(418 - 8 September 479) was the 21st legendary

Emperor of Japan The Emperor of Japan is the monarch and the head of the Imperial Family of Japan. Under the Constitution of Japan, he is defined as the symbol of the Japanese state and the unity of the Japanese people, and his position is derived from "the ...

Imperial Household Agency The (IHA) is an agency of the government of Japan in charge of state matters concerning the Imperial Family, and also the keeping of the Privy Seal and State Seal of Japan. From around the 8th century AD, up until the Second World War, it ...

(''Kunaichō'')
雄略天皇 (21)
retrieved 2013-8-28. according to the traditional

order of succession An order of succession or right of succession is the line of individuals necessitated to hold a high office when it becomes vacated such as head of state or an honour such as a title of nobility.sericulture Sericulture, or silk farming, is the cultivation of silkworms to produce silk. Although there are several commercial species of silkworms, '' Bombyx mori'' (the caterpillar of the domestic silkmoth) is the most widely used and intensively stud ...

.Nippon Gakujutsu Shinkokai (1969). ''The Manyōshū,'' p. 317. No firm dates can be assigned to this Emperor's life or reign, but he is conventionally considered to have reigned from 25 December 456 to 8 September 479.

Legendary narrative

Yūryaku was a 5th-century monarch. The reign of

Emperor Kinmei was the 29th Emperor of Japan,Imperial Household Agency (''Kunaichō'') 欽明天皇 (29) retrieved 2013-8-22. according to the traditional order of succession. Titsingh, Isaac. (1834)pp. 34–36 Brown, Delmer. (1979) ''Gukanshō,'' pp. 261– ...

( – 571 AD), the 29th Emperor,Titsingh
pp. 34–36
Brown
pp. 261–262
Varley, pp. 123–124. is the first for which contemporary historiography is able to assign verifiable dates; however, the conventionally accepted names and dates of the early Emperors were not to be confirmed as "traditional" until the reign of

Emperor Kanmu , or Kammu, was the 50th emperor of Japan, Imperial Household Agency (''Kunaichō'') 桓武天皇 (50) retrieved 2013-8-22. according to the traditional order of succession. Kanmu reigned from 781 to 806, and it was during his reign that the s ...

(737–806), the 50th sovereign of the

Yamato dynasty The , also referred to as the Imperial Family or the House of Yamato, comprises those members of the extended family of the reigning Emperor of Japan who undertake official and public duties. Under the present Constitution of Japan, the Emperor i ...

. According to the ''

Kojiki The , also sometimes read as or , is an early Japanese chronicle of myths, legends, hymns, genealogies, oral traditions, and semi-historical accounts down to 641 concerning the origin of the Japanese archipelago, the , and the Japanese imperia ...

'', this Emperor is said to have ruled from the Thirteenth Day of the Eleventh Month of 456 ( Heishin) until his death on the Seventh Day of the Eight Month of 479 ( Kibi). According to ''

'' and '' Nihon Shoki'', Yūryaku was named at birth, literally meaning "Wakatake (Young Warrior) of Great Hatsuse", where "Hatsuse" is the old name for

Sakurai, Nara is a city located in Nara Prefecture, Japan. As of March 31, 2017, the city has an estimated population of 58,386, and 24,629 households. The population density is , and the total area is . History Sakurai was briefly the capital of Japan dur ...

. is a name posthumously assigned to him by a much later era, literally meaning "Magnificent Plan". He was the fifth and youngest son of

Emperor Ingyō was the 19th legendary Emperor of Japan,Imperial Household Agency (''Kunaichō'') 允恭天皇 (19) retrieved 2013-8-28. according to the traditional order of succession. No firm dates can be assigned to this Emperor's life or reign, but he i ...

