# Japan: Its History, Arts, and Literature/Volume 7/Chapter 2

Chapter II
JAPANESE APPLIED ART
First Period — From Early Times to the End of the Eighth Century
There are proofs that the ancient Japanese attached much importance to industrial occupations. It is not possible, indeed, to speak with confidence as to the quality of their manufactures except in so far as the contents of burial mounds convey information. But history seems to indicate that the early settlers, the progenitors of the Japanese proper, were an industrial people rather than an agricultural; for whereas the records are almost silent on the subject of farming, they contain many references to handicrafts. It would appear that the whole of the people, apart from the administrative and military classes, were engaged solely in industrial pursuits, and that there existed a species of tribal division founded on differences of occupation. Thus the annals speaks of yuge-be (bow-makers); yahagi-be (arrow-makers); tatenui-be (shield-stitchers); kura-tsukuri-be (saddlers); ori-be, hatori-be and kinu-be (weavers and tailors); ko-taukmi (carpenters); kanu-be (blacksmiths); nuri-be (lacquerers); ishi-tsukuri (stone-cutters); and hashi-be (bridge builders). The number and variety of these organisations are alone sufficient to imply a tolerably advanced state of industrial activity, although the skill possessed by the artisans can​not have been of a uniformly high order. Occupations were hereditary, and it thus resulted that families generally bore the names of the industries they prosecuted. Over each organisation a chief presided, his title being Tomo-no-Miyatsuko (corporation master) or Tomo-no-O (corporation head). But these artisans evidently did not receive much public consideration. They generally formed part of a noble's household, and occupied there a position not greatly better than that of vassals in whom their patrons enjoyed a right of property. Not until the fifth century of the Christian era were they released from this state of bondage and granted the status of ordinary subjects.
The testimony of written records and that of relics exhumed from sepulchres indicate that the Japanese passed through two periods, a bronze age and an iron age. As to the time when the former commenced, it seems certain that the art of casting bronze, remote as was its origin on the Asiatic continent, did not lie within the knowledge of the aboriginal inhabitants of Japan, but was brought thither by immigrants from the mainland; that is to say, by the progenitors of the Japanese proper. It follows that the oldest bronze castings in Japan do not date from a period more remote than the sixth century, or, perhaps, the seventh before the Christian era, and that no special title to antiquity can be set up on their behalf as compared with corresponding works in various other countries.
On the other hand, if the Japanese cannot claim any distinguished antiquity for their knowledge of the art of bronze casting, they can certainly claim to have escaped any period of art degradation such as that ​through which Europe passed after the destruction of the Roman Empire. While Occidental nations now in the van of civilisation were still awaiting the impulse from Byzantium which in the middle of the tenth century inspired their earliest achievements in artistic metal work, the Japanese were busily producing many masterpieces of sculpture and metallurgy. The continuity of her artistic capacity thus becomes a notable feature of Japan's story. Her record is practically unbroken, and the progress of her art motives and methods can be studied in uninterrupted series during some fifteen centuries.
Throughout a period of four or five hundred years after the advent of the immigrants mentioned above, bronze apparently continued to be the sole metal used in the country, and the only purposes it served were the manufacture of sword-blades and arrow-tips. Many bronze swords have been found in the barrows which formed the resting-places of the dead in those early ages. They are straight, two-edged weapons, some having a hilt of more or less elaborate workmanship cast in one piece with the blade; others having hafts, or tangs, presumably for passing into wooden hilts. These castings were made in stone moulds, a few of which still survive in Japan, though their antiquity is, of course, a matter of conjecture. Arrow-heads are found associated with the swords, but no ornamental castings of any kind have been discovered, and it may reasonably be conjectured that none such existed.
From about the second century before the Christian era, iron began to be applied to purposes hitherto served by bronze, and, at the same time, evidences ​are afforded of a higher type of civilisation; for not only are the simple burial barrows of the first settlers replaced by megalithic dolmens and highly specialised forms of chambered tumuli, but also a decorative tendency is displayed in the application of thin sheets of copper, coated with gold, to the handles of swords and to the bits and trappings of horses. From the time when the Japanese learned the uses of iron, they abandoned bronze as a material for sword blades, though they continued to employ it for casting arrowheads. Spears with iron heads were now added to their weapons of war, and they began to cast bronze mirrors (kagami) and small bells (suzu). Mirrors had their origin abroad; they came either from China or Korea. The form of the imported specimens was a circular disc, with or without a handle, the face polished and quicksilvered, the back covered with decorative designs in relief, the character of which as well as the quality of the casting indicated a degree of artistic and technical skill beyond immediate attainment by the Japanese. But within a brief period these foreign models were rivalled and even surpassed by purely Japanese castings.
As for the bells of that early epoch, they are peculiar objects, without any exact counterpart in foreign countries, so far as is known. Hollow spheroids, with a slight cut in the lower part, they contained a piece of metal, or of some other hard substance, to serve as a tongue; and they were cast in groups of three or five round the rim of a metal plate, having a tang which served to attach it, as an ornamental appendage, to horse trappings, ceremonial robes, or hilts of swords, or to fasten it to a wooden staff which was carried in the hand and shaken so as ​to produce cymbal-like notes. These little bells were often plated with gold, and occasionally they were cast with a decorative design in relief. Their use as pendants for ornamental purposes corresponds with a similar employment of the well-known maga-tama (bent jewels), or crescent-shaped pieces of steatite, jasper, quartz, or other stones, which were attached to garments, trappings, musical instruments, and sword-hilts by the ancient Japanese, and of which numerous specimens may be seen in any collection of Far Eastern antiquities.
Among the early iron castings of Japan there are objects whose use remains to this day uncertain. At first sight they suggest the idea of bells, their shape being that of a truncated pyramid, with two ribbon-like flanges running up the sides and arched over the top so as to afford a means of suspension. The surface is usually divided by vertical and horizontal bands in relief, and groups of circular discs protrude from the flanges at regular intervals. There is great variety of dimensions, some being as small as an inch in height, others as large as five and one-half feet; in every case the thinness of the metal is remarkable,—one-sixteenth of an inch, for example, where the height of the object is fifty-four inches and the diameter at the base twenty inches,—and the workmanship indicates considerable skill. These curious objects are found buried in the earth in the provinces of Yamato, Kawachi, and Totomi, localities which help to connect them with the early Japanese immigrants. There are no indications that they served as bells, and the great thinness of the metal is in itself sufficient to preclude that theory. Since, further, they belong to a period prior to the intro​duction of Buddhism, they cannot be supposed to have been part of temple paraphernalia. Perhaps the most tenable supposition is that they served for the external decoration of the first buildings made in Japan after Chinese models, having been suspended from the corners of the eaves in the manner of the bell-shaped pendants of pagodas. Already in the seventh century of the Christian era they had become antiquities, and it seems natural to infer that the fashion, architectural or otherwise, with which their employment was connected, went out of vogue in the first or second century. Occasionally there are cast upon the surfaces of these bells decorative designs indicating a very crude stage of pictorial art; for example, figures even more rudimentary in outline than the conventional sketches of ancient Egypt.
