang. Hui conquered the Liaodong area, and let another son, Ren, defend Liaodong. In 320, the Koguryeo army attacked Liaodong but was beaten back. The armed conflicts between the Xianbei and the Koguryeo continued from 339 to 342. There were, however, no conflicts recorded during the 41-year period between 343-84. Koguryeo mounted an attack on Liaodong in 385, fifteen years after the fall of Former Yan.

When Murong Huang (r.333-49) succeeded his father in 333, his younger brother, Ren, rebelled in the Liaodong area. According to the Zizhi Tongjian, one of Huang’s officers named Tong Shu (288-357), a Han Chinese from Liaodong, sided with Ren after Huang’s initial defeat, and then, when Ren was crushed by Huang in 336, fled to Koguryeo. Surprisingly, Tong Shu appears as one of the two military aides-de-camp in the mural painting of a Koguryeo royal mausoleum, likely the tomb of King Koguk-won (r.331-71).

Paekche was an offshoot of the Puyeo-Koguryeo that had occupied the Han River area of the Korean Peninsula. According to the Samguk-sagi, King Koguk-won of Koguryeo invaded Paekche in September 369 with 20,000 infantry and cavalry soldiers. King Keun Ch’ogo (r.346-75) of Paekche let his Crown Prince (Keun Kusu) attack the Koguryeo army, who returned with 5,000 prisoners after destroying them. In November 369, King Keun Chogo held a grand military parade south of the Han River. The conquest of the entire Ma-han area occurred immediately thereafter. Keun Ch’ogo, together with the Crown Prince, led 30,000 elite soldiers and invaded Koguryeo in the Winter of 371, and killed the Koguryeo King Koguk-won in the battle at Pyung-yang. In 377, King Keun Kusu (r.375-84) led thirty thousand soldiers and attacked Pyung-yang. Before the appearance of King Kwang-gae-to (r.391-413), Koguryeo had constantly been battered by Paekche.

According to the Jinshu (in Annals), an envoy from Paekche had arrived at the court of Eastern Jin in January 372, and then a Jin envoy was sent to the Paekche court in June, granting Keun Ch’ogo the title of “General Stabilizing the East, Governor of Lelang.” The Samguk-sagi records that Keun Ch’ogo sent an envoy to the Eastern Jin court in January 372 and also in February 373. The Jinshu records the arrival of a Paekche mission in 384. The Samguk-sagi records the sending of an envoy and the arrival of a Serindian monk named Marananta from Eastern Jin in September 384, implying the formal introduction of Buddhism to Paekche. The Jinshu records that the title of “Commissioner Bearing Credentials, Inspector-General, General Stabilizing the East, King of Paekche” was granted to Chim-ryu (r.384-5) or Chin-sa (r.385-92) in 386.

The Japanese Islands are never mentioned in the Chinese dynastic chronicles after the Wo-zhuan record (in the Weishu of Sanguozhi) on the thirty Wo town-states (that had maintained intercourse with the Wei court between 238-47) followed by the Jinshu-Nihongi records of a Wo envoy (to the Western Jin court) in 266 until the year 413, when the Yamato state and Koguryeo are recorded to have sent local products to the Eastern Jin court. Historians speculate that the lacuna of this 147-year period (between 266-413) may imply that some sort of chaos prevailed in the Japanese Islands. This period coincides with the historical stage for the birth of the Yamato Kingdom, the first unified state on the Japanese Islands.

MODEL BUILDING FOR THE ORIGIN OF THE YAMATO KINGDOM
On the basis of the sudden appearance of horse bones and various artifacts related to horses in the Yamato area of the Japanese Islands in the late fourth century [c.370s], Namio Egami has contended that the horseriders crossed the sea from the southern peninsula and occupied Kyūshū in the early fourth century; and that their descendant Homuda (=Ōjin) carried out the conquest eastward to the Kinki region at the end of the fourth century, establishing the Yamato Kingdom. Wontack Hong, Ancient Korea-Japan Relations: Paekche and the Origin of the Yamato Dynasty, Seoul: Kudara, 2010, pp. 69-84 (http://www.HongWontack.com/homepage2/data/2051.pdf); Namio Egami, “Light on Japanese Cultural Origins from Historical Archeology and Legend,” Japanese Culture: Its Development and Characteristics, papers presented at the 10th Pacific Science Congress, ed. by R. J. Smith and R. K. Beardsley, Viking Fund Publications in Anthropology, Number 34, New York: Wenner-Gren Foundation for Anthropological Research, Inc., 1962, pp. 11-16; Namio Egami, “The Formation of People and the Origin of the State of Japan,” The Memoirs of the Tōyō Bunko, 23, Tokyo: Toyo Bunko, 1964, pp. 35-70; 江上波夫の日本古代史: 騎馬民族說四十五年, 東京: 大巧社, 1992; and 對談と討論: 日本民族=文化の源流と日本國家の形成, 民族學硏究. In May 1948, Eiichirō Ishida (1903-68), a cultural anthropologist, organized a symposium on the subject of “the Japanese People - the Origin of its Culture and the Formation of the Japanese State” with Namio Egami (1906-2002), Masao Oka and Ichirō Yawata participating. The discussions presented at the Symposium were published in the Ethnology Study (Minzokugaku Kenkyū, Vol. 13, No. 3) in February 1949. The primary result of the symposium was the dissemination of Egami’s theory. Egami himself regards his theory, which others have named “the Theory of the Horseriding People 騎馬民族說,” as a modern version of the theory of Sadakichi Kida (喜田貞吉 1871-1939) that was published with the title of “The Theory of the Common Origin of the Japanese and Korean Peoples 日鮮同祖論” in Race and History (Minzoku to Rekishi, Vol. 6, No. 1) immediately after Japan’s annexation of Korea in 1910. Kida was forced to resign from his post (國定國史敎科書 編纂擔當) in 1911 for statements held to be disrespectful to the imperial institution.

