Immigrants, gods, and movie studios

Sengoku Daimyo's Chronicles of Japan

In which we talk about envoys to the continent, and those people who then immigrated to the archipelago. Along the way we'll also talk about the tragic death of the Ise Princess and just how one powerful immigrant family are connected--however loosely--to a modern movie studio.

For more information on this episode, check out https://sengokudaimyo.com/podcast/episode-63

Rough Transcript

Welcome to Sengoku Daimyo’s Chronicles of Japan. My name is Joshua and this is Episode 63: Immigrants, Gods, and Movie Studios

Last episode we looked at how Wakatake, aka Yuryaku Tenno, and the court backed up their will in the archipelago as well as on the continent—using the Mononobe, their enforcers, in the areas near the court and further afield. As we discussed, this was a period with plenty of violence and turmoil, but one thing it wasn’t was a period of isolation. Besides the military entanglements on the continent, there were also accounts of more diplomatic efforts on farther shores—namely with the court of Liu Song.

And even though over the course of the reign Yamato power waned on the peninsula, as it would seem based on evidence in the Samguk Sagi, that doesn’t mean that there weren’t still people moving from one locale to the other. In fact, if Yamato influence did wane towards the end of Wakatake’s reign, that may have been impetus for more people—namely Yamato’s closest peninsular allies—to make the trip across the straits to the archipelago. So this episode we are going to focus on those people and the innovations, especially ideas they brought over, and—in a true illustration of how the historical processes described in the Chronicles continue to resonate down to the present day—we’re going to conclude with just what all of this has to do with a modern day movie studio-slash-theme park in Kyoto.

Now, as for people, we have plenty of evidence in this period of individuals coming across the straits and staying in the islands. We’ve talked about some of these people already, such as the Imaki, who were artisans brought over from Baekje, to join groups that we already know, like the Aya, and a few we’ll talk about this episode.

And these people were bringing new technologies. Some are obvious, like methods of weaving fabric, or even pottery. For example, there is a particular type of pottery, known in Japan as sueki, or Sue ware. It is unlike the terracotta used for the haniwa figures that famously decorated the kofun. Sue ware vessels tend to be blue-grey stoneware, and are the same—or at least extremely similar—to ones found on the Korean peninsula, particularly in the Kara and Silla regions. Perhaps unsurprisingly, a fair amount of it shows up in the area of modern Ohosaka, near Naniwa, likely Yamato’s main port, even when the court was elsewhere, indicating that there were likely potters there who had come over with the technology from the continent.

But beyond the tangible innovations imported from the continent and the peninsula, there were less tangible ones as well. We have writing, of course, but even just the basics of statecraft and how to organize and administer larger territories and diverse groups of people—things likely passed on from the dynasties in China.

And then there is another step beyond that in the realm of the metaphysical. And there were plenty of continental ideas on that front as well, bringing in foreign deities—or karakami—to be worshipped locally, as well as importing foreign concepts that were absorbed into local practice. In some cases these may have retained some connection to the continental practices that spawned them, but in others they may just as easily have become localized to the needs of the people. All of this would have a profound impact on the make-up and belief systems in the archipelago, such that there are many things that even today are regarded as indigenous to Japan or Shinto and yet would seem to have roots outside of the archipelago.

This didn’t all happen during the reign of Wakatake, of course, but there are enough things that did that this is as good a place as any for us to look at what was happening in this regard in the late 5th century.

So, backing up a bit. At this point, what exactly was going on on the peninsula and the continent? Of course, a big part of it – and something we’ve touched on in recent episodes – is the conflict between and among Silla and Goguryeo—as well as Baekje and Kara—over on the Korean peninsula. It is somewhat difficult to say how active Yamato was, but at least there appears to have been members of the greater Wa ethnic sphere who were a part of the conflicts going on.

