Kokon Chomonjū
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Kokon Chomonjū
, lit. ''A Collection of Notable Tales Old and New'', is a Kamakura-period collection of ''setsuwa''. It was compiled by and completed in 1254. The twenty volumes are divided by subject into thirty chapters: chapter 16 concerns art and painting and 17 ''kemari'' or "kickball". Of the 726 tales, nearly two-thirds are set in the Heian period. In a note between tales 721 and 722, Narisue states that "the original aim of this collection was to collect fine stories about music and poems Poetry (derived from the Greek ''poiesis'', "making"), also called verse, is a form of literature that uses aesthetic and often rhythmic qualities of language − such as phonaesthetics, sound symbolism, and metre − to evoke meanings in a ..., and depict them as if in paintings". References Setsuwa Early Middle Japanese texts 1250s books {{Japan-lit-stub ...
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Kamakura Period
The is a period of Japanese history that marks the governance by the Kamakura shogunate, officially established in 1192 in Kamakura by the first ''shōgun'' Minamoto no Yoritomo after the conclusion of the Genpei War, which saw the struggle between the Taira and Minamoto clans. The period is known for the emergence of the samurai, the warrior caste, and for the establishment of feudalism in Japan. During the early Kamakura period, the shogunate continued warfare against the Northern Fujiwara which was only defeated in 1189. Then, the authority to the Kamakura rulers waned in the 1190s and power was transferred to the powerful Hōjō clan in the early 13th century with the head of the clan as regent (Shikken) under the shogun which became a powerless figurehead. The later Kamakura period saw the invasions of the Mongols in 1274 and again in 1281. To reduce the amount of chaos, the Hōjō rulers decided to decentralize power by allowing two imperial lines – Northern and Southern ...
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Setsuwa
Setsuwa (, ja, 説話, setsu wa) is an East Asian literary genre. It consists of myths, legends, folktales, and anecdotes. ''Setsuwa'' means "spoken story". As one of the vaguest forms of literature, setsuwa is believed to have been passed down or presented in the form of narrations. Setsuwa are based foremost on oral tradition and existed primarily as folktales or in other non-written forms before being recorded and committed to text. However, some writers question whether all setsuwa tales were originally oral tradition, or only mostly so. Although there are no formal rules regarding what constitutes setsuwa as a genre, stories in the setsuwa style "have in common brevity; an uncomplicated plot unfolded in plain, direct language; character delineation through dialogue and action rather than through description and psychological analysis; and a predilection for amusing, startling, dramatic, or marvelous subject matter." Setsuwa vary quite considerably in topic, but can be divi ...
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Japanese Art
Japanese art covers a wide range of art styles and media, including ancient pottery, sculpture, ink painting and calligraphy on silk and paper, ''ukiyo-e'' paintings and woodblock prints, ceramics, origami, and more recently manga and anime. It has a long history, ranging from the beginnings of human habitation in Japan, sometime in the 10th millennium BC, to the present-day country. Japan has been subject to sudden invasions of new ideas followed by long periods of minimal contact with the outside world. Over time the Japanese developed the ability to absorb, imitate, and finally assimilate those elements of foreign culture that complemented their aesthetic preferences. The earliest complex art in Japan was produced in the 7th and 8th centuries in connection with Buddhism. In the 9th century, as the Japanese began to turn away from China and develop indigenous forms of expression, the secular arts became increasingly important; until the late 15th century, both religious and sec ...
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Japanese Painting
is one of the oldest and most highly refined of the Japanese visual arts, encompassing a wide variety of genres and styles. As with the history of Japanese arts in general, the long history of Japanese painting exhibits synthesis and competition between native Japanese aesthetics and the adaptation of imported ideas, mainly from Chinese painting, which was especially influential at a number of points; significant Western influence only comes from the 19th century onwards, beginning at the same time as Japanese art was influencing that of the West. Areas of subject matter where Chinese influence has been repeatedly significant include Buddhist religious painting, ink-wash painting of landscapes in the Chinese literati painting tradition, calligraphy of sinograms, and the painting of animals and plants, especially birds and flowers. However, distinctively Japanese traditions have developed in all these fields. The subject matter that is widely regarded as most characteristic o ...
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Kemari
is an athletic game that was popular in Japan during the Heian (794–1185) and Kamakura period (1185–1333). It resembles a game of football or hacky sack. The game was popular in Kyoto, the capital, and the surrounding Kinki (Kansai region), and over time it spread from the aristocracy to the samurai class and '' chōnin'' class. Nowadays, ''kemari'' is played as a seasonal event mainly at Shinto shrines in the Kansai region, and players play in a costume called ''kariginu'' ( :ja:狩衣), which was worn as everyday clothing by court nobles during the Heian period. History The earliest ''kemari'' was created under the influence of the Chinese sport '' Cuju'', which has the same kanji. It is often said that the earliest evidence of ''kemari'' is the record of 644 CE in the '' Nihon Shoki'', but this theory is disputed. In 644, Prince Naka-no-Ōe and Nakatomi no Kamatari, who later initiated the Taika Reforms, became friends during a ball game described as "打鞠", but ...