On the basis of the historical fact that Puyeo was attacked by the Murong-Xianbei in 346, and the chaotic stories of the period between 364-69 recorded in the Nihongi, Gari Ledyard has attempted to reformulate Egami’s model in order to make it more consistent with the appearance of the archeological break. Ledyard contends that the Paekche Kingdom in the Korean Peninsula was founded by the Puyeo refugees from Manchuria sometime in the twenty years between 352 and 372; and immediately thereafter, the Puyeo warriors reached the sea, boarded boats, and founded the Yamato Kingdom.

The model-building for the origin of the Yamato dynasty, however, cannot be based so preponderantly on archeological evidence. Hong contends that one may be able to build a plausible model for the origin of the Yamato dynasty only with an intensive examination of the entire available documentary evidence, and that one should thoroughly investigate the records in the accounts of Kojiki and Nihongi, as well as the records in the accounts of various supplementary documents such as the Harima Fudoki (播磨風土記), Shinsen Shōjiroku (新撰姓氏錄) and Shoku Nihongi (續日本紀), in order to deduce the origin of the Yamato dynasty and the roots of the Japanese imperial family.

According to the Samguk-sagi (三國史記 Chronicle of the Three Kingdoms—Koguryeo, Paekche and Silla in the Korean Peninsula, completed in 1145), Paekche under the reign of the warrior kings Keun Chogo (r.346-75) and Keun Kusu (r.346-84) was the most expansionist era for the kingdom. Hong contends that, not only the entire Ma-han area in the southern part of the Korean Peninsula, but also the western part of the Japanese Islands were conquered by the Paekche people sometime during the latter half of the fourth century when the Paekche’s military might reached its peak.

Hong focuses squarely on Paekche, and does not invoke some unknown North Asian nomad or Puyeo. Correcting the Nihongi-dating with the record of Samguk-sagi, Hong further postulates that the conquest of Japanese Islands by the Paekche people occurred sometime between 370-390; Ōjin (=Homuda) ascended the throne as the founder of the Yamato Kingdom in 390; and there was some time lag between the commencement of the conquest and the burial of the Paekche conquerors in gigantic tombs with horse trappings. The crucial evidence supporting Hong’s model consists of all the records contained in, among others, the Kojiki and Nihongi. The Kojiki and Nihongi write Paekche using two Chinese characters 百濟 and read them “Kudara,” and also write Wa with a Chinese character 倭 (Wo) and read it “Yamato.” Hong’s model may therefore be called the Kudara-Yamato Model.