Beyond the peninsula, of course, were the successive dynasties laying claim to some part of that area that had been known as the “Middle Kingdom” since ancient times. To the Japanese Chroniclers, this all was all simply labeled as “Kure”, the Japanese pronunciation of the character for Wu—one of the states that arose after the fall of the Han dynasty. While it only lasted until the 3rd century, it became the de facto name for just about any interaction with the mainland “Middle Kingdom”. And if the Korean peninsula was considered valuable for its continental goods and learning, “Kure” was considered the motherlode. A center of authority, sophistication, and learning. If something came from Kure, one can only imagine the prestige that brought with it.

At this point the dynasty that held sway over Wu’s ancient territory, from the Shandong peninsula all the way down into the northern reaches of modern day Vietnam, was a dynasty known to us as the Liu Song. In the north, in the Yellow River Basin, was the Northern Wei, a dynasty descended from the nomadic Xianbei people. While I suppose it is possible that any connection could have been drawn to either of these two powers, it seems likely that much of what is mentioned in the Yamato chronicles refers to the southern, Liu Song dynasty.

Our first contact with the Liu Song, then, is recorded by the Japanese Chroniclers as taking place in the year 462. Per the Nihon Shoki, this is when “The Land of Wu”—aka the Liu Song dynasty—sent envoys to Yamato with tribute. Of course, this lines up remarkably well—perhaps too well, in fact—with the information in the Song Shu, where they make the claim that this was actually the first envoy from the archipelago to the Liu Song court, and not vice versa. It’s pretty evident that from either perspective has recorded the “lesser” power sending tribute to the “greater”, in a sense. But either way, it seems likely that the Chroniclers had access to the Song Shu or similar works, and were fitting those dates together, though why they didn’t mention the other six embassies since 421 is anybody’s guess.

And then there are the missions that the Nihon Shoki claims were sent that we have no record of in the Chinese sources. For instance, in 464, in response, it would seem, to the mission of 462, Musa no Suguri no Awo and Hinokuma no Tamitsukashi no Hakatoko were sent as emissaries of Wakatake no Ohokimi.

Now Awo and Hakatoko have surfaced in our narrative before, though it was kind of a blink and you’d miss it kind of deal. They came up two episodes back when we were talking about Wakatake’s mean streak, where it was noted that, at least at one point these were the only two nobles in the whole of Yamato that held any love for Wakatake—his only friends. Of course, neither was anyone of particular note, with relatively minor kabane—far from the Omi and Muraji, and even the Atahe.

Of course, it is probably easy to be friends with the sovereign when you spend most of your life on the road for him. Not to mention that they likely owed him a great deal—members of more prestigious households would have had their own power base, whereas Awo and Hakatoko would have been more reliant on Wakatake’s pleasure. This also made them perfect for the task of representing him to the continent, since one expects they would not have their own agendas that might conflict with his own.

Granted, it is questionable just how well this mission went. The two envoys returned two years after they had been sent, in 466. This seems reasonable given the distance of such a journey.

In earlier periods, we were told of the goods that would be taken on these embassies, including fabric and enslaved people, only to return with even more valuable goods in return. However, we aren’t told what Awo and Hakatoko took with them, only what they brought back—two geese presented by Liu Song. Somehow I suspect this wasn’t the only thing that they brought back, but it was what the Nihon Shoki bothered to mention, mainly because of the odd story that goes along with it. It seems that when the envoys arrived back in the archipelago they put in at Tsukushi—modern Kyushu—and there they must have brought the geese and anything else ashore. Seems they did a poor job of looking after things though, and a dog got into the geese and killed them both.

Minuma no Kimi, the dog’s owner, realized he would need to pay some sort of restitution. After all, these weren’t just any old geese—they were gifts from the Liu Song emperor to Wakatake no Ohokimi. And so Minuma no Kimi quickly offered up what he could—he offered up ten geese and the bird-keepers to look after them. Wakatake accepted the payment and had the bird-keepers in particular resettled into two villages—in Karu and in Iware.