There is evidence that by the time of the Emperor Nitoku (313–399) considerable skill had been developed in the use of bronze, iron, and gold for decorative purpose. Gold plating was applied with dexterity to bronze and iron alike; decoration not without delicacy and grace appears upon the hilts of swords, and cleverly conceived motives, modelled and chiselled with ability, are seen upon the pommels,—motives indicating that the artists of that early epoch had passed the stage of merely copying natural objects and had learned to conventionalise them. Helmets formed of numerous thin iron plates riveted together and overlaid with gold, had bands of incised ornamentation and peaks chiselled à jour, and were altogether objects of fine workmanship, though the incised ornamentation—conventionalised fishes, birds, and animals, enclosed by borders of undulating lines—showed very imperfect command of the graving-​tool, and gave no earnest of the remarkable ability that Japanese artists were destined ultimately to display in this line. Reference must also be made to delicate cable-pattern gold chains with leaf-shaped pendants and pearl ornaments, objects of which the use has not been clearly divined, though the generally received idea is that they were suspended from the helmet. It is thus seen that, on the whole, the Japanese metal-worker of the fourth century was a handicraftsman of no mean skill, though the applications of his art had a narrow range.
The advent of Buddhism in the sixth century introduced a new standard of art conception, though commensurate attainment did not immediately follow. After the year 552 religious statues began to arrive from Korea in some numbers, and these, as well as the bronze images modelled in Japan during the next sixty or seventy years, show sculpture which has not yet fully emerged from its primitive stage. Not only are traces of the chisel shallow and uncertain, but the facial expression of the deities and their poses are mechanical and lifeless. It is easy to see that the tools available were rudimentary, the sculptor apparently being provided with nothing better than a straight chisel. The relationship of these statues to the rude stone-images of early and mediæval Japan is unmistakable. There is in both alike the same geometrically formal disposition of the drapery, offering no suggestion of the great skill subsequently acquired by Japanese sculptors in the representation of still life, and the method of construction is that practised by the metal-workers of all countries in the initial stage of their art, namely, casting or beating by the repoussé process into the required ​shape two thin plates of metal, one for the back, the other for the front, of the projected figure, and subsequently riveting them together at the edges. Many examples of a similar style of workmanship are seen in Korea, and confirmation is thus incidentally furnished of the tradition which assigns to Korean artists the credit of having been Japan's original instructors in the sculpture of religious images. Yet no name of any of these Korean teachers has been preserved. The first sculptor mentioned in Japanese annals is Shiba Tachito, a Chinese immigré, who is said to have come to Japan in the year 560 A.D., and to have received from the Emperor the title of kuratsukuri no obito, or head architect. His son, Shiba Tasu-na, succeeded to the office, and it is recorded that many sacred effigies were chiselled in wood either by these artists thenselves or under their instruction. They also superintended the building of Buddhist temples which, though solid and imposing edifices, did not, at that remote era, receive the wealth of interior decoration in glyptic work, lacquering and painting, for which Buddhist places of worship subsequently became remarkable. No authenticated specimens of sculpture by either Shiba Tachi-to or Shiba Tasu-na are now in existence, but from the time of Shiba Tori, grandson of Shiba Tachi-to, credible examples survive. This sculptor, generally known as Tori Busshi, attained extraordinary fame. His skill, which seems to have completely overshadowed that of his contemporaries or predecessors, receives from posterity a significant tribute, namely, that every fine carving possessing any claim to great antiquity is habitually ascribed to him by ignorant people, and some have not even hesitated to regard him as the painter of ​a fine example of mural decoration at the temple Horyu-ji, though such a theory is untenable. History first speaks of Shiba Tori in connection with three images which he carved in wood to order of the Emperor Yomei, in the year 586 A.D.; namely, an effigy of Shaka, sixteen feet high, with two attendant Bodhisattvas of smaller dimensions. These were placed in a temple specially built for their reception at Minabuchi, the temple and the images being an offering to invoke heaven's healing grace for the sick Sovereign. No vestige of these sculptures remains. Shiba Tori is also said to have chiselled many wooden images to order of the Emperor Yomei's son, Prince Shotoku—remembered by posterity as Shotoku Taishi. Shotoku never came to the throne. He filled the post of regent during the reign of the Empress Suiko (563–628). The earliest Japanese historiographer and Buddhist commentator, he left an unequalled reputation for learning, piety, and statesmanship, and among all the factors making for the spread of Buddhism in that era, his influence had probably most efficacy. Many sculptures in wood, said to be from his chisel, are preserved at various places in Japan, but there is reason to think that a majority of them are apocryphal. One, however, is regarded as authentic by connoisseurs. It is a statue of Kwannon, the goddess of mercy, six and a half feet high, its comparatively defective technique redeemed by considerable grace of pose and passionless refinement of feature. Shiba Tori's work, of which fully authenticated examples are preserved in the temple Horiu-ji, betrays greatly inferior development of artistic instinct, his images being squat, ill-proportioned, and deficient in dignity. They are apparently Chinese modifications of Indian ​types. Contrasted with these figures, Shotoku's Kwannon shows that already at this early period Japanese genius had begun to break away from the mechanical formalism of Korea. On the other hand, as might be expected from the evidence of objects found in dolmens, the decorative metal work of Prince Shotoku's time is of a more advanced character than the sculptor's art. The halos of sacred effigies and the ornaments attached to objects of temple furniture or used for the decoration of the temples themselves, show considerable skill in chiselling à jour as well as in repoussé, and the designs indicate an already advanced conception of decorative motives as well as a just sense of proportion and orderly arrangement. Notable among illustrative specimens is a pendant of gilt bronze destined originally to hang from the ceiling of the temple Horiu-ji. It is 6.96 metres long, and consists of six sections united by hinges, each section having a pierced design of plants, flowers, clouds, and emblems, the whole constituting a fine piece of decorative work.