Founder of the Yamato Kingdom and the Founding Date
Sōkichi Tsuda (津田左右吉 1873-1961) has contended that the Yamato Kingdom began with Ōjin on the basis of the following two evidences. (1) In the Kojiki and Nihongi, all thirteen kings between Jimmu (神武) the Founder and the fifteenth king Ōjin (應神) were recorded in posthumous formulaic titles, none of them individual or unique. From this, Tsuda reasons that posterity manufactured the titles, rendering them uniform. Beginning with Ōjin, however, the unique name (Ōjin=Homuda 褒武多/品陀/譽田) that was actually used since the time of the princedom was recorded as the posthumous title of each king, and hence Tsuda reasons that the name of each king was authentic. The Chinese-style titles, such as Jimmu or Ōjin, though most familiar to the general public these days, are not the ones we see in the original Kojiki and Nihongi. We only see Ihare (=Jimmu) or Homuda (=Ōjin). Such titles as Jimmu or Ōjin are believed to have been manufactured later by a scholar called Oumi Mihune (淡海三船 721-85). (2) From Jimmu to the fifteenth king Ōjin, the pattern of succession was strictly lineal, from father to son. Between Ōjin and Tenji (r.662-68-71), however, the pattern of succession was mostly fraternal, with kingship passing from brother to brother. Tsuda therefore contended that the records of Kojiki and Nihongi on all kings prior to Ōjin were fictitious. Wontack Hong presents four additional pieces of evidence to support Tsuda’s thesis. (3) Tsuda had focused on the fact that both the Kojiki and Nihongi record strict father-to-son successions prior to Ōjin. More importantly, however, the credibility of them is cast into doubt by the peaceful nature of the transitions ascribed to them, so unlike other transitions. Conflict and bloodshed, mostly between brothers, characterize the post-Ōjin successions, giving us no basis to suppose that pre-Ōjin successions were peaceful. (4) According to the Nihongi, the 70-year interval between the death of the so-called fourteenth king Chiuai and the enthronement of the fifteenth king Ōjin was ruled by Empress Jingū as regent (201-69). Yet Jingū is commonly acknowledged to be a fictitious figure apparently inspired by the third century Pimihu recorded in the Wajin-den (Wo-zhuan of Weishu). The story of Jingū’s regency makes the thesis that only the post-Ōjin kings did actually exist sound more reasonable. (5) The Harima Fudoki (compiled between 713-5) includes so many anecdotes related to only Homuda (=Ōjin) that one may readily believe Homuda to have been the founder of the Yamato Kingdom. (6) Among all Yamato kings, only Jimmu the official Founder and the so-called fifteenth king Ōjin were born in Kyūshū: Jimmu shortly after the imperial ancestor deity Ninigi descended to Kyūshū from heaven, and Homuda immediately after his mother (Empress Jingū) landed on Kyūshū, crossing the sea from Korea. From Kyūshū, Jimmu makes an epic Eastward Expedition, while Ōjin makes a miniature expedition eastward with his mother. The fact that only Jimmu, the official founder, and Ōjin the fifteenth king were recorded to have been born in Kyūshū (only to conquer unruly elements in the Yamato area) implies that both Jimmu and Ōjin represent the one and only founder of the Yamato Kingdom.

The first date in the Nihongi which is corroborated by external evidence is 461 CE. Among the Nihongi dating between 660 BCE and 460 CE, it is well known that the 30 years between 375-405 is the one and only period that can be dated accurately by external evidence. According to the Nihongi, the Crown Prince Homuda ascended the throne in 270. If we apply the well-known two sexagenary cycles (120 years) difference between the records of the Nihongi and those of the Samguk-sagi, the first year of Ōjin’s reign becomes 390. According to the Nihongi, Paekche sent crown prince Cheon-ji to the Yamato court in “the eighth year of Ōjin’s reign.” The Samguk-sagi records that the crown prince was sent to the Yamato court in 397. According to the Nihongi, Paekche King Asin died in “the sixteenth year of Ōjin’s reign,” and the Samguk-sagi records that Asin died in 405. These records are perfectly consistent with Hong’s proposition that Ōjin founded the Yamato Kingdom in 390.

Similarity in Kingship Myth between Koguryeo and Yamato Kingdom
According to the Samguk-sagi, the founder of Koguryeo, Chu-mong, had one son, Yuri, by his first wife, whom he married when he was in Northern Puyeo; and two sons, Biryu and Onjo, by his second wife, whom he married when he came down to Chol-bon Puyeo. When Yuri ascended the throne, Biryu and Onjo left Chol-bon Puyeo (which became Koguryeo) and went south with their followers in search of a new territory (to found Paekche). One can find striking similarity in kingship myths between Koguryeo and the Yamato Kingdom. The foundation myth of Koguryeo as recorded in the Samguk-sagi and Old Samguk-sa, on the one hand, and the foundation myth of the Yamato Kingdom as recorded in the Kojiki and Nihongi, on the other, reveal surprising similarities in essential motives. In both myths, a son of the heavenly god or sun goddess descends to earth from heaven and marries a daughter of the river god or sea god (after being tested for godliness by the bride’s father). Their romance terminates with the birth of a founding forefather of the earthly kingdom (being destined to be separated from each other), and the earthly founder leaves the initial settlement, crossing the river or sea, getting the help of turtles or of a man riding on a turtle.

In the finale, the foundation myth of Kojiki and Nihongi also matches the legend of Paekche itself: the elder brother Biryu went to the seashore and failed while the younger brother Onjo stayed inland in a mountain area and succeeded in founding a kingdom in the new world. In the Kojiki and Nihongi, Jimmu’s grandfather was a second child who was partial to mountains; the elder brother was partial to the sea and failed, subsequently submitting to his younger brother. Jimmu himself was the younger child, and the elder brother was killed during the first land battle. Ōjin (=Homuda) was a second child, and the elder brother did not merit so much as a single word of description in the Kojiki and Nihongi. A historical event in the formation of Paekche might well have been an additional source of inspiration for the writers of the Kojiki-Nihongi myth. The recorded foundation myths in both countries are consistent with Hong’s foundation model: it was the Paekche people who had established the Yamato Kingdom on the Japanese archipelago, and the roots of the Japanese imperial clan were the Paekche royal family whose origin, in turn, can be traced to the founder of the Koguryeo Kingdom, Chu-mong.