This was certainly better than what had happened in another case of a dog killing royal birds, which took place only a year later. In that case the owner, who could not pay restitution, ended up branded and made a part of the Torikahi Be, or Bird-keeper’s Be. This would also be the fate of those who questioned Wakatake’s judgment on this matter, so you know, paying up was probably a good thing.

But surely the continent had more to offer than birds, right? And so Awo and Hakatoko went back in 468. This time they came back—once again two years later—and this time they brought something better than birds. This time they brought craftspeople, namely Aya and Kure weavers.

Now some of this mirrors previous accounts, such as in the reign of Homuda Wake, when tailors of Kure were also said to have come over. They even brought specific tailors—one in particular they name as “Ane-hime”, who is given to the service of the god Ohomi, much as in Homuda Wake’s time they claim that an “Ane-hime”, which likely is more of a description than a name, was given to the god of Munakata. These could easily be two separate individuals, given the vagaries of the name-slash-descriptor, but it is also possible that the same stories got told slightly differently in different places in the Chronicles.

Now, this dedication of some of these foreign workers to shrines will bring us around to another topic in a bit—the connection between weaving and ritual life—but for now, let’s continue to pull on just one thread at a time—in this case the actual individuals and how they were incorporated into Yamato. All of these craftspeople from the continent were split up into various familial Be groups and sent to different places throughout the country, or at least that’s the official story. We will often see where members of a Be are mentioned as living in farflung lands, under the sway of local authorities.

Which brings us to the larger question of —how did these foreigners integrate into Yamato Society? The answer seems to be: on the whole, quite well. In fact, in this period, while there are certainly remembrances of continental origin that remain in various names or simply stories, many of these groups of people were either accepted as familial groups – Be - on their own, or placed into new or existing family groups and made a part of the citizenry of Yamato. This would later be codified into law, but for now the process seems vague.

The Chronicles do like to make the claim that creation of these family groups belonged to the sovereign, something that I’m not so sure about in these early times. Still, since that seems to have been a later prerogative that the royalty asserted, the Chroniclers were unlikely to countermand that in compiling their history. And so we see efforts to organize people, both foreign and local.

These Be had various purposes and types. We’ve already seen a few examples of Be created around certain occupations, such as the creation of the Imaki from Baekje artisans, or the Umakai Be and the Torikai Be—the Horsekeepers’ Be and the Birdkeepers’ Be, to look after various animals that had some value: horses, for likely obvious reasons, and birds, possibly like game wardens. Then there were less obvious groups, like the Wina Be, who apparently were a family group of carpenters, at least based on the stories about them, though their name may have simply referred to their original place of origin.

Sometimes these family groups were created simply for a specific person or purpose, such as the upkeep of a tomb, or to support a particular family. Others are less clear, and their origin stories may just be apocryphal.

For example, you might remember that brave—or perhaps foolhardy—individual who had gone up Mt. Miwa to obtain the kami for Wakatake, from Episode 61. There was a man named Chihisako Be no Sukaru, and there is another story about him on how he got that name. And it all has to do with silkworms and a slight misunderstanding.

The year was 462—The same year as that mission that was said to have arrived from the Liu Song—or possibly had been sent.

Back in the archipelago, we are told that Wakatake was trying to boost the native silk industry. We know from archaeological evidence that the people in the Japanese archipelago had been weaving silk locally since at least the Mid-Yayoi and earlier, using silk cocoons imported from the continent. Of course this technology was not a recent one. The section of the Wei Chronicles regarding the Wa claimed they were, in fact, raising their own silkworms and weaving silk even back then. It is uncertain just how widespread this was or even if it was actually happening—it could be that sericulture was simply considered a mark of civilization and therefore part of a common refrain about certain cultures. Still, certainly by the latter half of the 5th century we can say that sericulture was fairly well known and practiced in the archipelago.

