Japanese Legend Collection

Explanation

Myths, legends, and fairy tales not only overlap each other in certain respects, but their forms are also in common with each other, so that it is often difficult to define a strict distinction, but in fact, it is common to compare their differences in many of the materials at hand, and to tentatively classify as standard those features which seem to be the most salient. Classification itself is not the ultimate objective, but it is a very effective stall of achieving research objectives. For that reason, I have categorized more than 250 legends in this booklet. My criteria for classification are not always consistent. In short, the nature of the material itself already makes it impossible to establish a certain standard, since that is sufficient for research.

respect（名）点

tentatively（副）暫定的に

classification（名）分類、区分

objective（名）目的、方針

stall（名）口実、方便

One tale is not always simple in content and form. It is a common phenomenon that the same tale combines two properties, A and B, and that the two tales combine into a single story. It may seem simple on the face of it, but when studied in detail, it is not uncommon for it to be composed of complex elements. The parenthetical notes in each title of the table of contents for classification were attempted to indicate the nature, character, name, composition, motif, and other matters of note of each legend, to be useful in the study. Myths and legends that explain natural phenomena, the origin of plants and animals, their forms, and other things are found all over the world. Explanatory myths or legends are the names given to these kinds of stories. The five legends listed in Section 1 show the nature of national myths. It is for this reason that I have specifically named it an explanatory mythical legend rather than simply an explanatory legend. Legends aimed at explaining the origin and forms of plants and animals were named especially natural legends, following the example of Dähnhardt*, and included in section 22. In this story, there is a story in which the origin of animals is traced to humans or human spirits. Many of the stories in Ovidius's Metamorphoses** should be noted as exemplars of this kind of story worldwide. These are the four legends listed in the section of the following sub-natural legends. I tentatively named it a metamorphoses legend, meaning "Metamorphoses." The name vengeful spirit legend needs no explanation. The word "corpse metamorphosis" was once used by Chofu Anezaki***, and there are stories all over the world about Izanami no Mikoto's**** corpse producing five grains and Pangu's***** body producing everything in the world. There are many examples in the legends of barbarian races, such as the legend of the Ainu where poisonous bugs arose from the corpses of evil demons. I have always used the term corpse change since I found it interesting.

property（名）性質

parenthetical（形）括弧で括られた

explanatory（形）説明のための

mythical（形）神話の

metamorphosis（名）変形、変質

exemplar（名）例

vengeful（形）復讐の

corpse（名）死体

barbarian（名）未開人

However, among explanatory legends, there is a distinction between those that consistently aim at explaining something and those that are independent legends belonging to other categories that employ explanatory elements in part at the end. Legends such as (A), (B), (J), and (U) in section 22 are examples of this, and they are all metaphorical animal tales with explanatory elements. Thus, the independence of these legends is not in the least impaired by the removal of the explanatory element.

metaphorical（形）隠喩的な

impair（動）損なう、害する

removal（名）除去

Metaphorical animal stories are one of the forms of fable, and in Japan, the 'Battle between a Monkey and Crabs******' is a prime example. Of course, it is a pure fairy tale.

fable（名）寓話

Of the legends that are also intended for an explanation, those that explain the origin of place names are the least interesting of the legends and are therefore the least valuable in comparative studies. However, to show that this kind of legend also exists, we listed three examples in 18 (II). The description of the biographies of virtuous monks in parentheses indicates that the nature of the legend belongs to a religious legend. Many religious legends are derived from legends that preach the origin of something. Although legends originating from shrines and temples are, of course, explanatory legends in their nature, unlike ordinary myths and legends, they are influenced by founding religions opposite to natural religions, so it is necessary to name them specifically to distinguish them from ordinary explanatory legends.