Hong contends that Ninigi, the scion of the Sun Goddess recorded in Book One of the Kojiki, and Ihare (=Jimmu), the earthly founder, and Homuda (=Ōjin) the fifteenth king recorded in Book Two (at the beginning and at the end, respectively) of the Kojiki portray three different aspects of the real founder of the Yamato Kingdom. In the Kojiki as well as in the Nihongi, the mythological aspect was covered in the Ninigi section, the records of battles and conquest were covered in the Ihare (=Jimmu) section, and the massive arrival of the Paekche people was covered in the Homuda (=Ōjin) section. Ihare, Homuda and Ninigi constitute the trinity in the foundation legend of the Yamato Kingdom.

Yamato Imperial Line Recorded to Have Been Originated from Paekche
The Shinsen Shōjiroku (The New Compilation of the Clan Register), compiled in 815 in the reign of Saga (r.809-23), clearly suggests that the entire Ōjin (=Homuda) line of Yamato imperial families originated from the Paekche royal families. The Shinsen Shōjiroku records the progenitors for the 1,182 Yamato ruling clans. The preface of the Register states that since the Ma-hito (Jin-person 眞人) is the sovereign one among the imperial clans, the Ma-hito clans in the capital region are presented at the very beginning of the imperial group in Book One. According to the Register, however, all the Ma-hito clans can be regarded as the offspring of the Paekche royal family.

The first four Ma-hito imperial clans listed at the very beginning of Book One of the Register were recorded as descendants of Homuda (not from Jimmu), the fifth Ma-hito clan as descendants of Keitai, the seven following Ma-hito clans as descendants of Bidatsu; then the following eight Ma-hito imperial clans (i.e., thirteenth to twentieth) were recorded as the descendants of “the Prince of Paekche.” However, the twelfth -- that is, the Ma-hito clan immediately preceding those recorded as the descendants of the Prince of Paekche-- was recorded as the descendant of Bidatsu and also as the offspring of the King of Paekche. In other words, “the descendants of Bidatsu” are equivalent to “the offspring of the King of Paekche.” According to the Nihongi, Bidatsu (r.572-85) was the second child of Kimmei (r.539-71), who was the rightful heir of Keitai (r.507-31), who in turn was “a descendant in the fifth generation” of Ōjin (=Homuda). Thus, the Register records that the entire Ma-hito imperial clan, from the first to the twentieth, were the offspring of “the King of Paekche.” This implies that the entire Ōjin line of Japan’s imperial families originated from Paekche royal families. Nihongi records Temmu’s (r.673-86) posthumous name as Ama no Nunahara Oki no Mahito, assuring that he was one of the imperial Mahito clan.

Reconstructing the Sequence of Conquest
There are enough suggestive records in the accounts of Kojiki and Nihongi from which to reconstruct the life story of the conquerors, telling how they masterminded the conquest, who was the leader, when they crossed the sea, where they landed, and in what manner they fought and wrought. Hong endeavors to reconstruct the possible sequence of conquest on the basis of the passages in Kojiki and Nihongi that seem to be related with the actual event of conquest, taking the freedom of selecting and weaving the recorded materials into a coherent story. Aston, who had translated Nihongi into English, believes that the narrative from the year 246 CE (366 CE with the two cycles correction) down to 265 (385 CE) contains a solid nucleus of fact. Hong believes that the two-cycle correction method for the period 375-405 may then be extended nine years backward so as to include the 366-374 period. Hong traces the possible route of conquest and also establishes the exact dates for some important events that happened during the formative years of the Yamato Kingdom, reinterpreting the related Nihongi records as well as the associated historical facts within his model.

According to the Nihongi record for the year 366, King Keun Chogo (r.346-75) of Paekche had dispatched scouts to a Kaya state (Tak-sun) in July 364 in order to collect information about the passages to the Japanese Islands. Tak-sun seems to have been located in an area along the Nak-tong River which, flowing south to the modern Pusan area, constituted the shortest route from Paekche to the Japanese Islands. What the Nihongi tells us is that the King of a Kaya state (Tak-sun) suggested the need for large ships to the Paekche envoys. In the ensuing narration, however, the Nihongi records a large-scale Wa invasion of Korea with “Paekche generals.” According to the Nihongi, it was Jingū who dispatched an army to the Korean Peninsula in March 369 to invade “Silla.” It is said that, when the Wa army arrived at Tak-sun, they discovered that the size of their army was too small and hence had to ask for reinforcements. They were soon joined by troops led by a Paekche general. They then all together invaded and conquered “Silla,” and pacified Tak-sun and six other places. From here the armies turned west, conquered the southern savages, and then “granted” those conquered lands to Paekche. At this point they were joined by the Paekche King Keun Chogo (r. 346-75) and his son Prince Keun Kusu (r.375-84), whereupon four more localities spontaneously surrendered. The King and the Crown Prince of Paekche offered their congratulations, and sent the Wa soldiers off with cordial courtesy.