However, given the importation of more and more craftspeople, I suspect that silk was in ever greater demand. After all, it did one very little good to have all of these weavers and tailors coming over if you didn’t have anything for them to actually weave, let alone sew up.

Furthermore, raising silkworms could be done on an individual basis. You didn’t need to manage large plots of land, as with rice farming – silkworms are, of course, small, and as long as you have access to one or more mulberry trees for the leaves, you can generally keep them fed. Often this was seen as being in the realm of women—to raise the silkworms and process the cocoons and eventually weave the silk. To scale up production at this point there was really only one thing to do: Get more people to grow silkworms and harvest the resulting silk.

And so it made sense that if Wakatake wanted to see more silkworm cultivation occur, he should encourage it in the palace itself and amongst the women of the palace. Who better than his own Queen and consorts to take up this task. And so Wakatake conscripted the brave Sukaru to go and collect silkworms throughout the country so that they could be raised in the palace.

Unfortunately, it seems there was a bit of a communication problem. The term used for silkworms was “Kahi-ko”, which also sounded remarkably similar to a phrase that meant to “nurture children”, and so Sukaru did not realize that he was supposed to collect silkworms and, instead, he went around the countryside collecting babies and young children and eventually presented those to the sovereign, thinking that is what he was supposed to do.

When he realized what had happened, Wakatake laughed and then decreed that Sukaru would need to raise the children himself. And, in case you are wondering, no, there is no mention of the children’s parents or what happened to them. Perhaps they were orphans? That is perhaps the most charitable way to look at it.

Anyway, that is why the sovereign then created an entire family structure: the Chihisako Be—the Be of Little Children.

Of course I take most of these family creation stories with at least a grain of salt. This seems like quite the story, here, and while I enjoy a good pun as much as the next podcast host, the idea that someone would just go about collecting children because of a misunderstanding seems a bit much. And besides, a lot of this feels like more continental imperial trappings being placed on the sovereign, even having his consorts raise silkworms in the palace.

But the fact that the creation of the Chihisakobe is also connected with this story of raising silkworms draws an interesting connection, and they were likely more closely related to something to do with silk raising or weaving than little children.

And let’s not also forget Sukaru’s feat of wrestling a thunder god down from Mt. Miwa—combining silk industry and spiritual power.

Other families and/or Be were created during this time as well, or were organized together. Again, remember, these are not necessarily blood relatives, but individuals brought together into organizations designed around the familial framework. And although we’ve talked about Be being formed to help organize foreigners, there are plenty of examples of the same practice being applied to people and groups in the archipelago as well. In some cases this was likely done as a means of control as much as anything else—bringing an industry under a single head and therefore providing control even over disparate groups throughout the islands.

A good example is the Nihe no Hanishi Be—the clayworkers Be. According to the Nihon Shoki, an ancestor of the Hanishi no Muraji presented private subjects of various villages to be part of the Nihe no Hanishi Be to make vessels for the sovereign’s table. The fact that his family became the Hanishi and this was the Hanishi Be is not uncommon—there are often, but not always, corresponding families to some of the Be groups. I also find it interesting that he could just “give” private subjects—this likely refers to the idea that while he may have been collecting some tax or product from these villages, I suspect that production is now being redirected to a new recipient—in this case the royal family. Of course, the Hanishi family would likely retain some part in that, which would be key to their own wealth and status in the community of Yamato elites.

That the villages named are from all over is what I find truly interesting, however. The individuals being placed in this group were from Settsu, Yamashiro, Ise, Tanba, Tajima, and Inaba. Rather than suggesting that a single individual already had such a reach, this may have been more about putting various clayworkers in those areas under a single organizational unit, and a single organizational head. Thus their production could be more centralized as well. Still, how much of this was actual and how much was aspirational is hard to say..

So, Be could, in fact, be created around just about any craft, and it’s not so much the creation of a Be, but more where that craft came from, that clues in modern historians as to whether a given group were part of a continental tradition.