biography（名）伝記

parenthesis（名）括弧

preach（動）伝道する、説教する

founding（形）創始の、創立の

A depression legend is a legend that describes the collapse of a land or residential area that is the cause of a sin, a curse, or some other cause, and has a separate form in its principles. There are many cases of (B) in section 1 and (A) in (II) in Section 6. It seems to be common in the West, but there is also a story in "Soushen Ji (In Search of the Supernatural)*******" in China in which a castle sank and the ruins became a pool. The story becomes more complicated when it's not just a pool that sinks or remains submerged, but a pattern in which submerged objects are visible in the water or float up under certain conditions. This is the sinking bell legend. There is a legend that only the bell sank, or that it sank with the temple. There are many causes for this sinking, but in many cases, it is accompanied by tales of a kind of guilt or curse. One of the characteristics of this legend is that under certain conditions, a sunken bell can be heard floating or the sound of a bell can be heard. Legends explaining the sinking of things other than bells should be regarded as deformed by the variant sinking bell legend if their properties are the same as those of the sinking bell legend. The saddling swamp legend specifically describes the saddle sinking, but it has a certain format, so a separate entry is necessary. The name is based on a proper noun.

depression（名）陥没

residential（形）居住の

principle（名）原理

submerge（動）沈没させる

saddle（名）鞍

One of the notable motifs of the sinking bell legend and similar legends is the idea that the trigger for the sinking of the bell was based not on human guilt or some kind of curse but on the water god's envy and will. According to the Greek theory, this thought is particularly evident as the jealousy of the gods, but even in the Japanese legend world, this thought seems to be much more evident than previously noticed. The idea is that precious and rare things are envied and desired by the god of the sea, and their transportation arouses the feelings and anger of the god of the sea or the dragon. However, legends involving Buddhist bells seem to have a relationship with dragon gods in other areas.

notable（形）注目すべき

thought（名）思想

The name of the land emergence legend is based on the name given by the reporter in Chapter (E).

The characteristics of the giant legend, that is, the legend of Daidara Hoshi, are described in (B) of (I) in Chapter 2. This is also a kind of explanatory legend, but it is a legend especially related to giants, so it is better to name it the giant legend. The form of this legend is the so-called twin mountain legend, which explains the origin of two similar mountains. The footprint legend explains the footprints of giants, and if the origin of footprints is found in Shinto or Buddhist deities, other supernatural beings, or others similar to them, it is called the divine remain legend. Mt. Ibuki / Asai legend is a story in which mountains competed for height, and one mountain lost to height and beheaded the other, and the oldest record is the Fudoki text quoted in an article in 723 in 'Teio Hennenki********'. It is said that Mt. Ibuki and Mt. Asai competed for height, and as Mt. Asai increased its height overnight, Mt. Ibuki drew his sword and cut off the head of Mt. Asai. All naming based on the oldest known story is the way to go when I can't think of another suitable name. The name of the decapitation motif was based on this. Since the story is about two mountains having a comparing height, I named it the two-mountain comparison height legend.

behead（動）斬首する

decapitation（名）斬首

The 99th legend needs an explanation. Here, 99 means neither a radical number nor an ordinal number, but a unit number of 100, a number that is one less than the so-called concrete number, which, because of its nature, is one less than the number of units. It is not necessarily limited to 99, but may be 999, 499, or 9. At any rate, if there is an element that one is missing in a certain number, it fits the definition, so such an incomplete number of units has a special significance in all religions, literature, myths, and legends of the people. The story of Major General Fukakusa's 100-night visit*********, Benkei's********** killing of 1,000 people, and Kalmashapada's*********** decapitation of 1,000 kings was also the last one. Simply put, it means "in a little while." An example of this is the story that a chicken crow and the night falls when it reaches its goal. The motif of chicken singing has been adopted in various legends. The reason for its adoption is unclear, but to a slightly imaginable extent is the suggestion of the chicken singing motif.