From the second half of the seventh century progress became very marked, and, at the same time, the character of the sculpture suggests emancipation from Korean influence and closer approach to Chinese, with evident elements of Indian style, as is under- stood by recalling that China under the Tang dynasty had very intimate relations with India. The history of the epoch furnishes an explanation of these changes, for it tells that Japan's intercourse with China became altogether direct without any Korean intervention. But although, on the one hand, the sculptor evidently feels Indo-Grecian inspiration, although the winged steeds and griffins of Assyria ​make their appearance in decorative schemes, as do also conventionalised plants and foliage, especially the acanthus, and although the wide inter-relations of Asiatic countries and their occasional contact even with Greece and Rome find evident expression, on the other hand, the realistic and grace-loving genius of the Japanese begins to show itself very distinctly. Many authenticated relics of the period survive. They indicate a development of technical skill scarcely credible by comparison with the rudimentary essays of the preceding cycle, and they indicate also a conception of majestic beauty wholly unpredicted by any examples of earlier statuary, except, perhaps, the Kwannon of Prince Shotoku. It is to this epoch that posterity owes two groups of bronze statues justly regarded with admiration. One is the three Amidas of Koriu-ji; the other Yakushi and his two acolytes in the temple Yakushi-ji. Comparatively small figures,—0.32 metre in height,—the central effigy of the three Amidas is seated, the two others stand on lotus flowers, the stalks of which rise from a dais having for background a reredos on which Buddhist figures are cast in medium relief. This remarkably graceful and beautiful object is technically far superior to anything of the previous epoch, and the majestically benign repose that pervades the figures belongs to a high range of artistic conception. It is known that these statues were executed by order of Tachibana, spouse of the Emperor Tenchi (668–671), but the name of their artist has not been preserved. The Yakushi group is of even greater excellence. Its central figure (Bhaichadjya-guru)—4.25 metres in height—is seated on a dais, also of bronze, the faces of which have demons cast in relief ​and the borders are decorated with dragons, swans, phoenixes, tortoises, serpents, and vine-scrolls. The Sun and Moon effigies stand on either side. They measure 3.94 metres with the lotus flowers that form their pedestals. There is no question about the essentially Grecian type of the faces of this group; and the spirit and vigour of the work show that the wave of Occidental culture which flowed into China during the period of the Six Dynasties reached Japan also and found there more faithful interpreters than those of China herself. A popular fallacy, endorsed by more than one writer, describes the materials of these figures as shakudo,—an ebony-like compound peculiar to Japan,—but shakudo had not yet been invented; the images are of dark bronze.
The statues of this period are no longer composed of two repoussé plates fastened together at the edges: they are cast by the cire-perdue process. In the preceding epoch earthen moulds were used, but the Japanese had now become acquainted with the incomparably more effective method of a wax shell. That alone constitutes a remarkable advance in technical knowledge,—an advance made, doubtless, under Chinese instruction,—and the statues described above show further that the users of the chisel had become very skilled, all the details of the figures themselves, of the drapery, and of the accessories being worked out forcibly and with artistic feeling.
The only sculptors of this period whose names are remembered are Oguchi, Kimara, Yakushi, and Kanashi, but as none of their works has been identified, little interest attaches to the names.
Early Japanese sculpture reached its first culminating period in the eighth century; that is to say, the ​century immediately subsequent to the era of Tori, Ouchi, Shotoku, and the unknown modellers of the three Amidas and the Yakushi Trinity just described. Among the masters who illumined this golden era the names are recorded of Gyogi, a Buddhist priest immortalised by his contributions to every branch of material progress in his time; Hien Wantsz, whose nationality is uncertain, some calling him a Korean, some an Indian, and some a Chinese; Kimimaro, the founder of a colossal effigy of Buddha, the well-known "Nara Dai-Butsu," which stands in the temple Todai-ji; the three artists, Takaichi Makuni, Takaichi Mamaro, and Kakino Moto-no-Otoma, who assisted Kimimaro in his great work, and finally, two brothers, Keibunkai and Keibunkomi, generally known in their time as the Kasuga sculptors, since they came from a district called Kasuga-mura.
Speaking broadly, the eighth century is remembered by Japanese students as the "Nara epoch," because the custom previously observed of changing the capital with each change of sovereign was abandoned at the beginning of that century, and Nara continued to be the residence of the Court through seven generations. Comparatively little is known of the Nara Palace, though many of the articles and ornaments used by its inmates survive in a celebrated collection which during nearly twelve hundred years has been preserved in a storehouse connected with the Shōsō-in at that place. But some of the seven massive and beautiful temples erected in the days of the city's greatness stand still intact, and their graceful proportions, together with the sculptures and paintings they contain, speak eloquently of a refined and even luxurious civilisation. Nothing is more re​markablc about the Nara epoch than the vigorous growth of the Buddhist creed. Throughout the reign of all the Sovereigns that held their Court there, no expenditure was thought excessive in the service of religion. All the artistic resources of the time were devoted to the embellishment and furnishing of the temples. The priests attached so much importance to art as a means of appealing to the emotional side of human nature, that several of the greatest among them were themselves skilled painters and sculptors, contributing even more to the material and artistic development of their time than to its moral elevation. It may, indeed, be truly said, that the spread of Buddhism was synchronous with the rise of art and science in Japan. Carpenters, from the practice acquired in building temples, learned how to construct large edifices; sculptors and metallurgists became skilful by casting or graving idols of bronze, wood, and gold; painting, decorative weaving, the ornamentation of utensils, and the illumination of missals owed their expert achievement to the patronage and instruction of Buddhist monks; almost the first real impetus given to the potter's art is associated with the name of a priest,—in short, nearly every branch of industrial and artistic development stood more or less indebted to the influence of the creed. It is impossible to endorse the verdict of Japanese critics when they hold Buddhism responsible for decadence and retrogression which in reality marked, not the evil effects of the creed itself or of its propagandism, but a temporary diminution of its beneficent influence. Many abuses grew out of the arrogance, avarice, and ambition of the priests towards the close of the Nara epoch, ​but nothing could efface the work they had already achieved.
