Nakahara Zenshu: Character and Weapons of the Ryukyu Kingdom (1)

Nakahara Zenchu.

Nakahara Zenchu.

When studying Ryukyu martial arts, there is the interesting genre of “Okinawa studies.” It was begun by Iha Fuyu and continued by Nakahara Zenshū and many others. What is most intruiging is that – with their professionalism, access, and grasp of sources otherwise unreachable for most – they provided many important impulses to Karate history research. It was Iha who first researched the “Kusanku” case and wrote it down in an article he dedicated to Funakoshi. Nakahara Zenshu also added a lot of very specific knowledge on Karate history. This is the area where the best and most credible historical information come from.

The following is the 1st of five parts of my translation of Nakahara’s article called Ryūkyū Ōkoku no Seikaku to Buki (Character and Weapons of the Ryūkyū Kingdom) from 1969.

I believe it is the first English translation if this text, although I already incoporated ideas in details from it in my Karate 1.0 of 2013.

Nakahara Zenchū (1890-1964) was a researcher of what is called “Okinawan studies”. He wa born on Kume island, where his father was the village head of both the Gima and Yamagusuku villages.

Nakahara is particularly known for his studies of the old songs handed down in Okinawa and the Amami Islands and of the Omoro-saushi, written down by the Shuri government. At the age of 15 he dropped out of the Okinawa Prefectural Middle School in Shuri as he could not pay the school fees. In 1912 he graduated from the Okinawa Teachers’ College in Shuri, and in 1917 he graduated from the Hiroshima Higher Teachers’ College. Via the teaching profession in a variety of schools he become Professor at the Seijō Private School Tōkyō’s Setagaya district in 1928, where he was instrumental in the school management.

In addition, he acted as the president of the “Federation of Okinawans“, president of the Okinawa Cultural Association, and served as the director of the Tōkyō Office of the Ryukyu Scholarship Foundation, while being instrumental in leading the development of his successors. Major publications include Nihon Gaikō-shi (1924), Sekai Chiri Seigi (1931), Omoro-saushi Jiten Sōsaku-in (1967) and others. His complete works have been published in 4 volumes by the Okinawa Times.

Nakahara is regarded the successor of Iha Fuyu, the “father of Okinawan studies”.

Character and Weapons of the Ryūkyū Kingdom (1)

Possessing no weapons served as a fundamental principle for the small island kingdom of Ryūkyū. The fact that peace continued for approximately 400 years is considered a rarity.

There are various theories concerning this topic, most prominently the weapons confiscation by King Shō Shin (1477-1526) and the seizing of weapons by the Shimazu fief following their 1609 invasion of Ryūkyū. According to these theories, from about the 15th century onwards Ryūkyū and its inhabitants didn’t possess weapons anymore.

Primarily, in Okinawa there was no iron, and cut and thrust weapons were imported goods. And in this text it is to be shown that in Shō Shin’s era the (transl. note: a rather Confucian than military) character of the government was established and the original, former ideals of the government were not perpetuated any more.

Until today, the exact starting time and direction of rice-cultivation in Ryūkyū remains obscure. Since about the second or third century AD, settlements cultivating rice emerged here and there, which is affirmed by a variety of data. Because of this rice-cultivating culture, however, a lack of farming implements made of metal seems to be questionable.

Suddenly, from about the 12th century, military men rose to power in various places, competing against each other, and ruling the citizens living in and around the castles they built. These military men were called Aji. By the end of the 14th century, the many Aji had integrated into three big powers, and since the beginning of the 15th century the island witnessed an upswing of military men, with the relations to Japan becoming alive again, amounting in a cultural influx.

Originally, the people of Okinawa lived decentralized from the Japanese mainland, and their language was different, too, which meant a gap in the cultural progress. Mainland Japan had already entered a metal culture (Iron Age), while here in Okinawa it was still a stone age. Encouraged by the paradigm of Japan, sea voyages from Okinawa to Japan served the improvement of the cultural level, with the transmission of writing characters, religion, and blacksmithing at its nucleus. This can be perceived as an increasing desire for culture.

Progresses in shipbuilding technology made ocean voyages possible. At the end of the 14th century direct intercourse with China and Japan began and led to a rapid tide of cultural influx from both countries, and Ryūkyū expanded its sphere of activity to Southeast Asia, reaching its peak at the end of the 15th century in the era of King Shō Shin. Trying to describe the young nation’s energy, Ryūkyū craved for becoming civilized “just like a blossom longing for dew.”

At the end of the 14th century the many Aji were unified under one man, the master mind Shō Hashi, and this era was extremely militaristic. The castle of Shuri, Buddhist temples, and shrines were erected, and intercourse with foreign countries was carried out. This dynasty however collapsed after about 70 years. One of the chief vassals of the dynasty, who had many people on his side, ascended the throne and took on the royal name Shō En.

Shō En originally was a civil official of Shō Shin’s father. As since the era of Shō Shin all government officials of this country had become unarmed, the theory goes that because of this he later became a man of good character. In contrast to this, north in Japan, during the era of the rule of the military men, the government officials usually wore two swords in their belts, and I have the strange feeling that this discrepancy was no coincidence.

However, looking for the source of scholarship and culture, Okinawa gained trade profits from China by means of etiquette of paying tribute. Concerning cut and thrust weapons they however fell very much behind Japan. Japan excelled in the manufacturing of cut and thrust weapons, and the different kinds of these constituted the leading trading good to China. In this way Japan became kind of the arms factory of East Asia, so to speak, which was not a mere political idea, but an economic one. While later emphasis was put on clothing and accessories, the requirement of weapons supply cannot be ignored.

The ancient kingdom of Japan saw the energetic import of the Sui (581-619) and Tang (618-907) dynasties’ culture, and the plan for the Japanese nation under the ritsuryō codes – i.e. criminal and administrative laws – had been grounded on the Chinese ideal, with of course literary persons at the center of the system. It was from this reason that during the governments of the Nara and Heian periods military men were not at the center of political power.

The Ryūkyū kingdom came into existence during the Muromachi period (1333-1573), and as a result of the conditions of the cultural development, the cultural level as well as the character of the government (note: Confucian) had only few in common with the Muromachi shōgunate (1336-1573).

In the era of King Shō Shin, rather than closely resembling the era of the Nara emperor Shōmu – i.e. the government and administration of Nara as a Japanese version of the Tang dynasty –, the government and administration of Ryūkyū in contrast was closer to being as small sized Ming dynasty. Since the intrusion of the Shimazu (1609) there were many changes due to their control, but the fundamental conception of the government didn’t alter on a large scale.

From the above thoughts, let’s next examine the Momourasoe Rankan no Mei as an excellent historical source for the era of King Shō Shin.

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