radical number......根数

ordinal number......序数

at any rate......とにかく

definition（名）定義

incomplete（形）不完全な

Kalmashapada（名）斑足太子

adoption（名）採用、採択

If the object is obstructed at the last point by any cause other than the crow of the chicken, and is unsuccessful, it is simply a motif of obstruction. In the legend of (A) in (I) of section 2, gutters are used as a way to compare the backs of two mountains, but this motif is included in another motif category because there are other similar cases. The motif of compassion and aspiration is that a failure sympathizes with another failure and raises an earnest wish to fulfill their wish. For example, a noblewoman who was banished because of a venereal disease prayed sympathetically for the sick person in the world and became Awashima Myojin************ to fulfill the wish of the same patients forever. There are many gods of this kind in the world of folk belief.

crow（名）鳴き声

gutter（名）樋

compassion（名）慈悲

aspiration（名）願望、大志

earnest（形）熱心な

The giant tree legend is not just a legend about the giant tree, but a kind of legend about the giant tree that can be found in 'Nihon Shoki', 'Kojiki' and 'Fudoki'. For example, in 'Harima no Kuni Fudoki,' it is written that, in the morning, Awaji Island was hidden, and in the evening, Ooyamato and Shimane was hidden by the shadow of a camphor tree of Mii, Komade Village, Akashi Station, so they cut down and built a boat and crossed seven waves with one row. According to 'Chikugo no kuni Fudoki,' Mt. Taranomine, Fujitsu County, Hizen Province was hidden in the morning in the shadow of a camphor tree 2910 meters high in Mike County, and Mt. Alatsume, Yamaga County, Higo Province was hidden in the evening, so the province was named Miki (Mike). Thus, the giant tree legend was named after the legend of the giant tree. This form of legend seems to be distributed in various places, but a slightly modified version is written in 'Sasaki-ke Ki (Sasaki family record)'. It is, of course, an adaptation of a Chinese legend. In the past, there was a big chestnut tree in Kurimoto County, Omi Province, which troubled the Emperor at that time. When he had people cut down the big tree on the advice of ascetics, the wood chips were restored every night and could not be cut down. Then, Kudzu, who had been fighting with this big tree for several years, appeared in the Emperor's dream and told him that he should burn wood chips every day. When the Emperor ordered them to do so, they were able to cut down a large chestnut tree. This was the curse of the spirit of the big tree. This story doesn't say that it is a spirit, but based on the Chinese legend of the original story, it was tentatively named the spirit legend. Both (A) of (I) in section 4 and (A) of (III) in section 16 are tree spirit legends.

camphor（名）クスノキ

distribute（動）分布する

modified（形）修正された

adaptation（名）翻案

ascetic（名）苦行者

tentatively（副）暫定的に

The cane stick legend explains that a stick of a hero or a virtuous monk sprouted and grew into a large tree, and the two-tree legend explains that a forked stick or chopsticks grew into a tree. There are many trees associated with this kind of legend in the precincts of shrines. There are various anomalies and variations of this legend.

cane（名）杖

sprout（動）芽吹く

forked（形）フォーク形の、分岐した

precinct（名）境内

The origin of the name of the legend of the broom tree needs no explanation.

broom（名）箒

There are various beliefs about stones, such as growing and reproducing. The legends based on this belief are the growing-stone legend and the having-children-stone legend. There are also traces of gods and footprints on the faces of stones. A particularly noteworthy legend is that of horseshoe marks, which abound throughout the world. Fossil legends also abound since the story of Matsuura Sayohime.

noteworthy（形）注目に値する

horseshoe（名）馬蹄

The description of the baby crying legend as a footnote in (J) of section 5 is based on the fact that legends about infant crying are generally widely distributed in various forms, and this element is included in (A) of (I) of section 6. In the latter, it describes a white flag raised by an infant as well as the infant's cry. White is often an important color in the world of legends, and white horses, white costumes, white clouds and white flags all have a common meaning. However, the white water in (A) of (I) in section 6 is slightly different from these. It is a special element that appears in the castle ruins legend and the rich man legend, and it was named the bran-mound legend based on the idea of Kunio Yanagita.