By crosschecking the records of Samguk-sagi, Gari Ledyard logically deduces that all those stories recorded in the Nihongi represent the historical records of Paekche armies moving south. In the Nihongi, the above story ends with the Paekche King and the “Wa soldiers,” who are heading to the Japanese Islands, pledging eternal friendship and bidding farewell. Hong believes that, if we take the departing “Wa soldiers” as a contingent of Paekche warriors led by a Paekche prince named Homuda, then the entire story becomes coherent.

Hong reconstructs the possible sequence of conquest on the basis of the passages in Kojiki and Nihongi as follows.

Leaving the southeastern shore of the Korean Peninsula, crossing the Korea Strait, and passing the islands of Tsushima and Iki, the expeditionary force led by Homuda and his elder brother [Ituse] lands on Kyūshū Island, not on the northern plain area crowded by the Yayoi aborigines but, passing the Kammon Straight, on the secluded eastern shore of the Kyūshū Island called Hyūga. The epic Eastern Conquest commences from the Hyūga base.

The Kojiki writes: “[Homuda says that] ‘Where would it be best to dwell in order to carry on the government of the kingdom peacefully? I am thinking of going eastward.’ Thus, departing from Hiuga, he journeyed to Tsukusi [northern Kyūshū]. From there he sailed to...the land of Aki [the modern-day Aki District, Hiroshima Prefecture].”

The Nihongi writes: “Proceeding upwards…they…arrived at the port … in the township of Kusaka in the province of Kawachi. The imperial forces in martial array … endeavored to go eastward, crossing over Mount Ikoma. In this way they entered the inner country. Now when Nagasune heard this, he said: --‘The object of the children of the Heavenly Deity in coming hither is assuredly to rob me of my country.’ So he straightway levied all the forces under his dominion, and intercepted them at the Hill of Kusaka. A battle was engaged… [Homuda declares that] ‘I am the descendant of the Sun-Goddess, and if I proceed against the Sun to attack the enemy, I shall act contrary to the way of Heaven. Better to retreat … and bringing on our backs the might of the Sun-Goddess, let us follow her rays and trample them down. … Leading his army … [Homuda] arrived at Port Arazaka in Kumano. … Guided by the direction taken by Yatagarasu, [Homuda] arrived at the lower reaches of the Yoshino River. … “The [Homuda’s] army at length attacked Nagasune and fought with him repeatedly. … [Homuda proclaims]:--“During the six years that our expedition against the East has lasted, … the wicked bands have met death. … in the region of the Central Land there is no more wind and dust. Truly we should make a vast and spacious capital, and plan it great and strong. At present things are in a crude and obscure condition, and the people’s minds are unsophisticated. …Now if a great man were to establish laws, justice could not fail to flourish. When I observe the Kashihabara plain, which lies southwest of Mount Unebi, it seems the Center of the Land. I must set it in order. Two years later, Year [270/390], Spring, 1st month, 1st day, [Homuda] assumed the Imperial Dignity in the Palace of Kashihabara.”

Massive Influx of the Paekche People
Hong illuminates the massive influx of the Paekche people into the Yamato region immediately after Homuda (=Ōjin) founded the Yamato Kingdom in 390, as well as the close kinship between the Paekche and Yamato royal families as portrayed in the Nihongi.

The Nihongi records the official arrival of horses in the Japanese archipelago. The King of Paekche sent A-chik-ki with two quiet horses (one stallion and one mare, specifies the Kojiki) in 404, the fifteenth year of Ōjin’s reign. Because A-chik-ki was well-read in the classics, the Heir Apparent made him his teacher. Wang-in arrived from Paekche in 405 (with Confucian Analects and Thousand-Character Classics), and the Heir Apparent learned various books from him. A-chik-ki became the ancestor of the Scribes, and Wang In became the ancestor of the Chief Writers. The Kojiki adds that the King of Paekche also sent a blacksmith, a weaver, and a man who knew how to brew wine. The Nihongi records the construction of a reservoir in 396, the seventh year of Ōjin’s reign, by a group of people from the Korean Peninsula. The Kojiki records that there came some people from Silla who constructed a reservoir, and that the reservoir was called “Paekche reservoir.” The Nihongi records that the King of Paekche sent a seamstress named Chin-mo-chin in 403, who became the ancestress of the seamstresses of Kume.

