Japanese
Japanese may refer to:
* Something from or related to Japan, an island country in East Asia
* Japanese language, spoken mainly in Japan
* Japanese people, the ethnic group that identifies with Japan through ancestry or culture
** Japanese diaspor ...
aristocratic kin group (''
uji
is a Cities of Japan, city on Greater Kyoto, the southern outskirts of the city of Kyoto, in Kyoto Prefecture, Japan.
Founded on March 1, 1951, Uji is between the two ancient capitals of Nara, Nara, Nara and Kyoto, Kyoto, Kyoto. The city s ...
Classical Japan
The first human inhabitants of the Japanese archipelago have been traced to prehistoric times around 30,000 BC. The Jōmon period, named after its cord-marked pottery, was followed by the Yayoi period in the first millennium BC when new inventi ...
. Along with the
Inbe clan
Imbe clan (also spelled Imibe clan or Inbe clan) was a Japanese clan during the Yamato period. They claimed descent from Futodama.
The Inbe clan originally had a religious function by preparing and taking care of offerings.
Overview
As the n ...
, the Nakatomi were one of the two clans that oversaw certain important national rites, and one of many to claim descent from divine clan ancestors "only a degree less sublime than the imperial ancestors".Sansom, George (1958). ''A History of Japan to 1334'', pp. 35–36. It is said that soon after the beginning of
Jimmu
was the legendary first emperor of Japan according to the '' Nihon Shoki'' and '' Kojiki''. His ascension is traditionally dated as 660 BC.Kelly, Charles F"Kofun Culture"Shinto rites and hold the associated positions. Though their material holdings were not the most extensive, their spiritual and ritual importance placed the Nakatomi and Imibe second only to the Imperial House during their heyday.
One particularly important ritual which the head of the Nakatomi clan oversaw was the ''Ōharai'' purification rite, performed twice every year, in which the High Priest (of the Nakatomi clan) asked the '' kami'' to cleanse the spirits of all of the people of their impurities.
Asuka period
As a result of the Nakatomis' ritual position and role in the
Asuka period
The was a period in the history of Japan lasting from 538 to 710 (or 592 to 645), although its beginning could be said to overlap with the preceding Kofun period. The Yamato polity evolved greatly during the Asuka period, which is named after t ...
, they were among the chief advocates of conservatism in the controversy over the introduction of
Buddhism
Buddhism ( , ), also known as Buddha Dharma and Dharmavinaya (), is an Indian religion or philosophical tradition based on teachings attributed to the Buddha. It originated in northern India as a -movement in the 5th century BCE, and gra ...
to Japan in the 6th century. However, by the time of Nakatomi no Kamatari, in the early 7th century, the clan had switched sides, possibly as a result of their loyalty and close connection to the Imperial family; following Prince Shōtoku, likely the most famous advocate of Buddhism in all of Japanese history, and later Prince Naka no Ōe, the Nakatomi helped eliminate the Soga clan, powerful and very active supporters of Buddhism, and of the current administration of the time (see Isshi Incident).
The clan soon came to be opposed by a number of other clans which vied for power and prestige at Court, and for influence over the Imperial succession. It is said however, that despite being overshadowed by others in terms of pure material wealth, the head of the Nakatomi clan was, in the mid-7th century, the most powerful man in Japan. Even into the 8th century, members of the Nakatomi clan maintained their important ritual position, becoming hereditary heads of the ''
Jingi-kan
The , also known as the Department of Shinto Affairs, Department of Rites, Department of Worship, as well as Council of Divinities, was a Japanese Imperial bureaucracy established in the 8th century, as part of the ''ritsuryō'' reforms. It was fi ...
'' (Department of Rites) established by the
Code of Taihō
In communications and information processing, code is a system of rules to convert information—such as a letter, word, sound, image, or gesture—into another form, sometimes shortened or secret, for communication through a communication c ...
in 701.
Nakatomi clan after Fujiwara no Kamatari
Arguably the most well-known clan leader, Nakatomi no Kamatari was granted the name Fujiwara by Emperor Tenji as a reward for loyal service to the sovereign. Kamatari is honored as the founder of the Fujiwara clan, which accumulated extraordinary powers and prestige in the
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 Japane ...
(794–1185).
Only the descendants of Fujiwara no Kamatari's eldest son Fuhito were allowed the name of Fujiwara. All the other members of the Nakatomi clan kept their original family name until
Nakatomi no Imimaro Nakatomi may refer to:
*Nakatomi clan, an influential clan in ancient Japan
*'' Die Hard: Nakatomi Plaza'', a first-person shooter video game
*Nakatomi Corporation, a fictional corporation in the motion picture ''Die Hard'' and its sequels
* Nakato ...
was promoted to ''
chūnagon
was a counselor of the second rank in the Imperial court of Japan. The role dates from the 7th century.
The role was eliminated from the Imperial hierarchy in 701, but it was re-established in 705. This advisory position remained a part of the I ...
'' with the support of Fuhito. In 764, Kiyomaro, the son of Imimaro, sided with
Empress Kōken
, also known as , was the 46th (with the name Empress Kōken) and the 48th monarch of Japan (with the name Empress Shōtoku), Emperor Kōnin, Takano Imperial Mausoleum, Imperial Household Agency according to the traditional order of succession. ...
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 Japane ...
, all three legitimate houses of Nakatomi clan were granted the name Ōnakatomi.
Nakatomi no Ichishi Nakatomi may refer to:
*Nakatomi clan, an influential clan in ancient Japan
*'' Die Hard: Nakatomi Plaza'', a first-person shooter video game
*Nakatomi Corporation, a fictional corporation in the motion picture ''Die Hard'' and its sequels
* Nakat ...
was the last ''jingihaku'' (Head of the Department of Worship) of the Nakatomi clan, and his son Itohito later took the name of Ōnakatomi, thus being the last member of the Nakatomi clan.
Nakatomi Family Tree (大中臣系図)
Ikatsu ōmi-no-mikoto (雷大臣命)
┃
O-o-obase-no-mikoto (大小橋命)
┃
Nakatomi no Amahisa-no-kimi (中臣阿麻毘舎卿)
┃
Nakatomi no Abiko (中臣阿毘古)
┃
Nakatomi no Mahito (中臣真人)
┃
Nakatomi no Kamako (中臣鎌子)
┃
Nakatomi no Kuroda (中臣黒田)
┃
Nakatomi no Tokiwa (中臣常磐)
┃
Nakatomi no Katanoko (中臣可多能祜)
┣━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━┳━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━┓
Nakatomi no Mikeko (中臣御食子) Nakatomi no Kuniko (中臣国子) Nakatomi no Nukateko (中臣糠手子)
┃ ┃ ┃
┃ Second Branch of Nakatomi clan (中臣氏二門) Third Branch of Nakatomi clan (中臣氏三門)
┣━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━┳━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━┓
Fujiwara no Kamatari (藤原鎌足, 614–669) Nakatomi no Hisata (中臣久多) Nakatomi no Tareme (中臣垂目)
┃ ┃
Fujiwara clan (藤原氏) First Branch of Nakatomi clan (中臣氏一門)
See also
*
Kogo Shūi
is a historical record of the Inbe clan of Japan written in the early Heian period (794–1185). It was composed by Inbe no Hironari (斎部広成) in 807 using material transmitted orally over several generations of the Inbe clan.
Background
...
—a record of the conflict between the Nakatomi and Inbe clans.