¶ SECT. CXXVI.—EMPEROR NIN-TOKU (PART VIII.—DEATH OF KING HAYABUSA-WAKE AND QUEEN MEDORI).
Again the Heavenly Sovereign begged for his younger half-sister Queen Medori, using as middle-man his younger brother King Haya-busa-wake. Then Queen Medori [281] spoke to King Hayabusa-wake, saying: “Owing to the [ p. 350 ] violence of the Empress, [the Heavenly Sovereign] has not deigned to take Yata-no-waki-iratsume [into the Palace.] So I will not respectfully serve him. I will become the wife of Thine Augustness.” Forthwith they wedded each other, wherefore King Hayabusa-wake made no report [^2102] Then the Heavenly Sovereign, going straight to the place where Queen Medori dwelt, stood on the door-sill of the palace. Hereupon, Queen Medori being at her loom, was weaving garments. Then the Heavenly Sovereign sang saying:
“Oh! for whom may be the garments that my Great Lady Medori weaves?” [^2103]
Queen Medori replied in a Song saying:
“For an august veil for the high-going Falcon-Lord.” [^2104]
So the Heavenly Sovereign, perceiving her feelings, returned into the palace. At this time [^2105] when her husband King Hayabusa-wake came, his wife Queen Medori sang, saying:
“The lark flies to heaven. Oh! high-going Falcon-Lord, catch the wren.” [^2106]
[282] The Heavenly Sovereign, hearing this Song, [1] forthwith raised an army, wishing to slay King Hayabusa and Queen Medori, who then fled away together, and ascended Mount Kurahashi. [2] Thereupon King Hayabusa-wake sang, saying:
“Owing to the steepness of ladder-like Mount Kurahashi, being unable to clamber [up] the rocks, oh! she takes my hand! [3]
Again he sang, saying:
“Though ladder-like Mount Kurahashi be p. 351 steep, it is not steep when I ascend it with my younger sister.”
So when they fled thence, and reached Soni in Uda, [4] the Imperials [5] army pursued, overtook, and slew them.
[ p. 352 ]
¶ SECT. CXXVII.—EMPEROR NIN-TOKU (PART VIII.—QUEEN MEDORI’S ARMLET).
Chief Ohotate of Yamabe, [6] who was the generalissimo of that army, took the jewelled armlet which was wound round Queen Medori’s august arm, and gave it to his own wife. After this time, when a copious feast [7] was to be held, the women of the various families all went to court. Then the wife of Chief Ohotate came with that Queen’s jewelled armlet wound round her own arm. [283] Thereupon the Empress, Her Augustness Iha-no-hime, herself took the oak-leaves [8] [full] of great august liquor and graciously gave them to the women of the various families. Then the Empress, recognizing the jewelled armlet, gave [the wearer] no oak-leaf[-full] of great august liquor, but forthwith sent her away; [9] and sending. for the husband, Chief Ohotate, said: “Owing to that King and Queen’s impropriety, [the Emperor] deigned to send them away. This was nothing strange. And a slave such as thou despoils of the jewelled armlet that was wound round her august arm the body of his lady [that was still] warm, and gives it to his own wife!”—and forthwith he was condemned to death. [10]
[ p. 353 ]
¶ SECT. CXXVIII.—EMPEROR NIN-TOKU (PART IX.—A WILD-GOOSE LAYS AN EGG).
Another time, the Heavenly Sovereign, when about to hold a copious feast, [11] made a progress to the Island of Hime, [12] just when a wild-goose had laid an egg on that island. Then, sending for His Augustness the Noble Takeuchi, he asked him in a Song about the laying of an egg by a wild goose. This Song said:
“Court Noble of Uchi! thou indeed art a long-lived person. Hast thou [ever] heard of a wild-goose laying an egg in the land of Yamato?” [13]
Hereupon the Noble Take-uchi spoke in a song, saying: [284]
“August Child of the high-shining Sun, it is indeed natural that thou shouldest deign to ask, it is indeed right that thou shouldest ask. I indeed am a long-lived person, [but] have not yet heard of a wild goose laying an egg in the land of Yamato.” [14]
Having thus spoken, he was granted the august [15] lute and sang saying:
“Oh thou prince! the wild goose must have laid the egg because thou wilt at last rule.” [16]
This is a Congratulatory Incomplete Song. [17]
[ p. 354 ]
[ p. 355 ]
¶ SECT. CXXIX:—EMPEROR NIN-TOKU (PART X.—A VESSEL IS MADE INTO A LUTE)
In this august reign there was a tall tree on the west of the river Tsuki. [18] The shadow of this tree, on its being struck by the morning sun, reached to the Island of Ahaji: [19] and on its being struck by the evening sun, it crossed Mount Takayasu. [20] So the tree was cut down and made into a vessel, and a very swift-going vessel it was. At the time, this vessel was called by the name of Karanu. [21] So with this vessel the water of the Island of Ahaji was drawn morning and evening, and presented as the great august water. [22] The broken [pieces] of this vessel were used [as fuel] to burn salt and the pieces of wood that remained over from the burning were made into a lute, whose sound re-echoed seven miles [23] [off]. So [^2130]] sang, saying:
“Karanu was burnt [as fuel] for salt; the remainder was made into a lute; oh! when struck, it sounds like the wet plants standing rocked on the reefs in the middle of the harbour, the harbour of Yura.” [24]
This is a Changing Song which is a Quiet song. [25] [285]
[ p. 356 ]
¶ SECT. CXXX.—EMPEROR NIN-TOKU (PART XI.—HIS AGE AND PLACE OF BURIAL).