footnote（名）脚注

bran（名）糠

Indeed, the castle ruins legend has something in common with the rich man legend, and the elements of the buried gold legends in foreign countries are added to the Japanese castle ruins and the rich man legends. Buried gold is often cursed. No, it is needless to cite the famous Nibelungen treasure that gold itself is already the object of the curse. The legend of the golden chicken is one of the major research subjects because there are examples not only in Japan but also in the West, but at least the golden chicken appearing in the Japanese rich man legend is a transplantation of Sinocentrism. The legend based on the golden chicken curse is the golden chicken curse legend that should be compared with 'Nibelungen', that is, the cursed golden legend. It is not unusual to find a treasure contest motif in the rich man legend because it is also found in fairy tales, but the Cintamani motif is not limited to the rich man legend but appears in various legends. The word Cintamani is written in Buddhist texts and its properties and effects are explained in detail. Cintamani in Japan is represented by three types: uchide no kozuchi (magic hammer), kakuremino (invisibility cloak), and kakuregasa (invisibility hat). The legend that the millionaire called back the sun was probably the first case of Taira no Kiyomori's arrogance. The name rice cake target style extravagance motif is based on an old legend in Bungo Province that a rich man in Oita County shot a rice cake as a target. According to the 'Yamashiro no Kuni Fudoki', the ancestor of Hata no Nakatsuya no Imiki was arrogant about his wealth and shot rice cakes at the target. It is a sumptuary of the same nature, so it was named the rice cake target.

transplantation（名）移植

Sinocentrism（名）中華思想

Cintamani（名）宝珠

invisibility（名）不可視性

arrogance（名）傲慢

extravagance（名）浪費、贅沢

The bowl lending hole legend is a legend about a hole where a bowl is lent to a person, and the story is that this benefit is always extinguished by human negligence, guilt, or transgression. The type of hole is not fixed, and some holes lead to Dragon Palace, while others lead to other points. The latter belongs to the so-called loophole legend. The legend of (C) in section 8 is very rare in Japan. Just as the legend of Emperor Barbarossa on Mt. Kifhäuser in medieval Germany says that an emperor will surely appear in the future and lead the people to revive the prosperity of the past, it is very interesting that in all the legends that explain the expectation of future salvation, this expectation is connected to something underground. Urashima-style legend is a hermit world trip legend that explains the difference in time between the hermit world and the human world.

transgression（名）積み、逸脱、犯罪

loophole（名）抜け穴

salvation（名）救済

hermit（名）隠者、仙人

The meaning of the name of the sake spring legend is in the literature.

Among the Mythological Water World Legends, the one that has a special form is the spider legend, and it is similar to the following legend of kappa pulling horses in some respects. The legend of kappa pulling horses, which was named by Kunio Yanagita, is one of the patterns of kappa legends in which a kappa tries to pull a horse into a river by pulling its reins. The kappa whose arm is taken comes to retrieve his arm in imitation of the ogre whose arm was cut by Watanabe no Tsuna*************, or he apologizes and has his arm returned, and when the method of kappa extermination is similar to the ancient heroic legend of killing giant serpents or evil ogres, the name is heroic legend style monster extermination. This is different from fairy tales and myths in that the enemy is defeated by brawn.

ogre（名）鬼

extermination（名）根絶、駆除

The human swamp legend and the human serpent legend mean that humans become swamps or snakes. The lake extermination legend is a bit of a forced naming, but it is a legend in which lakes exterminate other lakes on their own or with the help of others, all of which are the premise that the genius lives in the lake. The story of the one-eyed fish is one of the explanatory legends associated with the lake legend.

genius（名）主

The legend of a maiden weaving a machine underwater or underground is a legend with a special form, but its nature and explanation must be withheld for a while.

withhold（動）保留する

Strictly speaking, it is a problem whether there is a human-wolf legend in Japan or not, but it is an incontestable fact that there is one that can be compared to the human-wolf legend of China and Korea to some extent, so I named it the human-wolf legend. However, both (A) and (B) in Section 12 are similar to Watanabe no Tsuna's extermination of female orge, and the original contents of the human-wolf legend may not be described. There have been too many stories about cats biting people to death and turning them into humans. The changed cat legend is quite different from the human-wolf legend, which explains that humans become wolves under certain conditions. The legend of wolves riding on their shoulders is a popular motif all over the world.