Kung-wol, the progenitor of the Hata clan, arrived at Yamato in the fourteenth year of Ōjin’s reign (403) from “Paekche,” leading the people of 120 provinces. Achi, the progenitor of the Yamato Aya clan, also arrived with the people of 17 provinces in the twentieth year of Ōjin (409). The records of both Samguk-sagi and King Kwang-gae-to’s epitaph corroborate the possible sequence of a massive movement of people from Paekche to the Japanese Islands precisely at about this time (403-9). According to the Nihongi, a large number of skilled workers, including saddle-makers, potters, painters, and silk-makers arrived at Yamato from Paekche in the seventh year of Yūriaku’s reign [463]. In order to differentiate these newly arrived skilled workers from those who had arrived during the reign of Ōjin (the Yamato Aya clan), they were called Newly-Arrived Aya (Imaki or New Aya), and were put under the jurisdiction of the Yamato Aya clan. According to the Shoku-Nihongi, the province of Takechi, which was the very center of the Yamato Kingdom, was so populated by Aya people that the people of other clans accounted for only one or two out of ten. This massive movement of peoples clearly establishes a place for Korea in the formation of the Yamato Kingdom.

If one reads the Nihongi, one cannot but feel a very close kinship between the Paekche royal family and the Yamato royal family, witness the Paekche royal family members repeatedly staying at the Yamato court for long period of time. The Heir Apparent Cheon-ji, the eldest son of Paekche King Asin (r.392-405), stayed at the Yamato court from 397 to 405. He returned to Paekche when Asin died in 405, and became King Cheon-ji (r.405-420). We also find in the Nihongi record that King Cheon-ji sent his younger sister, Shin-je-do, to the Yamato court, with seven maids, to wait on Ōjin.

During the reign of Nintoku, who had succeeded Ōjin, Paekche Prince Chu came to the Yamato court, trained a falcon, and went hawking with Nintoku. During the reign of King Kaero (r.455-75) in Paekche, the Paekche court sent a daughter of Lady Mony to the Yamato court to become the queen of Yūriaku, but she was burned at the stake after being found guilty of infidelity. Learning of this unfortunate incident, King Kaero sent his younger brother Kon-ji to the Yamato court to assist Yūriaku. Quoting the Paekche New Compilations (Paekche Shinsen), the Nihongi states that King Kaero sent his younger brother Kon-ji to the Yamato court in 461 to wait upon the Heavenly King (天王 Yūriaku) and “to confirm the friendship of big brother King.”

In 505, Paekche King Mu-nyung (r.501-23) sent a prince called Sa-a to assist the Yamato court. In 572, Bidatsu (r.572-85) made his palace at Oho-wi in the area called “Kudara” (百濟 Paekche). In April 597, King Wi-deock (r.554-98) of Paekche sent Prince A-jwa. The Nihongi also records the arrival of Prince Pung-jang, a son of Paekche King Uija (r.641-60), in 631. In 639, Jomei (r.629-41) ordered to build a great palace and a great temple. So the bank of the Kudara River (百濟川) was chosen as the site for the palace and a pagoda of nine stories was erected on the bank of the River Kudara. In 640, Jomei removed to the Palace of Kudara (百濟宮). In 641, the Emperor Jomei died in the Palace of Kudara. He was temporarily interred north of the Palace. This was called the “great temporary tomb of Kudara.”

The Be system of the Yamato Kingdom was apparently adopted from the Bu system of Paekche. The use of Kabane titles, like the division of political jurisdictions into Be, was adopted from Paekche. The primary means of controlling the people in the pre-Taika period (pre-645 CE) was Be system. It is quite likely that the institution of Be was the beginning of the Uji-Kabane (Shi-sei 氏姓) system in the Yamato Kingdom.

Yayoi Wave Introduces the Rice-Cultivating Culture
By the 1990s, modern biological anthropology has shattered the transformation theories whereby Jōmon populations evolved into the Yayoi and then modern Japanese. Recent progress in molecular genetics has convincingly established that the proto-Japanese people and proto-Japanese language were formed not during the Neolithic Jōmon period (10,000-300 BCE) but during the bronze-iron Yayoi period (300 BCE-300 CE) of rice cultivation.

Rice does not originate from the Japanese Islands. The Japanese archeologists have submitted carbonized rice grains from several Jōmon sites in northern Kyūshū to C-14 dating, and come up with a tentative date of 900 BCE. Rice cultivation on a full scale, however, was introduced around 300 BCE into the Japanese Islands together with new cultural elements, including stone tools, pottery, pit-dwelling, bronze-iron artifacts, and even downsize dolmen similar to those found in the Korean Peninsula.