Now as all of these new groups were being created and as people were coming in from the continent, they were merging together various ideas and concepts. In some cases, as we mentioned, it was technologies, from writing, to horses, to pottery, and even various fabric arts. But in other cases it was ideas—statecraft, for one, but also religious and spiritual thought.

Of course, at the time, people really did not distinguish between the natural and the supernatural. Kami and spirits were as natural to them as the mountains and seas. And, from what we see in the record, it would certainly seem that spiritual practices were seen as an important tool of statecraft. Of course, while there were similarities, it is likely that there was a lot of variation in ritual practices across the archipelago. Different groups would have their local deities and specific rites. If those rites were seen as effective in some way—whether curing illness, helping the crops, or just generally bringing good fortune—then those rites were propagated.

At the same time, that made the ritualists in charge of those rites powerful as well. As such we often see local deities, ritual centers, and family groups intertwined. Queen Himiko, after all, was said to have held power through her ability to commune with the spirits

As examples of this, think about how those women named Ane-hime were dedicated to this or that shrine or deity, and then consider some of the other mentions of spiritual and ritual power. Even the Mononobe, who are often talked about in a martial context, clearly had some authority through their connection to Isonokami.

Control of various ritual elements would be crucial in later periods—indeed, it would be one of the fundamental ways that power structures would be challenged. And remember how we talked about how Homuda Wake would be eventually morphed into the god Hachiman, from a group in Northern Kyushu? And later we’ll talk about groups like the Nakatomi, and even the Soga, who would wield Buddhism to their family’s benefit.

Even in the Heian period, families would keep diaries which would be used as precedent for various rituals and decisions. If you were seen as having control over some kind of ritual, that was a form of power on the archipelago. Perhaps this is part of why, as Yamato expanded its authority, it required various ritual centers to turn over their ritual tools, such as mirrors and jewels and swords, to the court. We’ve talked about some of this already with Wakatake’s predecessors, as they broadened the sphere of Yamato influence.

At the same time as all of this was happening within the archipelago, you had an influx of individuals from the continent who brought with them not just new ways of making things, but they brought their own gods, their own stories, and their own rituals. Gina Barnes has made note of how stories of the Queen Mother of the West made their way into the islands, and it is easy to see trappings of Chinese thought in various rituals. This is sometimes seen as the importation of Taoism, though there seems little evidence that it was brought in in such a structured manner. After all, many things we consider “Taoist” today were likely originally local traditions that existed alone before later being brought under a larger conceptual roof. So it may have just been isolated practices, not necessarily connected with the sage Laozi.

Likewise, there were foreign deities, or karakami, brought into Japan as well. Some of these seem obvious, like Ame no Hiboko, who is explicitly said to have come over from the Korean peninsula. Others are more controversial. Susanowo is often pointed to as likely originating on the continent, and even Amaterasu has been suggested as having elements of continental influence.

No doubt these new gods and rituals offered something novel to people on the archipelago. Much like other technologies, including statecraft, medicine, writing, etc., why wouldn’t these foreign systems be something to try? They likely were seen as exotic, and without the burden of a history of unanswered prayers or ineffective rituals. It seems reasonable to assume that people may have adopted some of these continental beliefs and made them their own, or simply used them for a touch of the exotic and to appear more cultured and erudite.

Michael Como makes a point about this in his 2009 book, Weaving and Binding: Immigrant Gods and Female Immortals in Ancient Japan. There, Como points out many of the connections between the immigrant groups coming into Japan, the weaving technologies that they brought with them and upon which they built their fortunes and economic power, and the influence they had on religious thought and practice in the archipelago, both by importing certain rituals and beliefs, but also by importing their own gods, or kami.