In his conception of an ancient Japanese Imperial city like Nara, the reader must not be guided by Western models. He must not imagine a vast agglomeration of buildings, warehouses, stores, theatres, residences, hotels, and so forth, from which the Palace is separated by its surrounding park. He must rather conceive two entirely independent towns: the one composed of lowly wooden cottages, clustered closely together and sheltering an industrious, cheerful, but profoundly humble population; the other an assemblage of structures colossal by comparison, the temples of the gods, looking out upon beautiful landscapes, and sheltered by hills that slope softly downward to crystal lakes, forest glades, and parterres of glowing blossom. In this second, or sacred, city stood the Palace, and the gulf that divided the quietly toiling plebeians in the one quarter from the nobles and courtiers in the other was bridged only by the benevolence and philanthropy of the Buddhist priests. To be prosperous in business here, to be relieved hereafter from the pain of perpetual inferiority,—these were the blessings that the commoner associated with piety, while for the upper classes it meant successful sway, victory in arms, and prosperity.
One notable result of this religious fervour was that the sculptor's chisel found perpetual employment in producing images for the seven great temples erected at Nara and for other scarcely less important edifices in the surrounding provinces. The art of sculpture thus reached its apogee in fertility of conception and beauty of execution. Hundreds of specimens survive from the epoch, and it becomes possible to speak of ​its productions with considerable confidence. The proportions of the various figures, their attitudes and their draperies show great fidelity of observation; the faces have a character of combined majesty and serenity; the technique is generally excellent, and the artists have succeeded in effecting a happy union of idealism and realism. Wood carvings of really fine type make their appearance now for the first time, and the epoch is also remarkable not only for colossal castings such as no other Oriental country has produced, but also for statues in clay and in dry lacquer.
The clay statues, sun-dried, not baked in a furnace, were modelled on a wooden core wrapped in straw which carried a coating of earth and boiled rice. For the surface work the material employed was potter's clay and talc, and to the finished figure colours were applied. It is not improbable that the idea of such a method was suggested by the cire-perdue process of casting. But although very fine results were obtained during the Nara epoch, modelling in clay was not much practised in later times, and ultimately the fashion became limited to keramists and puppet-makers.
The dry-lacquer process presented many difficulties and demanded great care. Two methods are described by Japanese writers. In one, the upper part of the statue having been modelled in clay, a hollow mould was taken from it, and into this was poured a coating of fine lacquer destined to form the outside of the figure. Into the interior, lacquer of gradually increasing thickness was run in layers, and the statue, having been ultimately drawn from the mould, was overlaid with a composition of incense, leaves, and bark of the Illicium religiosum (shikimi), ​dried and reduced to powder, decayed earth from the bed of a pond, and potter's clay. The head and torso thus constructed were then fixed on a wooden frame wrapped in cloth, and finally the arms and legs, having been modelled independently, were fastened in position with lacquer. The second method was much simpler. In this the sculptor commenced by chiselling a statue in wood, to which he applied a coat of tolerably coarse lacquer, and then a layer of cotton material, on which, finally, a coat of fine lacquer was superposed. Delicate work was not possible by this second process.
At the head of all the sculptures of the eighth century it is usual to place a huge bronze image of Lochāna Buddha, known as the "Nara Dai-Butsu." It certainly deserves that distinction in some respects, for it is fifty- three feet high, and the difficulty of making such a casting must have been immense. But however beautifully proportioned the colossal idol may have been originally, clumsy restorations in the sequel of conflagrations and other accidents have so marred it that it can no longer be compared with many smaller examples of contemporary sculpture. The intellectual energy and technical resources of the artist that conceived and executed such a work command admiration, but the measure of artistic success he attained is now a matter of conjecture only. Other specimens of the time convey fuller information. A series of clay statuettes preserved in the temple Hōryu-ji show, in a very marked degree, evidence of the humour for which Japanese sculpture became famous many hundred years subsequently; humour which is conspicuously absent in the works of China and Korea alike. On a much higher plane of art, ​however, stand four clay statues of the Deva Kings, which are among the treasured relics of Tōdai-ji. Trampling on the demons they have subdued, the faces of the four Devas display four different phases of combat, from fierce defiance and strong effort to stern resolve and calm triumph; their attitudes are modelled in consonance with these moods; the details of their armour and costume are skilfully rendered, and their proportions betray no anatomical errors. Even greater force of conception is attributed by Japanese connoisseurs to a clay statue of Shikongō (Vadjrapāni), belonging also to the gallery of the eighth century and kept in the same temple, Tōdai-ji. This statue has suffered much from the effects of time, and the condition of its right arm greatly impairs the general effect; but such as it is, it certainly deserves much of the praise bestowed on it since the public began to discover that early Japanese statuary merits attention. Among eighth-century works in dry lacquer, undoubtedly the most notable are the Hokke-do Trinity, by the priest Rōben. These figures present a marked contrast to the four Devas and the Shikongō mentioned above. Brahma and Indra, whose effigies form the acolytes of the group, are shown in an attitude of prayer, the expression of the faces majestically and profoundly serene, and even the folds of their garments modelled so as to accentuate the idea of passionless piety. A wide interval separated these figures from the conventional Indian deity which threatened at first to impose its type upon the Japanese sculptor. There is here nothing whatever of the curiously modelled torso, the massive sensuous cast of features, and the jewelled tiara which some of the earliest Japanese sculptures ​recall. The one fault is excessive breadth of shoulders and consequent lack of grace. As to statues carved in wood, the most celebrated is that of the Eleven-faced Kwannon preserved in the temple Hokke-ji. Nine of the eleven faces form a circlet for the head of the goddess, and are divided into groups of three, one group smiling, the second ironical, and the third gentle; and placed above them all is a somewhat larger head breathing perfect calm. There has been attributed to this statue extreme beauty of composition and execution; but the very obvious faults of ill-proportioned limbs, a squat figure, and somewhat clumsily chiselled drapery disqualify the statue for such applause. It shows, indeed, little superiority to the bronze Kwannon of Yakushi-ji, cast about a century earlier.
