May 9
Herman Ooms (UCLA)
Multiple Choice: Justifications for Rulership in the Tenmu dynasty, 650-750.
Political ideology in ancient Japan was not limited to divine imperial ancestry as spelled out in the "Kojiki" and "Nihon shoki". Mytho-history constituted only one phase or layer of multiple ways of
symbolizing Yamato's new ruling authority; and vertical sacralization was only half of its message. Posthumous names for rulers also reveal alternate, patterned ways in which individual reigns were conceived and represented. Daoist symbols were used; some rulers presented themselves as servants of the Buddha. Finally, the new palace-cities of Fujiwara-kyo - and Heijo-kyo - were designed to give spatial expression to the nature of politico-religious rule. This paper analyzes the plurality of these symbolics centered on the Tenmu dynasty.
Discussant: Davie Lurie (Columbia)
Herman Ooms (UCLA)
Multiple Choice: Justifications for Rulership in the Tenmu dynasty, 650-750.
Political ideology in ancient Japan was not limited to divine imperial ancestry as spelled out in the "Kojiki" and "Nihon shoki". Mytho-history constituted only one phase or layer of multiple ways of
symbolizing Yamato's new ruling authority; and vertical sacralization was only half of its message. Posthumous names for rulers also reveal alternate, patterned ways in which individual reigns were conceived and represented. Daoist symbols were used; some rulers presented themselves as servants of the Buddha. Finally, the new palace-cities of Fujiwara-kyo - and Heijo-kyo - were designed to give spatial expression to the nature of politico-religious rule. This paper analyzes the plurality of these symbolics centered on the Tenmu dynasty. Discussant: Davie Lurie (Columbia)