The august years of this Heavenly Sovereign were eighty-three. His august mausoleum is on the Ear-Moor of Mozu. [26]
¶ Footnotes
350:1 p. 351 Scil. of the success of his mediation. ↩︎
350:2 Or, “for whom is the loom [employed], with which my Great Lady Medori weaves?”—The word hata in Archaic Japanese signifies both “garment” and the instrument which is used to weave a garment, i.e. a “loom” (
and 
). In later times the second meaning has prevailed to the exclusion of the first. ↩︎350:3 There is here a play on the name of the Queen’s paramour Hayabusa-wake, which signifies “Falcon-Lord” as in the translation—The parallel passage of the “Chronicles” gives these two Songs as a single one which is put into the mouth of Queen Medori’s handmaidens,—is a more acceptable version of the incident. ↩︎
350:4 Motowori suspects that there is here an error in the text, which should, according to him, read: “After this.” ↩︎
350:5 The gist of this Song is an instigation to murder the Emperor (whose name was Oho-sazaki, i.e., “Great Wren.” Conf. Sect. CIV, Note 18), addressed to the singer’s husband (whose name was Hayabusa-wake, i.e., “Falcon Lord”). But the allusion to the lake remains obscure. Keichiū suggests that it is simply mentioned as a term of comparison for the falcon’s power of flight, while Motowori opines that the meaning rather is: “The lark flies so high up to heaven that it would be hard to catch it; but the wren is an easy prey.” ↩︎
350:6 Viz., as may be supposed, repeated by some fourth person. ↩︎
350:7 Kurahashi-yama, in Yamato. ↩︎
350:8 The Song, like the next, is too clear to stand in need of explanation. “Ladder-like” is an attempt to render the force of the Pillow-Word hashi-tate. See Mabuchi’s “Dictionary of Pillow-Words,” s.v., for the exact force attributed to it by Mabuchi. ↩︎
351:9 For Uda see Sect. XLVI, Note, 14. The etymology of Soni is equally obscure. ↩︎
351:10 The character
, though read by the commentators with the usual Japanese Honorific mi, “august,” has here its proper Chinese signification of “Imperial.” ↩︎352:1 p. 352 Yamabe no Ohotate no murazhi. The “gentile name” was Yamabe no murazhi, and the personal name Ohotate, though the confused wording of this passage does not make it appear so. Yama-be signifies mountain (i.e., hunters’) tribe. Oho-tate is “big shield.” ↩︎
352:2 See Sect. CVII, Note 7. ↩︎
352:3 Or, perhaps rather “aralia-leaves” (Con/. Sect. CXXIII). ↩︎
352:4 Or, “had her dragged away.” ↩︎
352:5 Literally, “was granted the punishment of death,” or "(the Emperor) deigned to condemn him to death. ↩︎
353:1 p. 353 See Sect. CVII, 7. ↩︎
353:2 Hime-shima, i.e., “Princess Island.” The name is supposed to be connected with that of the goddess of Himegoso mentioned near the end of Sect. CXIV, and first occurs in Sect. V (Note 33). ↩︎
353:3 The wild-goose goes far north at the approach of spring, and the translator is informed by Capt. Blakiston that the latter has not known p. 354 of any breeding even on the island of Yezo. The Emperor was therefore naturally astonished at so strange an occurrence as that of a wild-goose laying an egg in Yamato, and asks the Noble Take-uchi whether he had ever heard of the like of it before, Take-uchi being at that time more than two hundred years old (!) according to the chronology of the “Chronicles,” and therefore the oldest and most experienced man in the Empire.—“Court Noble” represents the Japanese word Aso (for Asomi, believed by Motowori and Moribe to be derived from a se omi
, lit, “my elder brother minister” but used simply as a title), The words Uchi and Yamato are preceded in the original by their respective Pillow-Words tamaki-haru and soramitsu, whose force it is impossible to render in English, and whose origin indeed is obscure. The words rendered “laying an egg ”are literally “giving birth to a child.” ↩︎353:4 This Song is too clear to need explanation. As in the preceding one, Yamato is accompanied by the Pillow-Word sora-mitsu. ↩︎
353:5 Or, “Imperial.” ↩︎
353:6 I.e., say Motowori and Moribe, who refer this episode to a time previous to Nin-toku’s accession, “The wild-goose has laid an egg in token of the future accession to the throne.” The translator prefers the view expressed by Keichiū in his Kō-Gan Shō, and adopted in the “Explanation of the Songs in the Chronicles of Japan,” that the words tsuki na “at last,” must here be taken in the sense of “long,” and the Song interpreted to mean “The wild-goose lays an egg as an omen that thy reign will be a long one.” This view is supported by the story in the “Chronicles,” which places the Song in the Emperor’s fiftieth year and gives him thirty-six years of subsequent existence, thus making the prophecy amply fulfil itself, as one would expect that it should do in the pages of such a work. According to the other view, the text of the “Chronicles” calls for emendation. ↩︎
353:7 Hogi-uta no kata-uta. For “Incomplete Song” see Sect. LXXXIX, Note 14. ↩︎
355:1 p. 355 This is Moribe’s reading (given without any comment) of the original characters
. Motowori pronounces them corrupt; but, having no emendation to propose, simply leaves them without any kana reading. ↩︎355:3 Takayasu no yama, in the province of Kahachi. The characters with which the name is written signify “high and easy.” ↩︎
355:4 The significance of this name, written
, remains obscure notwithstanding the efforts of the commentators to explain it. ↩︎355:5 I.e., this vessel was used to bring over every morning and evening p. 356 the water for the Imperial household, which was drawn on the Island of Ahaji. ↩︎