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Tai Shogi
Tai shogi (泰将棋 ''tai shōgi'' or 無上泰将棋 ''mujō tai shōgi'' "grand chess", renamed from 無上大将棋 ''mujō dai shōgi'' "supreme chess" to avoid confusion with 大将棋 '' dai shōgi'') is a large-board variant of shogi (Japanese chess). The game dates to the 15th century and is based on earlier large-board shogi games. Before the discovery of taikyoku shogi in 1997, tai shogi was believed to be the largest playable chess variant, if not board game, ever. One game may be played over several long sessions and require each player to make over a thousand moves. It was never a popular game; indeed, a single production of six game sets in the early 17th century was a notable event. Like other large-board variants, but unlike standard shogi, the game is played without drops, and uses a promotion-by-capture rule. Because of the terse and often incomplete wording of the historical sources for the large shogi variants, except for chu shogi and to a lesser extent d ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Dai Shogi
Dai shogi (大将棋, 'large chess') or Kamakura dai shogi (鎌倉大将棋) is a chess variant native to Japan. It derived from Heian era shogi, and is similar to standard shogi (sometimes called Japanese chess) in its rules and game play. Dai shogi is only one of several large board shogi variants. Its name means ''large shogi'', from a time when there were three sizes of shogi games. Early versions of dai shogi can be traced back to the Kamakura period, from about AD 1230. It was the historical basis for the later, much more popular variant chu shogi. Rules of the game Other than the additional pieces (the iron and stone generals, knights, angry boars, cat swords, evil wolves, violent oxen, and flying dragons, which all promote to gold generals), the rules of dai shogi are thought to have corresponded very closely to those of its descendant chu shogi. Objective The objective of the game is to capture the opponent's king and, if present, the prince, which counts as a second ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
White Elephant
A white elephant is a possession that its owner cannot dispose of, and whose cost, particularly that of maintenance, is out of proportion to its usefulness. In modern usage, it is a metaphor used to describe an object, construction project, scheme, business venture, facility, etc. considered expensive but without equivalent utility or value relative to its capital (acquisition) and/or operational (maintenance) costs. Background The term derives from the sacred white elephants kept by Southeast Asian monarchs in Burma, Thailand (Siam), Laos and Cambodia. To possess a white elephant was regarded—and is still regarded in Thailand and Burma—as a sign that the monarch reigned with justice and power, and that the kingdom was blessed with peace and prosperity. The opulence expected of anyone who owned a beast of such stature was great. Monarchs often exemplified their possession of white elephants in their formal titles (e.g., Hsinbyushin, and the third monarch of the Konbaung ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Deva (Buddhism)
A Deva (देव Sanskrit and Pāli; Mongolian тэнгэр, tenger) in Buddhism is a type of celestial beings or gods who share the god-like characteristics of being more powerful, longer-lived, and, in general, much happier than humans, although the same level of veneration is not paid to them as to Buddhas. Other words used in Buddhist texts to refer to similar supernatural beings are devatā ("deities") and devaputta ("son of god"). While the former is a synonym for deva ("celestials"), the latter refers specifically to one of these beings who is young and has newly arisen in its heavenly world. Types Deva refers to a class of beings or a path of the six paths of the incarnation cycle. It includes some very different types of beings which can be ranked hierarchically according to the merits they have accumulated over lifetimes. The lowest classes of these beings are closer in their nature to human beings than to the higher classes of deva. Devas can be degraded to h ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Yama-uba