If any confident judgment may be based on the articles in the Shōsō-in collection, it would appear that the applied art of Japan had already reached a high stage of development in the eighth century. The collection comprises more than three thousand specimens,—bells, swords, mirrors, desks, musical instruments, censers, objects of virtu, articles of costume, chess-boards, vases, glass utensils, tissues, paintings, books, and reliquaries. Many of them exhibit workmanship of remarkable delicacy and skill; so much so that a certain measure of credulity is required on the part of any one attributing them to Japanese artists and artisans. Yet when, in the year 756, the Emperor Shomu donated a majority of these objects to the temple Tōdai-ji, they were accompanied by a list in which it was recorded that several swords and screens were Chinese and that a reliquary and a screen were Korean, the inference obviously suggested being ​that all the rest were Japanese. If that deduction be warranted, the Japanese of the eighth century could do these things: they could sculpture metal delicately and minutely, using a number of chisels and burins, and thus showing a long step of progress from the sixth-century time of few and ineffective implements; they could inlay metals with mother-of-pearl and amber; they could apply cloisonné decoration to objects of gold, the cloisons being of silver and somewhat clumsy; they could work skilfully in lacquer, black, and golden; they could encrust gold with jewels; they could chisel metal in designs à jour or in the round, both with much skill; they could cast bronze by the cire-perdue process, showing detailed work as clear as though it had been finished with the chisel; they could encrust wood with ivory, plain or coloured, and inlay it with mother-of-pearl, gold, or silver; they could weave rich brocades; they could paint decorative or pictorial designs on wood, overlaying them with translucid varnish which preserved the colours fresh for centuries; and they could manufacture coloured glass. The difficulty which the student encounters in assigning these beautiful objects to Japanese artists is that in not one instance do the decorative designs bear a purely Japanese character, and that in many instances they are essentially Chinese, Indian, or Persian. It is of course conceivable that Japanese decorative artists may not yet have emerged from the copying stage, and that they borrowed motives frankly and faithfully from foreign sources. But, on the other hand, if these objects had been of native production, would the Nara Court have placed them among the treasures of the principal temple? It seems more reasonable to believe ​that they were rare articles of foreign provenance, and that they indicate nothing beyond the refined taste of the Japanese of that epoch.
Two specimens of art workmanship may, however, be specially referred to as indisputably illustrative of eighth-century Japanese skill. One is a gong framed in the coils of four dragons, which rise from entwining a pillar poised on the back of a Dog of Fo, the whole in bronze; the other is a richly lacquered drum, set in a frame of gilt bronze chiselled à jour in a design of dragons and phoenixes, and surmounted by a radiant sun. The Japanese obtained the dragon and the Dog of Fo (shishi) from China, as well as the idea of using the latter by way of pedestal; but there are points about this beautifully designed bronze gong which prove its Japanese provenance, and the central decorative scheme on the lacquered drum—a triple combination of the male and female principles—is essentially Japanese. To the makers of such objects a high degree of artistic and technical attainment must be conceded, though there is not sufficient reason to credit them with the varied exercise of skill shown by the Shōsō-in specimens.
Among Japanese commentators and antiquarians there is a tendency, followed by several foreign students also, to detect strong traces of Chinese and Korean influence in the works described above, and even to attribute some of the best of them to Korean or Chinese sculptors. But before accepting such a theory this question has to be answered: If a Korean or a Chinese expert working in Japan before the close of the eighth century was capable of modelling figures like the four Deva Kings and the Brahma of Tōdai-ji, why did none of the numerous Chinese and ​Korean sculptors who worked to meet the demands of the Buddhist religion in their own countries, succeed in producing a single masterpiece comparable with these effigies? Tradition is so confident about the debt owed by Japan's artists to the neighbouring continental countries that the broad fact may not be doubted, especially as there are internal evidences of its partial truth. But the amount of the borrowing is open to query. It is contrary to the suggestions of reason or the teachings of precedent that countries supposed to have been the parents and teachers of a particular art as well as the fields of its earnest exercise through long centuries, should not be able to show any products of that art corresponding with the admirable examples attributed to their emigrant experts working under alien patronage in a neighbouring island. Such was not the case in the field of pictorial art, nor yet in that of keramics, nor yet in that of textile fabrics, and the apparent inference with regard to sculpture is that, though the Japanese obtained technical instruction from their continental neighbours, and motives from the creed which the latter were instrumental in propagating, their own genius soon carried the practice of the art beyond the range of Chinese or Korean conception.
Before pursuing the historical sequence of the development of the sculptor's art in Japan, some special subjects must be briefly discussed.
The chiselling of stone images was practised by the Japanese from an early period of their art history, but it does not seem possible to determine with even approximate accuracy the date when this class of work had its origin. Nor is there much to encourage research. Japanese sculptures in stone have always ​been of very mediocre quality, not for an instant supporting comparison with the studies in marble bequeathed to the world by the ancient Greeks. Should time have in store for Japan vicissitudes such as overtook the prehistoric world of the West, it is not difficult to imagine that some race of explorers, thirty or forty centuries hence, discovering the stupendous masonry and the huge granite blocks of the Tōkyō and Ōsaka castles, may draw an inference similar to that suggested by the ruins of Tirynth and its sister cities of Argolis, and may conclude that japan was once inhabited by a race of giants. But they certainly will not find anything to suggest that the men who applied granite to such colossal uses understood the value of the imperishable material suggested by Nature herself as a medium for transmitting artistic conceptions to posterity. The most reasonable explanation of the inferiority shown by the Japanese in this respect is that the quality of the stone generally available in their country defied any fine exercise of glyptic skill. Japan is not without stores of good marble, which are now beginning to be successfully utilised for purposes of sculpture. But in remote ages their existence does not appear to have been suspected, and the artist, being supplied only with granite and coarse sandstone, was not encouraged to attempt work inconsistent with the quality of the material. Some critics maintain, indeed, that the technical difficulties attending sculpture in stone proved insuperable to the Japanese. But such a theory can scarcely be reconciled with the singular ability they showed in bringing still more refractory substances within artistic control. Further, the evidence furnished by their ancient tombs shows that, in ​times as remote as the beginning of the Christian era, they knew how to hew stones and join them into the forms of sarcophagi, so perfect in shape that some of them, when exhumed in later epochs, were regarded as palanquins in which demigods had ridden, or as boats in which they had sailed the seas during the age of Japan's government by divine beings. Still more conclusive proof of ability to fashion stone into given shapes is afforded by objects for personal adornment found in these tombs,—carved jewels (maga-tama) of agate or jadeite; tubular jewels (kuda-tama) of light green stone; hexagonal jewels (kiriko-dama), and triple-ring jewels (mitsuwa-dama) of quartz; and already in the fourth century of the Christian era, one of the sections of artificers employed by the Government had the name of Tamatsukuri-be, or sculptors of ornamental minerals. In the face of these facts it is impossible to doubt that the cutting, shaping, and polishing of stone fell well within the competence of Japanese artisans in very early times, and that had they recognised it as a material suitable for sculpturing objects of high art, technical difficulties would not have deterred them.