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Heian Period
The is the last division of classical Japanese history, running from 794 to 1185. It followed the Nara period, beginning when the 50th emperor, Emperor Kanmu, moved the capital of Japan to Heian-kyō (modern Kyoto). means "peace" in Japanese. It is a period in Japanese history when the Chinese influences were in decline and the national culture matured. The Heian period is also considered the peak of the Japanese imperial court and noted for its art, especially poetry and literature. Two types of Japanese script emerged, including katakana, a phonetic script which was abbreviated into hiragana, a cursive alphabet with a unique writing method distinctive to Japan. This gave rise to Japan's famous vernacular literature, with many of its texts written by court women who were not as educated in Chinese compared to their male counterparts. Although the Imperial House of Japan had power on the surface, the real power was in the hands of the Fujiwara clan, a powerful aristocratic f ...
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Traditional Japanese Music
Traditional Japanese music is the folk or traditional music of Japan. Japan's Ministry of Education classifies as a category separate from other traditional forms of music, such as (court music) or (Buddhist chanting), but most ethnomusicologists view , in a broad sense, as the form from which the others were derived. Outside of ethnomusicology, however, usually refers to Japanese music from around the 17th to the mid-19th century. Within this framework, there are three types of traditional music in Japan: theatrical, court music, and instrumental. Theatrical Japan has several theatrical forms of drama in which music plays a significant role. The main forms are kabuki and Noh. Noh or music is a type of theatrical music used in Noh theatre. Noh music is played by an instrumental ensemble called . The instruments used are the stick drum, a large hourglass-shaped drum called the , a smaller hourglass-shaped drum called the , and a bamboo flute called the . The ensemble is p ...
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Japanese Poetry
Japanese poetry is poetry typical of Japan, or written, spoken, or chanted in the Japanese language, which includes Old Japanese, Early Middle Japanese, Late Middle Japanese, and Modern Japanese, as well as poetry in Japan which was written in the Chinese language or '' ryūka'' from the Okinawa Islands: it is possible to make a more accurate distinction between Japanese poetry written in Japan or by Japanese people in other languages versus that written in the Japanese language by speaking of Japanese-language poetry. Much of the literary record of Japanese poetry begins when Japanese poets encountered Chinese poetry during the Tang dynasty (although the Chinese classic anthology of poetry, ''Shijing'', was well known by the literati of Japan by the 6th century). Under the influence of the Chinese poets of this era Japanese began to compose poetry in Chinese '' kanshi''); and, as part of this tradition, poetry in Japan tended to be intimately associated with pictorial painting, p ...
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Monumenta Nipponica
''Monumenta Nipponica'' is a semi-annual academic journal of Japanese studies. Published by Sophia University (Tokyo), it is one of the oldest English-language academic journals in the field of Asian studies, being founded in 1938. Although the journal originally published articles in several languages, such as French, German, Spanish, and Italian, the journal has been published solely in English since early 1963. A series of 75 monographs were also published until 1986 under the ''Monumenta Nipponica'' name. A symposium was held at Sophia University on October 6, 2018 to commemorate the 80-year anniversary of ''Monumenta Nipponica’s'' founding. Videos of the symposium are available on YouTube. In 2020, Sophia University published a special issue commemorating ''Monumenta Nipponica’s'' 80-year founding, showcasing the people who made the journal happen and noteworthy historical events. Contents Each issue contains two to three main research articles, and around twenty reviews ...
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Sophia University
Sophia University (Japanese: 上智大学, ''Jōchi Daigaku''; Latin: ''Universitas Sedis Sapientiae'') is a private research university in Japan. Sophia is one of the three ''Sōkeijōchi'' (早慶上智) private universities, a group of the top three private universities in Japan with the other two being Keio University and Waseda University, according to the Times Higher Education. It is also ranked number 18 in the 2021 Times Japan University Rankings. Founded by the Roman Catholic religious order of the Society of Jesus in 1913, the university has grown from its three original academic departments of Philosophy, German Literature, and Commerce to 9 undergraduate Faculties and 10 Graduate Schools, with over 13,900 students in total at the moment. Sophia has international students from 77 countries and it has forged agreements with 395 overseas universities in 81 countries to encourage students joining the exchange programs with several other top universities throughout the wo ...
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