For example, one of the families that was of some import in the early Heian period were the Hata, a group with a foreign lineage, whose name specifically references woven cloth, and who had considerable ritual control over various sacred sites, including Buddhist temples and also the famous Kamo shrines. That the capital of Heian-kyo—modern Kyoto—was built in their ancestral stronghold is likely not a mere coincidence. The Hata are an important enough example of everything I’m talking about that we’re going to spend most of the rest of the episode talking about this particular family and how they tie into several places in the Chronicles at this point.

In particular, one of the stories that Como uses to illustrate the connections between immigration, weaving and ritual comes from our current reign, the reign of Wakatake, and it is about Takuhata no Himemiko, the Ise Princess. Make a note of the “hata” in her name – I promise we’ll return to it soon.

Now for some reason—the Nihon Shoki doesn’t seem to explain why—Kunimi of the Abe no Omi apparently started a rumor that the royal Ise princess, Takuhata no Himemiko, had been having an affair with the bath official, Takehiko of the Ihoki-be no Muraji.

Takuhata no Himemiko, aka Waka Tarashi Hime, was the daughter of Wakatake and Kara Hime, and the sister of Crown Prince Shiraga.

And so it is understandable that when Kikoyu, Takehiko’s father, heard about the rumor, he immediately thought about what that might mean for him and the family. It was unthinkable for someone of his family’s status to have an affair with a royal princess, let alone the Ise Princess, who was supposed to be the Priestess at Ise Shrine. And we’ve already seen how quickly Wakatake could take action at even a perceived slight against himself or his family. And so Kikoyu invited his son out to the Ihoki river—from which the Ihoki-be no doubt take their name—where they were to go out cormorant fishing. For those not familiar, this is a practice that continues to the present day, where cormorants are tethered to the fisherman’s boat and trained to dive down for fish and bring them back to the boat.

Now, no doubt going out fishing with your old man would have been a great bonding experience, but Kikoyu had other plans for Takehiko. Once they were at the river, rather than going out fishing, Kikoyu slew his own son, hoping that by doing so his family could avoid the stain of slander that was starting to circulate.

When word of all of this reached Wakatake, he began to make inquiries into what was going on, and he sent people to question Takuhata Hime. Of course, she was ignorant of any of this—she apparently hadn’t even heard the rumor that Kunimi had started—and it seems it all came as quite a shock. After the inquisitors left, Takuhata was distraught. She went to Isuzu no Kawakami, near Ise shrine. She had taken a divine mirror, which she buried, and then she strangled herself.

Eventually word got around that the Princess was missing and so Wakatake sent people to find his daughter. When they came to the area of Kawakami, they saw a rainbow like a serpent, about forty to fifty feet long. At the end of the rainbow, much like a leprechaun’s pot of gold, they found the sacred mirror that Takuhata hand buried, and nearby they found her body.

In examining the body, they noticed something odd, and they cut open her corpse in some kind of kofun era autopsy. Inside her belly they found something like water, and in the water there was a stone. Through this bit of CSI:Yamato they were able to deduce that Takehiko was innocent.

This news devastated Takehiko’s father, Kikoyu, who realized that he had killed his own son for nothing. In rage, he went after and killed Kunimi, the one who had started the vicious rumor, which had set this whole drama in motion—something reminiscent of a Shakespearean tragedy. Kikoyu, his own son dead, and his revenge taken, fled and hid in the Isonokami shrine.

This whole story may seem like simply a tragedy, included because it is about the daughter of the sovereign and the Ise Priestess. But for those of us today, looking back, this actually tells us a lot—and perhaps even more because of what is not being said.

But how does this tale connect with the rest of our narrative?

Well, for one, Amaterasu, the deity of Ise, is also connected with weaving. After all, it was her weaving hall into which Susanowo threw the backwards flayed colt, killing her maiden as she made the ritual garments for the kami of Takamanohara. That was the incident that sent the sun goddess herself into the cave.