In China and Korea the custom of erecting huge memorial tablets of marble or granite existed in ancient ages. But the Japanese were slow to adopt it, and never reconciled themselves to the use of ornamental sculpture on such objects. History contains a poem attributed to that personage of somewhat apocryphal achievements, the Empress Jingo (201–269 A.D.), in which words occur indicating apparently that a stone monument was set up to the deity Sukuna. But the first unequivocal record of stone sculpture is found in the annals of the Emperor Keitei's reign ​(507–531 A.D.), when there flourished in Chikushi a local magnate remarkable for his extravagant style of life and ultimately for rebelling against the Imperial authority. It is stated that he adopted the Chinese custom of causing a grand tomb to be erected for himself, and that he collected a number of skilled workers in stone for the purpose. Encircling and guarding the tomb were placed sixty stone effigies of warriors each seven feet high and each with a stone shield planted beside him. In a recess on the south of the tomb a figure was set up representing a judge, before whom a naked culprit kneeled to receive sentence for stealing four wild-boars, which also were sculptured in the same material, and close at hand stood three horses with a background of two stone edifices. Some traces of this elaborate monument remain, but even in their complete absence the record is sufficiently explicit to show that the chiselling of natural objects in stone was understood at that remote time, though the manner of applying the art was alien, and its products were probably very crude. Moreover, after the abolition of the barbarous customs of burying alive the chief vassals of a prince or noble at the time of his interment,—a reform effected at about the commencement of the Christian era,—images of stone were sometimes used as substitutes for these living sacrifices, though in ordinary cases rudely shaped effigies of sun-dried clay were deemed sufficient. Excavations recently made near the tumulus of the Emperor Kimmei (540–571 A.D.) brought to light a number of stone images of men and animals, and similar objects have been found buried at other places under circumstances which suggest great antiquity. But not one of the specimens hitherto found ​indicates that the sculptor aimed at beauty of form or accuracy of proportion, and it need scarcely be added that none of them had any direct connection with religious rites, for the deities of the Shinto cult, which alone prevailed in Japan in those times, were never represented in effigy. In comparatively modern eras, when it became the habit to erect over the resting-places of the dead handsome bronze monuments and to surround them with stone fences, the chisels of great glyptic artists were sometimes employed to cut upon the pedestals of these monuments, or on the panels of gates giving access to their enclosures, scenes of religious import, such as the entry of Buddha into Nirvana or episodes from the careers of the Arhats. But these were quite exceptional applications of glyptic art.
The use of stone for sculpturing Buddhist idols commenced in the reign of the Emperor Bidatsu when (585 A.D.) two envoys whom he had sent to Korea brought back a stone effigy of the Buddhist deity, Miroku. From that time, whenever images had to be erected in the open air, stone seems to have suggested itself as a suitable material, and the traveller in Japan often sees, set up by the roadside or enshrined at the elbow of a mountain track, little stone images of Jizo (K'shitigarbha), the protecting deity of wayfarers, the gentle god who encourages unhappy children in purgatory to pile up pebbles until the heap shall be high enough to raise them to the plains of the blessed. Scarcely less frequent are effigies of foxes seated on pedestals before the rustic shrine of Inari, the god of food, where the peasant prays for rich harvests. But none of these objects deserves attention as a specimen of sculpture. They ​are mere suggestions. Eloquence of form did not enter into the thought of the humble mason that hewed them, nor, indeed, did their purpose or their surroundings usually encourage any fine effort of art.
The perception of the Japanese is nothing if not congruous. He has an instinctive sense of the fitness of things within his own range of experience, and it would seem to him a solecism to erect a delicately chiselled, elaborately ornamented image among the mosses and shadows of a forest or the dust and contamination of a roadside. When, however, a stone carving was destined to form part of the entourage of an important temple or mausoleum, greater care was bestowed on its modelling. It then usually took the form of the Kara-shishi (Chinese lion, i.e. Dog of Fo), to which the Japanese sculptor often succeeds in imparting an aspect of much vigour and vitality.
The Emperor Gotoba, in the year 1187, had a pair of stone shishi chiselled to stand inside the inner gate of the temple Todai-ji at Nara, and effigies of two Bodhisattvas and the four Heavenly Kings, also in stone, to stand within the building. It is recorded that he entrusted the execution of this work to a Chinese sculptor, Lo Ku, who was assisted by three Japanese. Lo pointed out that the stone procurable in Japan was not fitted for the purpose of fine sculpture, and the Emperor caused stone to be imported from China at a cost of about £3,000.
There are preserved in a cave at the back of the temple Nippon-ji, in Awa province, fifty-three stone erfigies of Buddhas, said to have been sculptured in the days of the Emperors Shomu (724–748 A.D.) and Heizei (806–809 A.D.), and these were supplemented, in ​1775, a thousand figures, namely, five hundred Buddhas and five hundred Arhats, the whole constituting the most numerous assemblage of stone images in Japan. Many other ishi-botoke, as a stone Buddha is called, may be seen here and there throughout the country, but the general verdict with regard to them all is that they cannot be described as objects of art. The experience of the Emperor Gotoba shows that want of good stone was fatal to the development of sculpture in that material, and in any case it is not improbable that the Japanese glyptic artist would always have preferred metal and wood, as better adapted to the wooden temples he was invited to people with images. Indeed this latter consideration may have been paramount. It is easy to conceive that had the Parthenon been constructed with pine or the temples on the Acropolis of Selinus with oak, posterity would not have inherited marble pediments or tufa metopes.
Wooden Statue of Manjusri.
The renowned Bodhisattva. By Unkei. 1180-1220.