The people of Korea proper began cultivating millet in the north and rice in the south before 2,000 BCE. They started using bronze between 1,500-1,000 BCE, and iron c.400 BCE. With all these developments going on for thousands of years just across the Korea Strait, it may seem astonishing that the Japanese Islands were occupied by stone-tool-using hunter-gatherers until 300 BCE. Hence Diamond has raised such questions as follows: “How did the Jōmon culture survive so long? Why did the Korean rice farmers wait so long to cross the Korea Strait and commence the Yayoi era in the Japanese Islands?”

We still have only an incomplete mosaic of hard data on climate changes in the Holocene (the most recent geologic period of last 11,500 years), but the mountain glaciers seem to have started to re-advance around 400 BCE, with cooler conditions persisting until 300 CE. The beginning of a Little Ice Age seems to have coincided with the Great Celtic Migrations (c.400-178 BCE) in the west end of the Eurasian continent and the Warring States Period (403-221 BCE) in the east end. In 390 BCE, the fierce Celtic warriors known as Gauls had besieged Rome itself. The Warring States Period with seven champion states had formally commenced in 403 BCE. A sudden change in climate, such as the commencement of a Little Ice Age, may have prompted the southern peninsular rice farmers to cross the Korea Strait circa 300 BCE in search of warmer and moister land. This may answer the timing of the “Yayoi Wave” that had commenced the rice-cultivating Yayoi era (c.300 BCE-300 CE) in the Japanese Islands.

Kofun Wave Introduces Equestrian Goods and Stoneware
The Little Ice Age (400 BCE-300 CE) produced the heyday of the Roman Empire located in the warm Mediterranean zone and the Han Chinese Empires in mainland China. There followed a drought period of maximum intensity in the Mediterranean, North Africa and far to the east into Asia around 300-400 CE. This period coincides with the severe droughts in the Eurasian steppes that could have triggered a chain reaction that resulted in the invasion of the Huns and the subsequent Germanic folk migrations (374-476) in the west end, and the Five Barbarians and Sixteen States Period (304-439) in the east end. Hong contends that the establishment of the Yamato Kingdom by the Paekche people from the Korean Peninsula and the commencement of the Late Tomb Period (c.400-700 CE) on the Japanese Islands coincided with a period of global drought of maximum intensity. Around 300-400 CE, a drought may well have forced the Paekche farmers around the Han River basin to search for new territory in the southern part of the Korean Peninsula as well as in the western part of the Japanese Islands. This may answer the timing of the “Kofun Wave” that commenced the Middle-Late Tomb era under the Yamato Kingdom in the Japanese Islands.

In 1983, Walter Edwards has argued that the changes in the contents of the tombs in the Japanese Islands can be explained in terms of “process” rather than as the product of a discrete “event” that created the Yamato Kingdom. Edwards has classified not only the equestrian goods, but also the sue-ki stoneware as the continental “horserider materials,” and then insisted that the gigantic early fifth century Middle Period tombs of Ōjin and Nintoku precede the presence of continental “horserider materials” because their influx into the Japanese Islands occurred “no earlier than the middle of the fifth century,” and hence “the political power they represent cannot be seen as deriving from it.” Quite a few eminent scholars seem to have seized on the Edwards’ thesis fairly uncritically, and contended that the Middle and Late Tomb cultures (400-700) had emerged as a result of internal evolution, eliminating the idea of a second wave of people from the Korean Peninsula, the “Kofun Wave.” Hong shows why the “evolutionary” thesis of Edwards is inadequate, and calls our attention to the “Kofun Wave” thesis, accounting for its timing.

After a lapse of exactly 20 years, Edwards states in 2003 that “In the fifth century, the keyhole tombs reached their greatest size in the 425m long mound regarded as the mausoleum of the legendary Emperor Ōjin, and the even longer mound attributed to his son, Nintoku. … This process began with the appearance of Korean style stoneware (=sueki) in the late fourth or early fifth century, followed by continental style weaponry and equestrian goods.

Few people know the fact that the so-called sue-ki stoneware was called Chosun (Korean) pottery until the 1950s, when the word sue (derived from a reference to the vessels in the 8th-century anthology Manyōshu) was adopted by the Japanese. It must have been an unbearable burden for the contemporary Japanese to keep calling the representative artifact marking the 300-year Middle and Late tomb periods Chosun (Korean) pottery.

The quantity of iron objects from sites of all types in the Japanese islands grew dramatically in the early fifth century. Yet few people know the fact that, until iron sand was discovered in the Japanese Islands in the sixth century, the source of this iron had been Korea. The implications of early Japan’s total reliance on Korea for iron are profound.