, Yamamba or Yamanba are variations on the name of a ''yōkai'' found in Japanese folklore. Description The word can also be written as 山母, 山姫, or 山女郎, and in the town of Masaeki, Nishimorokata District, Miyazaki Prefecture (now Ebino), a "yamahime" would wash her hair and sing in a lovely voice. Deep in the mountains of Shizuoka Prefecture, there is a tale that the "yamahime" would appear as a woman around twenty years of age and would have beautiful features, a small sleeve, and black hair, and that when a hunter encounters her and tries to shoot at it with a gun, she would repel the bullet with her hands. In Hokkaido, Shikoku, and the southern parts of Kyushu, there is also a yamajijii (mountain old man), and the yamauba would also appear together with a yamawaro (mountain child), and here the yamauba would be called "yamahaha" (mountain mother) and the yamajijii a "yamachichi" (mountain father). In Iwata District, Shizuoka Prefecture, the "yamababa" that ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Amdo
Amdo ( am˥˥.to˥˥ ) is one of the three traditional Tibetan regions, the others being U-Tsang in the west and Kham in the east. Ngari (including former Guge kingdom) in the north-west was incorporated into Ü-Tsang. Amdo is also the birthplace of the 14th Dalai Lama. Amdo encompasses a large area from the Machu (Yellow River) to the Drichu (Yangtze). Amdo is mostly coterminous with China's present-day Qinghai province, but also includes small portions of Sichuan and Gansu provinces. Historically, culturally, and ethnically a part of Tibet, Amdo was from the mid-18th century and after administered by a series of local Tibetan rulers. The Dalai Lamas have not directly governed the area since that time. From 1917 to 1928, much of Amdo was occupied intermittently by the Hui Muslim warlords of the Ma clique. In 1928, the Ma Clique joined the Kuomintang (Chinese Nationalist Party), and during the period from 1928 to 1949, much of Amdo was gradually assimilated into the Qingh ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ebisu (mythology)
, also transliterated or called or , is the Japanese god of fishermen and luck. He is one of the , and the only one of the seven to originate purely from Japan without any Buddhist or Taoist influence. Origins as Hiruko In medieval times, Ebisu's origin came to be tied together with that of ''Hiruko'' - the first child of Izanagi and Izanami, born without bones (or, in some stories, without arms and legs) due to his mother's transgression during the marriage ritual. Hiruko struggled to survive but, as he could not stand, he was cast into the sea in a boat of reeds before his third birthday. The story tells that Hiruko eventually washed ashore—possibly in —and was cared for by the Ainu . It is however believed that Ebisu first arose as a god among fishermen and that his origin as Hiruko was a much later conception, after the worship of him had spread to merchants and farmers. It is also theorized that he was originally a god known as "Kotoshironushi no Mikoto", son of Ōkun ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Nanban Trade Period
or the , was a period in the history of Japan from the arrival of Europeans in 1543 to the first ''Sakoku'' Seclusion Edicts of isolationism in 1614. Nanban (南蛮 Lit. "Southern barbarian") is a Japanese word which had been used to designate people from Nanman, Southern China, Ryukyu Islands, Ryukyu islands, Indian Ocean and South-East Asia, Southeast Asia centuries prior to the arrival of the first Europeans. For instance, according to the Nihon Kiryaku, Nihongi ryaku (日本紀略), Dazaifu (government), Dazaifu, the administrative center of Kyushu, Kyūshū, reported that the Nanban (southern barbarians) pirates, who were identified as Amami Islands, Amami islanders by the List of Japanese classical texts, Shōyūki (982–1032 for the extant portion), pillaged a wide area of Kyūshū in 997. In response, Dazaifu ordered Kikaijima (貴駕島) to arrest the Nanban. The ''Nanban'' trade as a form of European contact began with Portugal, Portuguese Portuguese discoveries, exp ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Xiongnu
The Xiongnu (, ) were a tribal confederation of nomadic peoples who, according to ancient Chinese sources, inhabited the eastern Eurasian Steppe from the 3rd century BC to the late 1st century AD. Modu Chanyu, the supreme leader after 209 BC, founded the Xiongnu Empire. After their previous rivals, the Yuezhi, migrated west into Central Asia during the 2nd century BC, the Xiongnu became a dominant power on the steppes of East Asia, centred on the Mongolian Plateau. The Xiongnu were also active in areas now part of Siberia, Inner Mongolia, Gansu and Xinjiang. Their relations with adjacent Chinese dynasties to the south-east were complex—alternating between various periods of peace, war, and subjugation. Ultimately, the Xiongnu were defeated by the Han dynasty in a centuries-long conflict, which led to the confederation splitting in two, and forcible resettlement of large numbers of Xiongnu within Han borders. During the Sixteen Kingdoms era, as one of the "Five B ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Qilin