From the remarkable cleanness of casting shown by some of these mirrors, it has been inferred that the cire-perdue process was employed by their makers. But that is exceedingly doubtful. As to the reflecting surface, though probably obtained at first by polishing alone, it soon came to be coated with an amalgam of tin and quicksilver, and as Japan had no quicksilver of her own, she must have had recourse to China, or ​to Korea, China's pupil. The same information is furnished by the gilding and silvering found on copper plates which formed decorative adjuncts of sword-hilts and horse-trappings from the beginning of the iron age (200 B.C.). Hence it may be affirmed on the evidence furnished by relics of art industry that, in the first or second century before the Christian era, Japan was in contact with Chinese or Korean civilisation, and that she learned from one of her continental neighbours the process of obtaining reflective surfaces by means of mercury.
The Japanese mirror attracted much attention at one time among foreigners, owing to a curious property it sometimes possessed, namely, that the pattern on the back was reflected by the polished surface in front. The effect was best seen by double reflection,—that is to say, when light cast on the surface of the mirror was reflected on some other flat surface. So strange did this feature seem that it received the epithet "magical," and for many years it was considered the "correct thing" that every collector should include a Japanese "magic mirror" among his treasures. Of course the Japanese themselves knew that their mirror possessed this property, but they did not understand it and did not indulge in many conjectures about a phenomenon which seemed inexplicable. So soon, however, as the scientist of the West approached the problem, he discovered a simple solution. It is a structural accident. When a mirror, laid face upwards, is subjected to pressure by the hand of the artisan polishing its surface, it necessarily rests on the salient points of the arabesque or other design that decorates the reverse, ​and the portions of the face lying in the interstices of these points become more or less depressed, so that light falling on the surface is broken up and unevenly reflected. Dr. Anderson has suggested that the "magical" feature has another explanation; namely, that the contraction of the fused metal when cooling in the mould was influenced by the comparative thickness or thinness due to the convexities and concavities of the pattern. That is probable enough, but it has been demonstrated by experiment that the property in question can be produced at will, by a process founded on the former theory. The Japanese, whether manufacturers or users of these mirrors, never regarded their freaks of reflection as an admirable quality, and Western virtuosi might wisely adopt the same attitude towards the phenomenon.
Japan's temple bells deserve notice for many reasons,—not the bell-like objects of thin cast iron found buried in the ground in certain provinces, objects whose purpose has never been clearly ascertained, but the bronze bells actually used as such from the eighth century onward. The metallic voices that summon worshippers in the West can seldom be counted sounds of gentleness and harmony. Even cathedral carillons of Europe and America have too often a clash and a clang little suggestive of "the peace that passeth understanding." But the tsuri-gane (suspended bell) of Japan gives forth a voice of the most exquisite sweetness and harmony—a voice that enhances the lovely landscapes and seascapes, across which the sweet solemn notes come floating on autumn evenings and in the stillness of summer's noonday hazes. The song of these bells can never be forgotten by those that have once heard it. Their ​notes seem to have been born amid the eternal restfulness of the Buddhist paradise, and to have gathered, on their way to human ears, echoes of the sadness that prepares the soul for Nirvana. Some of them are giants among bells. The Sanjusangen-do in Kyōtō, where stand the 33,333 images of the Goddess of Mercy, has a bell fourteen feet high, nine feet in diameter, ten and three-fourths inches thick, and weighing fifty-six tons. It was cast in the beginning of the seventeenth century. At the temple Chion-in, in the same city, there is a bell ten feet ten inches high, nine feet in diameter, nine and one-half inches thick, and weighing forty-three tons. It was cast in the year 1633. Still older than either of these—the oldest bell in Japan indeed—is that of Tōdai-ji at Nara. Cast in 732 A.D., it is twelve feet nine inches high, eight feet ten inches in diameter, ten inches thick, and its weight is forty-nine tons. At innumerable places throughout the country, bells of smaller but still noble proportions toll the passing hours or summon the people to special services. But they are never heard at funerals. The glory and credit of having cast these wonderful bells belong exclusively to the Japanese, for though they took the shape originally from China, they soon surpassed her in the size and quality of their castings. Peking boasts a bell cast in 1406, by order of the great Ming Emperor Yung-lo. It was long supposed to be the biggest bell in the world by persons ignorant of the Tsar Kolokol and its smaller sister at Moscow. The Peking bell weighs fifty-three tons, and is therefore four tons heavier than the Nara bell, but the latter was cast six hundred and seventy-four years earlier than the former. The second biggest bell of ​China—that of Nanking—weighs only twenty-two tons, a size reached and surpassed by numerous bells in Japan. Dimensions apart, however, there is absolutely no comparison in the matter of beauty and grandeur of tone between the bells of China, the teacher, and those of Japan, the pupil. In what kind of esteem the notes of a really fine bell are held by the Japanese may be gathered from the fact that among the "Eight Beauties" (Hak-kei) of the celebrated Lake Biwa, the sound of the evening bell of Mii-dera stands fourth. Some have sought the secret of the Japanese bell's sweetness in the method of ringing; that is to say, not with a clapper,—metal clashing against metal,—but with a beam of wood swung horizontally so as to strike a boss on the outer surface of the bell. That may contribute to the result, but cannot, of course, be the reason of it. An eminent writer, discussing the bells of Europe, says that as celebrated violins—an Amati or a Stradivarius—are the outcome of innumerable experiments, extending over centuries, so the "perfect" bells of Holland, cast by the masters of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, "disengaged themselves after ages of empirical trials as the true models, and supplied the finished type for all succeeding bell-workers." The rules thus evolved and still implicitly obeyed were that the metal should be a mixture of copper and tin in the proportion of 4 to 1, that the thickness of the bell's edge should be one-fifteenth of its diameter, and that its height should be twelve times its thickness. Every one of these rules was ruthlessly violated by the founders of Japanese bells. As to the composition of the bell metal, there does not seem to have been any accurate formula. The ​great Tōdai-ji bell is said to have been made of copper and tin in the proportion of 36 to 1, but the record is probably an approximation only. It is at all events certain that no care was taken to maintain any hard-and-fast ratio of mixture in later times. The casting of a temple bell constituted a species of festival. People thronged from all parts of the parish, carrying offerings, mirrors, and other metal ornaments, which were thrown into the melting-pots without any question as to the nature of the metal composing them. Not infrequently copper coins supplied the chief, if not the only, material. Thus, for a bell cast at Kamakura in the thirteenth century, 330,000 coins were used. Mr. Gowland's analysis of the old copper coins of Japan shows their composition to have been, copper, 77.30; tin, 4.32; lead, 15.33; arsenic, 1.14; antimony, 0.31; iron, 1.01; silver, 0.06; sulphur, 0.52, and gold a trace,—a compound very unlike the ideal bell-metal of the European experts. With regard to dimensions, three of the big bells of Japan give the following figures:—
Tōdai-ji bell,—thickness, one-tenth of diameter; height, 15⅓ times the thickness.
