日本文化の多くは中国由来なのか：複眼で見るDid Most of Japanese Culture Come from China? A Complex Perspective

The idea that most of Japanese culture came from China is surprisingly strong, even inside Japan. Look at the actual history, though, and it holds true only from a certain age onward. Before that, matters are more complicated.

The key threshold is the Kofun period. Archaeologists disagree a great deal over how to date Japan's eras, but the Kofun period is generally understood to have begun around the middle of the third century.

The people at the center of shaping the Kofun period were the toraijin (渡来人), those who came across the sea to Japan between about 3,000 and 1,700 years ago. Their roots lay in East Asia, and many were naturalized and settled. In the process a good deal of culture derived from China arrived, but nearly without exception it was received only at the imperial court. This is one point to hold on to. The Japan of that time, in effect, meant little more than the southern part of present-day Nara Prefecture.

A tendency to revere China, to be sure, had already begun around the Yayoi period, before the Kofun. According to the Wei Zhi Wajin Den (魏志倭人伝) in the Chinese history Records of the Three Kingdoms, several leaders in Japan repeatedly sent envoys to strengthen ties with the Chinese emperor. So when the balance of power among the Chinese dynasties shifted in troubled times, unrest broke out in Japan too.

In present-day terms it is said that when the United States sneezes, Japan catches a cold; the same relation held toward China from ancient times.

But this current comes into clear view only later, in the Asuka period (593–710). In that period writing, the greatest feature of Chinese culture, and a Sinicized Buddhism arrived one after another, and clans at court fought fiercely over whether to accept the new culture.

A faction arose that argued for promoting Chinese culture at home: the Soga clan. In the reign of Empress Suiko (r. 593–628) in particular, the situation changed completely with the appearance of Prince Shotoku (574–622), who might be called the mover behind the acceptance of Chinese culture.

The triangle of Soga no Umako, head of the Soga clan, Empress Suiko, and Prince Shotoku pushed Sinicization forward at a stroke. The relations among the clans, divided on the surface over accepting or rejecting Buddhism, grew in time into war. In the end the Soga won overwhelmingly, and the age entered a new era of rapidly promoting Chinese culture at home.

From here Chinese culture spread at a stroke, centered on Nara, and so the age is generally called the Nara period (710–794). There is some truth in that view, but its foundation was the descendants of the East Asian toraijin of the Kofun period.

Their roots were in East Asia, so Chinese culture was familiar to them, and it is thought that moving with the current of the new age was also a priority for the survival of the naturalized groups. The area from Nara to Osaka in particular was land where many of those groups lived.

So in the Asuka period a decisive current arose of actively making Chinese culture Japanese. On this base, the Kofun through Asuka periods can be seen as Japan's process of receiving Chinese culture. In fact, the forms of culture nurtured then became an unavoidable factor in all later Japanese history, and in effect the driving force that formed it.

In a sense, Japan still strongly carries on the framework formed in that age.

From this viewpoint, much of present-day Japanese culture does come from China. But we must not overlook that from the Asuka period to now is, after all, only some 1,300 to 1,400 years. Before the East Asian toraijin flowed in and a culture took form, the Jomon and Yayoi periods, which are called Japan's prehistory, together span more than 10,000 years.

Realistically, then, there is a foundational stage of Japanese culture of more than 10,000 years, and from the Kofun period on, a movement over some thousand-odd years of accepting and rejecting Chinese culture.

For us a thousand years is very long, but seen historically it is hard to say that Japanese culture depended on Chinese culture for most of what it is.

The kimono, the tatami, painting, and many other things have their source in China, but it was Japan that developed them in its own way. Underneath that skill of remixing other cultures, we must take into account those more than 10,000 years of cultural formation that are not usually spoken of, and because many commentators ignore this, the real picture is slow to appear.

Personally, I think the common view that most of Japanese culture originates in Chinese culture is, though partly true, not true as a whole.