. After his elder brother Emperor Ankō was murdered, he won the struggle against his other brothers and became the new Emperor. Yūryaku's contemporary title would not have been ''tennō'', as most historians believe this title was not introduced until the reigns of

Emperor Tenmu was the 40th emperor of Japan,Imperial Household Agency (''Kunaichō'') 天武天皇 (40) retrieved 2013-8-22. according to the traditional order of succession. Ponsonby-Fane, Richard. (1959). ''The Imperial House of Japan'', p. 53. Tenmu's rei ...

and Empress Jitō. Rather, it was presumably , meaning "the great king who rules all under heaven". He had three wives (including his consort Kusahahatahi). His successor, Prince Shiraka (

Emperor Seinei (444 — 27 February 484) was the 22nd legendary Emperor of Japan,Imperial Household Agency (''Kunaichō'') 清寧天皇 (22) retrieved 2013-8-28. according to the traditional order of succession. No firm dates can be assigned to this Emperor's ...

), was his son by his wife Kazuraki no Karahime. In 463, Yūryaku Tennō invited the thunder god of the Mimuro hill to come to the Imperial Palace, and ordered Chiisakobe no

muraji (from Old Japanese: ''muraⁿzi'' < *''mura-nusi'' "village master") was an ancient Japanese hereditary title denoting rank and political standing (a ''

Sugaru to fetch the deity. He obliged, thinking the supernatural being would have no reason to refuse the invitation, and rode carrying a halberd with a red banner, symbolising his office of royal messenger. Soon enough, the thunder stroke, and Sugaru enlisted the help of priests to enshrine the kami into a portable carriage, to be brought in the Emperor's presence, as a great serpent. But, said Emperor neglected to practice proper ritual purification and religious abstinence. The thunder kami then showed his displeasure through thundering and threatening fiery eyeballs, and Emperor Yūryaku fled into the interior of the Palace while covering his eyes. The great serpent was returned to Mimuro, and the Emperor made many offerings to appease the angry deity. This story is recorded in Nihongi and mentioned by

William George Aston William George Aston (9 April 1841 – 22 November 1911) was an Anglo-Irish diplomat, author and scholar-expert in the language and history of Japan and Korea. Early life Aston was born near Derry, Ireland.Ricorso Aston, bio notes/ref> He dis ...

, in "Shinto, the Ancient Religion of Japan" as well as several other books. According to the Nihongi, Yūryaku was of ungovernable and suspicious temperament, and committed many acts of arbitrary cruelty. The actual site of Yūryaku's

grave A grave is a location where a dead body (typically that of a human, although sometimes that of an animal) is buried or interred after a funeral. Graves are usually located in special areas set aside for the purpose of burial, such as grav ...

is not known. The Emperor is traditionally venerated at a

memorial A memorial is an object or place which serves as a focus for the memory or the commemoration of something, usually an influential, deceased person or a historical, tragic event. Popular forms of memorials include landmark objects or works of ...

Shinto shrine A is a structure whose main purpose is to house ("enshrine") one or more ''kami'', the deities of the Shinto religion. Overview Structurally, a Shinto shrine typically comprises several buildings. The ''honden''Also called (本殿, meanin ...

(''misasagi'') in Habikino, Osaka, which is designated by the

as Yūryaku's

mausoleum A mausoleum is an external free-standing building constructed as a monument enclosing the interment space or burial chamber of a deceased person or people. A mausoleum without the person's remains is called a cenotaph. A mausoleum may be cons ...

. It is formally named ''Tajihi no Takawashi-no-hara no misasagi''.

Consorts and children

Empress ('' Kōgō'') : ,

Emperor Nintoku , also known as was the 16th Emperor of Japan, according to the traditional order of succession. Due to his reputation for goodness derived from depictions in the Kojiki and Nihon Shoki, he is sometimes referred to as the . While his existenc ...

's daughter Consort ('' Hi'') : , Katsuragi no Tsubura no Ōomi's daughter *Third Son: , later

Saiō A , was an unmarried female member of the Japanese Imperial Family, sent to Ise to serve at Ise Grand Shrine from the late 7th century until the 14th century. The Saiō's residence, , was about 10 km north-west of the shrine. The remains of ...