Kyōtō Dai-Butsu bell,—thickness, one-tenth of diameter; height, 15½ times the thickness.
Chion-in bell,—thickness, one-eleventh of diameter; height, 13⅔ times the thickness.
The first two of these bells seem to suggest a definite rule of ratios, but the third upsets the idea altogether, and all depart widely from the principles of the Dutch experts. In section Japanese bells show a shape different from that of European bells. The former have the rim thickened internally, so that the mouth is slightly restricted, and to that construction ​has been attributed the gentle rising and falling tone of their boom. It would be curious if experiments should prove that this simple device sufficed to secure results which European bell-founders were at such pains to achieve by accurate composition of metal and strict ratios of dimensions. That the Japanese could not only produce a monster bell of magnificent tone, but were also able to manufacture bells having their consonants in musical sequence, is proved by sixteen bells preserved at Nikkō. Rein writes of these bells that, although exactly alike externally in form and size, they yield distinctly and with the finest effect all the notes of two octaves. It is quite conceivable, however, that these bells were cast in accordance with rules obtained from the Dutch traders at Deshima. No similar bells are found elsewhere in Japan.
The form adopted for the hanging bells of Japan has always been, approximately, that known as "mitre-shaped" in mediæval Europe. Elaborate ornamentation of the surface was not resorted to in the case of large bells. They sometimes carry lines of ideographs cast in low relief,—verses from the sutras, Chinese apothegms, or more or less detailed lists of the names of the donors of the bell and the date of casting,—and in rare cases they have medallions of dragons or phœnixes. Small bells, however, are often elaborately decorated with kylin, shishi (dogs of Fo), figures of angels (ten-jin), and long inscriptions in prose or poetry.
Those that have any knowledge of the difficulties connected with bell hanging in Europe and America, of the trouble of oscillating towers and defective leverage, will be curious to hear how the Japanese ​hang the monster bells spoken of above. It is a very simple process. The bell is suspended from a low framework of powerful timbers, the uprights leaning slightly towards cross-beams connecting their upper ends. Slung by ropes or chains in an independent framework is a massive beam which oscillates horizontally, and is adjusted so as to strike full and square on the boss of the bell. These unpretentious belfries make no claim to architectural beauty or structural grandeur. The bell is everything. It hangs fully en évidence, nothing being suffered to dwarf its proportions or interfere with its notes.
The "gong," which alike in name and conception is of purely Chinese origin, was manufactured from a very early date in Japan. Chinese metallurgists understood, and taught the Japanese how to temper and anneal bronze, which, when suddenly cooled from a cherry-red heat, becomes sufficiently soft for easy manipulation, and can afterwards be hardened by reheating and slow cooling. The commonest kind of gong is the well-known discoid, with a rounded central boss; but another form, called the "alligator's mouth" (wani-guchi), is familiar to every temple-goer. It consists of two discoids, strung together so that a wide aperture separates them. A third kind of gong is hemispheroidal,—a bowl of beaten metal, which, instead of being suspended like the wani-guchi or the ordinary gong (dora), is insulated by being placed on a cushion. This variety goes by the name of kin or rin, the former appellation being given to the larger sizes. There is finally the kei, a V-shaped plate of bronze, suspended from the apex. All these, with one exception, are beaten with a short stick having a leather-covered pad at one end. The ex​ception is the "alligator's mouth." It hangs in the vestibule of temples and shrines, and is sounded by means of a thick rope which hangs in contact with its surface, and is swung against it by worshippers to attract the presiding deity's attention. It cannot be said that the Japanese developed any remarkable skill in the manufacture of these objects. The kin often emits a prolonged musical note, tender and soft, and Japanese connoisseurs of sound make enthusiastic distinctions between one kei and another as to timbre and purity of voice; but it does not appear that the manufacture of these objects ever made any special claim on the attention of experts. In the matter of gongs there can be no doubt that Korea stands far in advance of Japan. Neither country, however, possesses a large supply of fine gongs. Long and patient search for such treasures may often prove fruitless. But if the searcher is so happy as to find a Korean gong of the best type,—and he is just as likely to find it in Japan as in Korea,—he has an instrument of grand sounding capacities, which sends forth wave after wave of complex vibrations, mellow, sonorous, and sweet.
* ↑ See Appendix, note 10.
* ↑ See Appendix, note 11.
* ↑ See Appendix, note 12.
* ↑ See Appendix, note 13.
* ↑ ​Note 10.—Practically all knowledge hitherto collected of the sepulchral relics of Japan is due to the patient and scientific researches of Mr. W. Gowland, and to those of the late Baron Kanda and Professor Tsuboi of the Imperial Japanese University.
* ↑ ​Note 11.—Similar moulds exist in Korea, a fact which helps to establish the theory of an industrial connection between Japan and that part of the Asiatic continent in early ages.
* ↑ ​Note 12.—It is noteworthy that the mirrors of the ancient Greeks were exactly similar to those of China and Japan, with the exceptions that the Greeks did not use quicksilver and that their decorative designs were engraved.
* ↑ ​Note 13.—It is interesting to compare these facts with the historical records on which the Japanese themselves have hitherto been accustomed to rely. Their oldest tradition tells that the Sun Goddess gave a mirror to her grandchild, bidding him worship it as her invisible soul no less fervently than he had previously worshipped her visible presence. There is not any serious attempt to state arithmetically the time when that event occurred, but it necessarily antedates the era of Japan's terrestrial sovereigns, and must therefore be referred to the seventh or eighth century before Christ. Yet Japanese archæologists speak of the art of metal casting as having been acquired from Korea in the first century before the Christian era, and even record the names of two Korean experts—Mai Jun and Sho Toku-haku—who came to Japan to teach the process. In other words, they represent the first exercise of the art as having taken place six or seven hundred years after its products had come into actual use. There is not any irreconcilable contradiction, of course. The Japanese historian may maintain that the mirror had been in his countrymen's possession and had been regarded by them as a rare and wonderful object, long before they understood the processes of its manufacture. But, as a matter of fact, he does not appear to have yet noticed the discrepancy between attested facts and the statements he advances.
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