The qilin (; ) is a legendary hooved chimerical creature that appears in Chinese mythology, and is said to appear with the imminent arrival or passing of a sage or illustrious ruler. Qilin are a specific type of the mythological family of one-horned beasts. The qilin also appears in the mythologies of other cultures, such as Japanese and Korean mythology, where it is known as the kirin, and Vietnamese mythology, where it is known as the kỳ lân. Origins Earliest mention of this mythical horned beast is in the poem included in the Classic of Poetry (11th - 7th c. BCE). ''Spring and Autumn Annals'' mentioned that a ''lin'' () was captured in the 14th year of Duke Ai of Lu () (481 CE); '' Zuo Zhuan'' credited Confucius with identifying the ''lin'' as such. The bisyllabic form ''qilin'' ( ~ ), which carries the same generic meaning as ''lin'' alone, is attested in works dated to the Warring States period (475 - 221 BCE). Q''i'' denotes the male and ''lin'' denotes the fem ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Fenghuang
''Fènghuáng'' (, ) are mythological birds found in Sinospheric mythology that reign over all other birds. The males were originally called ''fèng'' and the females ''huáng'', but such a distinction of gender is often no longer made and they are blurred into a single feminine entity so that the bird can be paired with the Chinese dragon, which is traditionally deemed male. It is known under similar names in various other languages ( Japanese: ; vi, phượng hoàng, italics=no or ; Korean: ). In the Western world, it is commonly called the Chinese phoenix or simply phoenix, although mythological similarities with the Western phoenix are superficial. Appearance A common depiction of fenghuang was of it attacking snakes with its talons and its wings spread. According to the ''Erya'''s chapter 17 ''Shiniao'', fenghuang is made up of the beak of a rooster, the face of a swallow, the forehead of a fowl, the neck of a snake, the breast of a goose, the back of a tortoise ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Kite (bird)
Kite () is the common name for certain birds of prey in the family Accipitridae, particularly in subfamilies Milvinae, [], and Perninae."kite". Encyclopædia Britannica. Encyclopædia Britannica Online. Encyclopædia Britannica Inc., 2014. Web. 24 Nov. 2014 . The term is derived from Old English ''cȳta'' (“kite; bittern”), from the Proto-Indo-European root *''gū- '', "screech." Some authors use the terms "hovering kite" and "soaring kite" to distinguish between ''Elanus'' and the milvine kites, respectively. The group may also be differentiated by size, referring to milvine kites as "large kites", and elanine kites as "small kites". Species * Subfamily Elaninae ** Genus '' Elanus'' *** Black-winged kite, ''Elanus caeruleus'' *** Black-shouldered kite, ''Elanus axillaris'' *** White-tailed kite, ''Elanus leucurus'' *** Letter-winged kite, ''Elanus scriptus'' ** Genus '' Chelictinia'' *** Scissor-tailed kite, ''Chelictinia riocourii'' ** Genus '' Gampsonyx'' *** Pearl k ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Rakshasa
Rakshasas ( sa, राक्षस, IAST: : Pali: ''rakkhaso'') lit. 'preservers' are a race of usually malevolent demigods prominently featured in Hindu mythology. According to the Brahmanda Purana, the rakshasas were created by Brahma when he assumed a body of ''tamas'' (darkness), the beings springing forth and promising to protect the waters of creation. They are often depicted to be man-eaters (''nri-chakshas'', ''kravyads''), acting as embodiments of the powers of evil in the Vedic scriptures. They are offered a distinction from yakshas, their cousins who are depicted to be forces of destruction. The term is also used to describe asuras, a class of power-seeking beings that oppose the benevolent devas. They are often depicted as antagonists in Hindu scriptures, as well as in Buddhism and Jainism. The female form of rakshasa is rakshasi. Hinduism In Vedas The Hymn 87 of the tenth mandala of the ''Rigveda'' mentions about Rakshasas. They are classified amongst the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