Consort ( ''Hi''): , Kibi no Kamitsumichi no omi's daughter * * Consort ('' Hi'') : , Kasuga no Wani no omi Fukame's daughter *, married to Emperor Ninken

King Bu

According to the

Book of Song The ''Book of Song'' (''Sòng Shū'') is a historical text of the Liu Song Dynasty of the Southern Dynasties of China. It covers history from 420 to 479, and is one of the Twenty-Four Histories, a traditional collection of historical records ...

, a King Bu (武) from Japan dispatched envoys to the Emperor of Liu Song, a minor Chinese dynasty, in both 477 and 478. Communications included a notice that the previous ruler, an older brother, had died, and that Bu had ascended to the throne.Batten, Bruce Loyd. (2006). The King 'Bu' in this document is believed to refer to Emperor Yūryaku, due to the fact that the character used to write the name (武) is found in the name by which Emperor Yūryaku was called during his lifetime: . The inscriptions on the Inariyama and

Eta Funayama Sword Eta Funayama Kofun () is a ''kofun'', or burial mound, located in Nagomi, Kumamoto in Japan. The mound was designated a National Historic Site of Japan in 1951. The designation includes and . Several artifacts excavated from the mound have be ...

, also supports the idea that Bu is an equivalent of Emperor Yūryaku. The Chinese historical records state that Bu began his rule before 477, was recognized as the ruler of Japan by the Liu Song,

Southern Qi Qi, known in historiography as the Southern Qi ( or ) or Xiao Qi (), was a Chinese imperial dynasty and the second of the four Southern dynasties during the Northern and Southern dynasties era. It followed the Liu Song dynasty and was succe ...

, and Liang dynasties, and continued his rule through to 502.

Poetry

The Emperor's interest in poetry is amongst the more well-documented aspects of his character and reign. Poems attributed to him are included in the ''

Man'yōshū The is the oldest extant collection of Japanese (poetry in Classical Japanese), compiled sometime after AD 759 during the Nara period. The anthology is one of the most revered of Japan's poetic compilations. The compiler, or the last in ...

'', and a number of his verses are preserved in the ''Kojiki'' and the ''Nihonshoki''.

Ancestry

Notes

References

* Aston, William George. (1896)
''Nihongi: Chronicles of Japan from the Earliest Times to A.D. 697.''
London: Kegan Paul, Trench, Trubner. * Batten, Bruce Loyd. (2006)
''Gateway to Japan: Hakata in war and peace, 500–1300.''
Honolulu:University of Hawaii Press. ; ; OCLC 254764602] * Delmer Brown, Brown, Delmer M. and Ichirō Ishida, eds. (1979)
''Gukanshō: The Future and the Past.''
Berkeley: University of California Press. ; * Nippon Gakujutsu Shinkokai (1969). ''The Manyōshū: The Nippon Gakujutsu Shinkokai Translation of One Thousand Poems.'' New York:

Columbia University Press Columbia University Press is a university press based in New York City, and affiliated with Columbia University. It is currently directed by Jennifer Crewe (2014–present) and publishes titles in the humanities and sciences, including the fie ...

. * Ponsonby-Fane, Richard Arthur Brabazon. (1959)
''The Imperial House of Japan.''
Kyoto: Ponsonby Memorial Society. * Titsingh, Isaac. (1834). ''

Nihon Ōdai Ichiran , ', is a 17th-century chronicle of the serial reigns of Japanese emperors with brief notes about some of the noteworthy events or other happenings. According to the 1871 edition of the '' American Cyclopaedia'', the 1834 French translation of ...

''; ou
''Annales des empereurs du Japon.''
Paris: Royal Asiatic Society, Oriental Translation Fund of Great Britain and Ireland. * Varley, H. Paul. (1980)
''Jinnō Shōtōki: A Chronicle of Gods and Sovereigns.''
New York: Columbia University Press. ;

External links

Nihon Shoki
Online English Translations
Scroll 14 - Emperor Yuryaku
{{DEFAULTSORT:Yuryaku Japanese emperors 418 births 479 deaths People of Kofun-period Japan 5th-century monarchs in Asia 5th-century Japanese monarchs Japanese male poets Man'yō poets 5th-century Japanese poets