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Furba sherpa
Professor Monika Dix
English 205
September 21 2016
MFL/ENGL205Response Paper#1
Nihongi is an imperially commissioned Japanese history text completed in 797 during Nara
period. Fujiwara no Tsugutada and Sugano no Mamichi are the primary editor of this text. It is
one of the most important historical text for the information about Japan's Nara period. The text
is forty volumes in length.Among those stories, "Age of The Gods: Ukemochi" and "Record of
Soverigns: The empress and her Brother Prince Sahibiko" depicts the sad story about the two
brother and sister and the circumstances that made two of them drift apart from each other.
In the Age of The gods: Ukemochi, it is described how the death of the earth god was the
reason of separation between the sun and the moon and as wells as origin of food for human
race. The opening of the story starts by introducing how the two gods Izanagi and Izanami gave
birth to Amaterasu (Sun Goddess), Tsukuyomi(god of moon), and Susanoo and The God Izanagi
charging his three children by giving Amaterasu to rule over the plain of heaven, Tsukuyomi to
help Amaterasu in the charge of heavenly matters and Susano-o to govern the plain of the ocean.
While Amaterasu was in heaven she told Tsukuyomi to go and check the country of Reed
plains for the deity named Ukemochi. Upon receiving the commands Tsukuyomi descended to
the place where Ukemochi was. In the mean time, Ukemochi was throwing things from her

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mouth like she threw boiled rice to the land, broad of fin and narrow of fin which might be fishes
to the sea and again when she threw somethings smooth and rough of hair to the mountain.
Seeing this Tsukuyomi became angry with Ukemochi and drew his sword and slayed her.
Tsukuyomi then returned to the heaven and reported Amaterasu about the situation. Upon
hearing this Amaterasu was angry with Tsukuyomi and told him the he is wicked deity and she
will not see his face ever again and this is how they got separated.
After this Amaterasu ordered Ama no kumabito to go and see Ukemochi but by
this time Ukemochi was lifeless. However her death was not in vain, on the crown of her
head there had been produced an ox and horse; on top of her forehead there had been
produced millet; over her eyebrows there had been produced silkworms; in her eyes there
had been produced panic grass; in her belly there had been produced rice; and in her
genitals there had been produced wheat, large and small beans.
Ama no kumabito picked all of these things and gave them to Amaterasu then she
made these things for the human race to live and eat like she made the millet, the panic,
the wheat and the beans the seed for dry fields and the rice was made seed for wet fields.
Not only this she even appointed a village chief of heaven and sowed these things for the
first time in the narrow field and long fields of heaven which was pleasure to watch
during autumn.
Now talking about Records of Sovereign: The Empress and her Brother Prince
Sahobiko, it is about the conflict that the empress had to go through due to her brother
desire to kill the emperor and she is stuck between the wife role and the role of sister.
This story opens with an introduction on marital system during those ancient Japanese era

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and showing the contrast between the character of empress in kojiki version and in this
one. In the Kojiki, the empress deliberately attempts to kill the emperor while here the
empress is in dilemma.
Fourth year, autumn, Ninth month, twenty-third day. Prince Sahobiko plotted
against the emperor and even thought of making the empress part of his plan. He asked
the empress to make joint with him as a sister and questioned her whom she loves the
most. To this question she replied without much thought saying she loves her brother the
most. Upon hearing this, brother Prince Sahobiko tried to manipulate his sister saying
that the beauty of her, for which the emperor fall upon will fade one day and his affection
will cease. He told her that there are large number of concubine in the palace and one day,
one of them will remove her so before this happens let's be together and slay the emperor.
He gave her the dagger and told her to put this on her garments and stab this in the
neck of the emperor and kill him. The empress got frightened and did not know what to
do and thought of telling her brother that she cant do this but at that mean time she saw a
glimpse of determination in her brother face and thought herself that remonstrance would
be useless right now so she kept the dagger in her garment as he told her to do.
Winter has finally came and with this came the opportunity to kill the emperor.
The emperor was taking day nap with the empress's knees as his pillow, and at one time
empress thought of killing the emperor for his brother's sake. Her eyes were full of tears
then suddenly her tears fell on the emperor face which made him awake.

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After waking up the emperor told her about his dream, where he saw a small
brocade color snake coiling around their neck and rain fall at the same time which wet
their faces. After hearing this empress told him the reality of the dream and told him she
was going to kill him. She told him that she was stuck between the wife and sister role.
She was afraid that she might lose one of them and because of this she could not sleep.
The king trusted her and told her it was not her fault and commanded Yatsunada,
the remote ancestor of Kimi of kozuke to slay Sahobiko. Sahobiko at this time had
already made large number of armed forces and rice castle to hid himself. The empress
was sad to know that she was the reason for this fight so she took imperial prince in her
arm and went inside the castle hoping that her brother would stop this but seeing no
change in her brother emotion she felt guilty so she told the emperor that in return of the
love that he has given for her, she wants him to make her palace as consorts where he
would be in service of five ladies with virtuous minds. The emperor agreed with this and
saved the imperial child from the castle however the castle was burnt down with
Sahobiko and his younger sister leaving inside to die.
The similarities is that in both stories, there is sad ending to brother and sister
relation. In both stories brother are the shown the reason for the sad end of the relation.
For example in Age of The Gods: Ukemochi, because of Tsukuyomi killing the deity, they
got separated and even in another story because of the brother's creed , he got himself
killed.
The difference between this two story is that in the first story the sister is
projected as strong person so she did not hesitate ones to punish his brother while in the

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case of another, the sister is not strong enough to protest against her brother even if he
suggest her of killing her own husband. The second story is more realistic which depicts
the trauma that one women has to go through when she has to be sister and even wife at
the same time.
Overall both stories have sad ending. I also have brother so reading this made me
to think what would I do if someday I had to go through this trauma. This reading kind of
gives us the insight view to sister and brother relation. I liked the way that emperor
believed in empress when she told him the truth. He acted like the emperor and did not
make decision harshly on the spot by punishing the empress rather he tried to understand
her situation as she is both wife and sister.

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References
Shoku Nihongi. (2016, August 18). In Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia.
Retrieved 21:25, September 21, 2016, from
https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Shoku_Nihongi&oldid=735162747

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