I would also point out that when Takuhata decided to take her own life, she buried a mirror. Of course, a mirror is a symbol of the sun and of Amaterasu, but again, it is also a prestige item from the continent.

Now this isn’t to say Amaterasu is a Korean deity; there are factors that make her distinctly Japanese, in my opinion. Rather, I think it helps us see the melting pot of ideas and concepts that came over from the continent at this time and merged with local tradition.

Furthermore, this happened in ways that were relatively seamless compared to later importation of ideas, and perhaps that had to do with the less centralized nature of power at this time. After all, what does it mean to be “Wa” or “Japanese” at a time when there are still multiple states with their own ritual centers and even their own sovereigns?

And then there is the name—Takuhata. “Hata” certainly refers to woven cloth, but you may also remember back in Episode 22 that Takuhata Chichi Hime was the name of a kami—the daughter of Takami Musubi, wife to Amaterasu’s son Oshihomimi, and mother to none other than Ninigi no Mikoto. Takuhata’s name references myriad bolts of silk—or hata, and she is one of the deities said to be enshrined along with Amaterasu at Ise Shrine. And so it seems that Princess Takuhata is using the name of one of the deities of Ise Shrine—specifically the daughter of Takami no Musubi, one of the more important deities of the early stories—possibly even more important than Amaterasu herself.

So, according to Como, we see in this story a connection, coming from continental traditions, between weaving – Hata or Takuhata- and spiritual beliefs. The Queen Mother of the West, for instance, is often depicted with a headdress of weaving implements, and then there are stories such as the Weaving Maiden and the Cow-herd boy—the story of Tanabata—which shows up in different ways from the continent to the archipelago.

And then there is the power that we see some immigrant groups wield, in this case the Hata family. The Hata family was probably not a new lineage group in the time of Wakatake—though whether it was a formal lineage group or simply a description of people who claimed some descent from the peninsula is hard to say. The Nihon Shoki indicates that there were members of the Hata dispersed in various places. Now, “Hata” is the pronunciation of the sinograph used for the ancient Qin dynasty. There is a claim that the first Hata people were people of Qin who moved to the Korean peninsula. They are sometimes said to be the progenitors of the Jin-han people, who then became Silla.

More likely, there were later people of ethnic Han descent who did move into the Korean peninsula, possibly with the various commanderies. This may be the origin for the “Hata” name, which at the very least demonstrates that they came from the continent, possibly of ethnic Han but at least of peninsular origin—even later works agree with that.

Anyway, as I mentioned, the members of the Hata were dispersed, and here the Nihon Shoki uses interesting language. Per Aston’s translation it basically states that the Omi and Muraji—that is the higher ranking noble houses—enforced their services at their pleasure and would not allow the Hata no Miyatsuko to control them.

This gives us some insight into how some of these family groups worked. Even though family or Be members might be dispersed, it seems that their production was expected to be overseen by a central authority. I can’t help but think of some of the work by Dr. Paula Curtis on the metalworkers in later periods, where there were individuals who had particular rights, granted by the court, to oversee and authorize production, for which they were due some not insignificant amount of recompense. The Miyatsuko appears to have occupied a similar position. What I am not sure of is just how new an innovation this would have been in the 5th century. I suspect that it wasn’t nearly so much about asserting traditional privilege as it was creating those same privileges as part of the continuing consolidation of control and authority across the archipelago.

In this case it was Sake, the Hata no Miyatsuko, who is said to have requested consolidation of the Hata under his authority.

But who was Sake, and why would the sovereign listen to him?

Well, Sake seems to have his origin story in about 468, when Wakatake had requested the work of a carpenter, to construct what Aston translates as a “lofty edifice”. It is said that this skilled carpenter nimbly ascended the high building and ran round as if he were flying.

An Uneme from Ise looked up as the construction was going on and marvelled at his work as she was walking. She got so caught up in what was going on above her that she failed to watch where she was going and she fell flat on her face in the courtyard, upsetting the dish of meat that she was bringing to serve Wakatake.

