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Updated: June 25, 2025
Just at this time, the Court in Kyoto preferred its application, and Sadanobu at once appreciated that if the rank of dajo tenno were conferred on Prince Tsunehito, it would be impossible to withhold that of o-gosho from Harunari. Consequently the Bakufu prime minister wrote privately to the Kyoto prime minister, Takatsukasa Sukehira, pointing out the inadvisability of the proposed step.
How long a time was required for this primal integration, under a patriarchal monarchy, we cannot know; but we have learned that the later integration, under a duarchy, occupied considerably more than a thousand years.... Now the extraordinary fact to note is that, during all those centuries, the imperial cult was carefully maintained by even the enemies of the Mikado; the only legitimate ruler being, in national belief, the Tenshi, "Son of Heaven," the Tenno, "Heavenly King."
But the grand displays of the sacred symbol are upon the great festivals of the new year, the accession of Jimmu Tenno to the throne of Japan, and the Emperor's birthday. Then all the miles of streets are festooned with shimenawa thick as ship-cables.
10 Anciently the two great Shinto festivals on which the miya were thus carried in procession were the Yoshigami-no-matsuri, or festival of the God of the New Year, and the anniversary of Jimmu Tenno to the throne. The second of these is still observed. The celebration of the Emperor's birthday is the only other occasion when the miya are paraded.
One is the gift of the Imperial Government; the other, the gift of the common people. The government's gift is the Dai-Kioku-Den, erected to commemorate the great festival of Kwammu Tenno, fifty-first emperor of Japan, and founder of the Sacred City. To the Spirit of this Emperor the Dai-Kioku-Den is dedicated: it is thus a Shinto temple, and the most superb of all Shinto temples.
A highly aristocratic Court, possessing one of the most complicated and jealously protected hierarchies in the world, and presided over by a monarch claiming direct descent from the sacred Jimmu Tenno of twenty-five hundred years ago, decrees to-day precisely as before, the elaborate ritual governing every move, every decision and every agreement.
Florenz accounts for the distinction between Kobetsu and Shinbetsu as due to the existence of two military ruling classes, resulting from two successive waves of invasion or immigration. The Kobetsu were the followers of Jimmu Tenno; the Shinbetsu were earlier conquerors who had settled in Yamato prior to the advent of Jimmu. There was a division also into castes kabane or sei.
Before the time of the Emperor Jimmu was the Age of the Gods, the period of mythology. But trustworthy history does not begin for a thousand years after the accession of Jimmu Tenno; and the chronicles of those thousand years must be regarded as little better than fairy-tales.
Almost the whole of authentic Japanese history is comprised in one vast episode: the rise and fall of the military power.... It has been customary to speak of Japanese history as beginning with the accession of Jimmu Tenno, alleged to have reigned from 660 to 585 B.C., and to have lived for one hundred and twenty-seven years.
The Chinese sovereign, Yunglo, sent a message of sympathy to the Japanese potentate's son, Yoshimochi, in which the deceased was designated "Prince Kung-hsien," but Yoshimochi, though not distinguished for ability, had sufficient wisdom ultimately to adopt the advice of the kwanryo, Shiba Yoshimasa, and to decline the rank of Dajo Tenno, as well as to break off relations with the Ming ruler.
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