incontestable（形）議論の余地のない

(A) of section 13 is similar to the tale of a Norse heroic legend in which Sigurd becomes a blacksmith's apprentice and wields a valiant power. The Chiyou************** legend, mentioned in the note in (D) of the same section, refers to a widely distributed legend in which the monster's body is cut and buried in separate places, and the Chiyou legend is based on the naming of Kunio Yanagita. The meaning of animal favors goes without saying.

blacksmith（名）鍛冶屋

apprentice（名）徒弟、見習い

The legend of the Yamato three mountains style marriage dispute is based on the legend of Mt. Unebi, Mt. Kagu, and Mt. Miminashi, which is included in 'Manyoshu' and is the subject of a Noh play. The name of the Maiden Mound style marriage dispute legend is based on the story of the Maiden Mound in 'Yamato Monogatari' and it is a legend that a maiden was asked to marry two or more men and ended her miserable life. There are few examples.

The ship bridge legend is a legend like Sano's ship bridge in a Noh play or Shinobazu Pond in "Boukai Maidan***************," and the most famous example is the Greek legend of Hero and Leander, in which one of the men and women who go across the sea to love dies because of an obstacle. Since the ship bridge doesn't have to be a motif, both (A) and (B) of section 15 are stories about women who rode in a tub.

obstacle（名）障害物

The name marriage to the god legend encompasses all the legends that explain marriage between humans and non-humans. If the latter is an animal, it is specifically named the legend of marriage to the monster, while if it is a god or other supernatural being, it is named the legend of marriage to the god. Like the story of Toyotama-hime and Hikohohodemi-no-mikoto in the Shinto texts, the woman is a snake and the story of the human world is called the Toyotama-hime-style divine princess legend. Like the story of Mt. Sodefrimine in 'Hizen no Kuni Fudoki,' the legend of the underwater world in which the man is a snake, and the stage is called Otohihimemeko-style marriage to the god legend. The name of the snail woman style comes from the story of the snail woman in "Zu ting shi yuan (Lexicon of the Ancestral Garden)****************," which is the original story of "Hamagri no Soshi (the Book of Clam)*****************". The Mt. Miwa style divine marriage legend is a legend of Mt. Miwa that no one knows and requires the spool of hemp thread motif. Like the legend of Mt. Himedake in Hyuga, the man they gave birth to left a memorial of the shape of the snake's tail on his spiritual body should be called the tail-shaped legend.

encompass（動）包含する

supernatural（形）超自然的な

spool（名）糸巻き

The secret divulgation motif of the legend of the Justice Dog Mound is described in (A) and (B) of section 17, but this motif is common in Western legends and fairy tales, and in China, there is a tree spirit legend that seems to be the original story of (A) of section (I) of section 4.

divulgation（名）漏洩、暴露

The peaceful old-life legend is the same as that of the spring of sake. The reason why the spring gushes is the halberd, spear or staff of a hero or a virtuous priest should be considered as a spiritual staff motif. The tales in which food turns to stone, the spring dries up, and the river runs out of water because people refuse the request of a virtuous monk, a god, or a Buddha and are cursed are all legends belonging to the same category, and the most prominent features are tentatively named the stone taro legend and the waterless stream legend. On the other hand, the legend that water rises, increases, and improves because of the hospitality of a virtuous monk is the anti-waterless stream legend. The purpose of this kind of legend is to warn against gluttony, and there are many examples of this as the origin legend of each ethnic group.

gush（動）湧き出る

halberd（名）矛、槍

prominent（形）有名な、著名な

waterless（形）水のない

gluttony（名）暴食

The name of the criminal bell legend comes from the legend of the bell in a collection of legends compiled by Grimm, which tells the story of casting a human into a bell.