CREATING A NEW HISTORY AFTER THE FALL OF PAEKCHE
The disappearance of the Paekche Kingdom in 663 and the unification of the Korean Peninsula in the hands of the Silla people by 676 caused an unprecedented identity crisis for the Yamato rulers. Should they continue to identify themselves with the Paekche, they feared their days on the Japanese Islands would be numbered. Temmu’s (r.673-86) own words, quoted in the Preface of Kojiki, offer a glimpse of Temmu’s sense of crisis and of the necessity, therefore, to create a new history: “Those chronicles handed down and kept by the head family of each clan contain records which differ greatly from the facts. Unless we correct those false records at this very moment, the foundation of our kingdom and royal family will be lost in a few years. I now intend to scrutinize all those records with great care, eliminate the falsehoods, correct the errors, and hand down the true version of our history to posterity.” Temmu ordered the creation of new histories of the Yamato dynasty on March 17, 681. Before Temmu died in 686, the outline of the new history was finalized, and was memorized by Hieda Are, then 28 years old, who had extraordinary powers of memory. On September 18, 711, Gemmei (r.707-715) ordered Yasumaro to write down the new History of Royal Mandate (勅語舊辭) that had been memorized by Hieda Are. Four months later, on January 28, 712, Yasumaro presented the results, called Kojiki, to Gemmei. On the basis of Kojiki, the Yamato court immediately commenced the compilation of the Nihongi, finished in 720.

The Yamato rulers compiled the Kojiki and Nihongi with definite objectives in mind. In the new history, the Yamato Kingdom is said to have been established in time immemorial (660 BCE) without any connection with Paekche; the imperial family became a truly native force without any relation to the Paekche people; and all Korean and Chinese kingdoms were under the suzerainty of the Yamato court. The ruling clans were postulated to have come down to the Japanese Islands (to the Kyūshū Islands at first), not from the Korean Peninsula but directly from heaven. Ever since the appearance of Kojiki and Nihongi, their ideology was instilled into the mind of the Yamato ruling class, and eventually evolved into the semi-religious emperor worship on the Japanese Islands. As a result, even after the traditional ruling class of Paekche origin lost all their powers to the samurai warriors of peasant origin, the destitute nobles in the Kyōto area were left alone by the earthly new rulers. Furthermore, the emperor has continued to reign as the nominal head of the Japanese state until today.

SAMURAI-SHOGUNATE AND MEIJI RESTORATION
During the ninth century, the aristocratic clans and large temples started to create private manors, and by the tenth century, the public land-holding system as well as the authority of the central government collapsed completely. The spread of private estates reduced the state revenues, leading to a nation-wide breakdown of law and order. Farmers began to arm themselves for self-protection and gather around the wealthiest and most influential of their own standing. After being mobilized for fighting, the peasant soldiers used to return to their lands. As time passed, however, there evolved military specialists by natural selection who started, from at least the early 10th century (say, late 930s), to form a professional full-time warrior class called samurai, structured on the lord-vassal style ties among fighting men. Although the court nobles were still able to compete for power and influence with warriors, the establishment of military government in Kamakura (1192-1333) effectively terminated the rule by the Yamato court. The military government, in one form or another, endured into the nineteenth century. The Paekche rulers, who had conquered the Japanese Islands and set themselves up as a layer of overlords above the rice-growing Yayoi-Kofun peasants, lost power to the samurai class of peasant origin, though some of them could survive as the heads of samurai warriors.

In 1853, U. S. Commodore Perry and his fleet forced the Tokugawa shogunate (1603-1868) to open up the nation. The weakness of the military government encouraged the ancient enemies of the shogun to conspire to effect the termination of the regime. The conspirators chose the strategy of resurrecting the emperor from obscurity to serve as the figurehead of a modern government built around the coalition of leading anti-shogun clans. Almost by default, the concept of the emperor became crucial as a rallying point. Since the Japanese people had long ago ceased to be aware of the existence of the emperor, they had to launch vigorous promotion campaigns to put the emperor on conspicuous display. There emerged the correct answer to the question about the founders of the Yamato Kingdom and the roots of the imperial family: “It was the imperial clan who were the forefathers of the current imperial family that established the Yamato Kingdom. Most importantly, the imperial clan represented a truly native ruling force that had emerged as the result of natural socio-political evolution on the Japanese archipelago. A single unbroken line for myriad generations (Bansei Ikkei 萬世一系) represented the orthodox account of the imperial family and its origin.”

Japan’s defeat in the Second World War brought an end to official claim for divine status of the imperial line. The Japanese people, including Egami, suddenly found themselves groping for new understanding of their past history that would be consistent with democratic ideals, and also for new ways to define who and what they were. The questions on the nation’s origin were opened to academic investigation. But it did not take long before the emperor-centered ideology struck back at Japanese society. Numerous Japanese historians began to present and still continue to present many and richly imagined variations on the theme of the correct answer.