Wakatake jumped to the logical conclusion—or logical to him, anyway—that this meant that the Uneme must have been having some kind of an affair with the carpenter, and he immediately charged the Mononobe with executing the hapless woodworker.

And that would have been the end of him, it seems, if a nearby musician, Hata no Sake no Kimi, hadn’t heard what was going on. He quickly grabbed a nearby zither and started to play a song, talking about Prosperity to the maid of Ise, and wishing for long life for the carpenter. Though I don’t know that I can really piece together the specifics, the song seemed to bring Wakatake to his senses, and he realized that he had overreacted.

Wakatake quickly pardoned the supposed offense and, it seems, the construction went on without further incident.

More importantly to our own story, perhaps, is Sake’s ability to help assert himself with the sovereign and to help calm a tense situation. This likely is meant to equally reflect his political acumen and know-how, which is why, a few years after this, when Hata no Sake requested authority over the other members of the Hata lineage group, Wakatake granted his request.

When that authority was granted, it is said that Sake, attended by the various kinds of Be workmen, presented taxes of fine silks piled up to fill the court—no doubt further ingratiating him and his people with Wakatake.

I don’t think it is too far fetched to assume that the economic—and thus political—power of the Hata came, in part, from their specialization in the silk industry. It was, after all, an area where continental expertise could easily be leveraged in terms of new technological advancements. By consolidating that under a single administrative unit, that also provided greater access to these goods by the court, and in the records of the following year we are told that all of the provinces were ordered to plant and grow mulberry bushes, with members of the Hata dispersed again to make sure they continued to produce silk for the court.

Unsurprisingly, this was quite lucrative, and it would serve the Hata well. In fact, they would be a powerful noble family in the Nara and at least early Heian periods, gaining ritual authority through several prominent shrines, as well as their economic industry.

Now, Sake himself was rewarded with a new personal name for all of his troubles. He was henceforth known as Uzumasa—or possibly Uzumorimasa. And if that sounds familiar, you might be a bit of a film buff.

You see, the Hata would later be involved with a little family temple, known as Hachiokadera—the temple of the bee mound. That temple had a Buddha statue from Korea that is said to have been brought back by none other than Shotoku Taishi himself. Now Hachiokadera was not exactly in a prominent location in the 7th century. It was on the banks of the Omuro river, on a large plain between the larger Katsura and Kamo rivers. It wouldn’t be until the late 8th century that this area, a Hata family stronghold, would become the site for a new city, to be known as Heian-kyo—modern Kyoto. The area around the Hata temple—known today as Koryuji—is still known as Uzumasa, spelled with kanji indicating the “Great Hata”, indicating the family that used to live there and their purported great ancestral family head.

That neighborhood on the western outskirts of Kyoto eventually became home to a fledgling movie industry, including the backlot and sets for numerous movies, particularly by the Toei film company. You can still go and visit them at Uzumasa Toei Studios—like a little Hollywood studios for Chambara and other films, where they are still shooting, even today. Thus the name of the 2014 film about the tradition of filming Samurai movies: Uzumasa Limelight.

And that is, briefly, how a modern movie about chambara films is connected all the way back to the head of a house of immigrants in the 5th century, a house whose connection to weaving also raises interesting connections with ritual practices imported from the continent, and whom we will no doubt see more of in episodes to come.

And with that, I think we will bring this whole thing to a close. We continued our look at the interactions between the archipelago and the continent, and saw how people were coming over and settling, bringing their ideas and technologies with them as they did so. And we saw how these technologies weren’t always just how to make physical things, but could just as easily be ideas.

Next episode we will start to move on from Wakatake and look at what happened at the end of his reign—and the sovereign possibly known as “BU” in the Song chronicles.

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And that’s all for now. Thank you again, and I’ll see you next episode on Sengoku Daimyo’s Chronicles of Japan.