It is noteworthy that some of the sacrifice legends clearly explain the sacrifice as if it were a kind of magic. The hakama-lottery motif is a motif in which a person is chosen to be sacrificed by the patchwork of hakama. In addition, the story of sacrificing the first person who passes on the road, not the pattern of hakama, is not a motif limited to the legend of sacrifice because there have been many examples in various countries worldwide since ancient times.

*Dähnhardt: Oskar Dähnhardt (1870 - 1915) German old philologist.

**Ovidius's Metamorphoses: (BC43 - AD17) A Roman poet who lived during the reign of Augustus. The Imperial scholar Quintilian considered him the last of the Latin love elegists. Although Ovid enjoyed enormous popularity during his lifetime, the emperor Augustus exiled him to Tomis, the capital of the newly-organised province of Moesia, on the Black Sea, where he remained for the last nine or ten years of his life. Ovid is most famous for the Metamorphoses, a continuous mythological narrative in fifteen books written in dactylic hexameters.

***Chofu Anezaki: (1873 - 1949) A religious scholar. After graduating from Tokyo Imperial University, he studied in Germany, England and India and became a professor at the university.

****Izanami no Mikoto: This is wrong and the correct name is Ogetsu-hime. In Japanese myth, when Susanoo saw Ogetsuhime taking food out of her nose, mouth, and buttocks, he got angry and killed her, and silkworms were born from her dead head, rice from her eyes, millet from her ears, red beans from her nose, barley from her genitals, and soybeans from her buttocks.

*****Pangu: He is a primordial being and creation figure in Chinese mythology and Taoism who separated heaven and earth, and his body later became geographic features such as mountains and roaring water.

******Battle between a Monkey and Crabs: One of the old Japanese folk tales. A monkey monopolizes a persimmon raised with seeds obtained by deceiving a crab and kills the crab, but is avenged by the crab's children, a bee, and a mortar.

*******Soushen Ji: A 4th-century Chinese compilation of legends, short stories, and hearsay concerning Chinese gods, ghosts, and other supernatural phenomena.

********Teio Hennenki: A type of chronicle centered on the history of successive emperors made in the 12 century. It covers the period of Emperor Govsimi (1298 -1301) from the mythological period.

*********Major General Fukakusa's 100-night visit: A character who appears in a play modeled on Ono no Komachi, a beautiful poet created by Noh playwrights in the Muromachi period. He proposes to Komachi, but she says she will marry him if he visits her for 100 nights, and he does but dies on the 99 day.

**********Benkei: Benkei dueled with passers-by and tried to collect 1000 swords, but he was defeated by Ushiwakamaru (MINAMOTO no Yoshitsune) and failed to obtain the 1000 swords.

***********Kalmashapada: An ancestor of Rama, the avatar of the god Vishnu and the hero of the Hindu epic Ramayana. After he succeeded to the throne, he believed in heresy and vowed to get the heads of 1000 kings and got 999 heads. However, he was persuaded by the 1000 captured king to become a Buddha.

************Awashima Myojin: A god enshrined throughout Japan mainly at Awashima Shrine in Wakayama City, Wakayama Prefecture. She married Sumiyoshi Myojin but was exiled to Awasima Island because of a woman's disease.

*************Watanabe no Tsuna: He was a military commander in the middle of the Heian period. He cut off the arm of an ogre living in Rajomon Gate at the entrance of the capital. The ogre then transformed into an old woman and tricked him back.

**************Chiyou: A mythological being that appears in Chinese mythology. He was a tribal leader of the Nine Li tribe in ancient China. His body was separated in two and buried.

***************Boukai Maidan: An essay written in the Edo period by an unknown author.

****************Zu ting shi yuan: Chinese dictionary of characters. Muan Shanqing of Song compiled it. Published from 1098 to 1100. It is about 2400 words written in texts related to Zen Buddhism, with annotations added.

*****************Hamagri no Soshi: It is one of the otogi-soshi (short, illustrated stories written in the medieval period). The story of a man marrying a woman who came out of a clam he caught.