is the first dictionary of the

Okinawan language Okinawan (, , , ), or more precisely Central Okinawan, is a Northern Ryukyuan languages, Ryukyuan language spoken primarily in the southern half of the Okinawa Island, island of Okinawa, as well as in the surrounding islands of Kerama Islands, K ...

and the first of any Ryukyuan language. The dictionary was compiled by a group of seven people under the order of King Shō Tei, dated no later than 1711. ''Konkōkenshū'' contains many archaic words and expressions remembered by an elder woman of the royal court that served three kings, and cites works such as the '' Omoro Sōshi'', an Old Okinawan anthology, ''

The Tale of Genji is a classic work of Japanese literature written by the noblewoman, poet, and lady-in-waiting Murasaki Shikibu around the peak of the Heian period, in the early 11th century. It is one of history's first novels, the first by a woman to have wo ...

'', and '' The Tales of Ise'', which are works written in Early Middle Japanese.

Volumes

There are two volumes in Konkōkenshū, a ''kenkan'' (乾巻) and a ''konkan'' (坤巻), corresponding to the

hexagram , can be seen as a compound polygon, compound composed of an upwards (blue here) and downwards (pink) facing equilateral triangle, with their intersection as a regular hexagon (in green). A hexagram (Greek language, Greek) or sexagram (Latin l ...

s in

I Ching The ''I Ching'' or ''Yijing'' ( ), usually translated ''Book of Changes'' or ''Classic of Changes'', is an ancient Chinese divination text that is among the oldest of the Chinese classics. The ''I Ching'' was originally a divination manual in ...

. The entries in each of the volumes are sorted by thematic order: * The ''kenkan'' includes the following 11 themes: heaven and earth (乾坤) humanity (人倫), seasons (時候), branches of the bodies (支体), types of feelings (気形), herbs (草木), tools (器材), housing (家屋), clothes (衣服), and food and drink/beverages (飲食). This volume contains approximately 380 entries. * The ''konkan'' includes the following 12 themes: heaven and earth (乾坤), the heavenly gods (神祇), humanity (人倫), tools (器材), feelings (気形), herbs (草木), seasons (時候), branches of the bodies (支体), and food and drink/beverages (飲食). This volume contains approximately 720 entries. According to Lawrence (2015:158), the total number of entries in the Konkōkenshū is 1,148 entries, of which 92 of them are duplicates.

Structure

Headwords are written on the top of the page, while the translation and explanation are written on the bottom of the page. The headwords are typically written in

hiragana is a Japanese language, Japanese syllabary, part of the Japanese writing system, along with ''katakana'' as well as ''kanji''. It is a phonetic lettering system. The word ''hiragana'' means "common" or "plain" kana (originally also "easy", ...

, although some

kanji are logographic Chinese characters, adapted from Chinese family of scripts, Chinese script, used in the writing of Japanese language, Japanese. They were made a major part of the Japanese writing system during the time of Old Japanese and are ...

are used.

Manuscripts

Various manuscripts of the Konkōkenshū exist. The manuscript is held at the Okinawa Prefectural Museum, and has been thought to be the original text. A facsimile copy of the ''Hyōjōsho-bon'' edited by Hokama Shūzen was published by

Kadokawa Shoten , formerly , is a Japanese publisher and division of Kadokawa Future Publishing based in Tokyo, Japan. It became an internal division of Kadokawa Corporation on October 1, 2013. Kadokawa publishes manga, light novels, manga anthology magazines ...

in 1970.

References

Works cited

* * * {{cite book, last=Hokama, first=Shūzen, year=1995, title=沖縄古語大辞典, trans-title=Dictionary of Archaic Okinawan, location=Tokyo, publisher=

External links

Konkōkenshū online text

Manuscript of the ''kenkan'' volume of ''Konkōkenshū'' on NDL Digital Collections

Manuscript of the ''konkan'' volume of ''Konkōkenshū'' on NDL Digital Collections
Dictionaries Ryukyuan languages Art and cultural repatriation after World War II 1711 books