1A History of Japanese Studies in Spain----- An Introduction -----1
By Alfonso J. Falero
Salamanca University
Abstract
A brief overview is offered of the whole history of studies related to Japan in Spain. It isa long history, but intermittent. The missionary period presents a very good start full of
possibilities but thwarted all too soon. A second period opens during the sakoku in Japan, where
missionary-grounded texts are still produced. Then Japanism comes in from Europe, making asolid ground in Spain too. The first Spanish generation of Japanologists is quite late comparedwith Britain, and centres around the 50's - 90's of last century. Japanese Studies properly
speaking are still in the initial stage in Spain at this very moment. University curricula are proof
thereof.
Preliminary consideration. A note on the disciplinary approach
When we generally discuss about the notion of “Japanese Studies” today, we proceedfrom a preliminary agreement concerning the scope of the field we grasp by this denomination,
the historical moment of the foundation of the discipline as such and the general features of its
history. Moreover so if we speak about Japanese Studies in Europe. Broadly speaking we
consider the foundation of the field to have happened around the moment when European
scholars entered Meiji Japan, thanks to the Japanese government’s policy of fostering cultural
exchanges with our countries. We call this phase the era of “Japanologists”, the self-learned
almost heroic founding fathers of the discipline, revealing by using this term our dependency on
the German tradition of Japanology, soon to become an academically grounded field of
research. We basically agree that after WWII the situation of the discipline radically changed,
and the already running academic programs yielded new generations of scholars who succeeded
the former pioneers, entering a wholly new phase of mature research. This new phase we callproperly speaking the constitution of Japanese Studies as such. Japanese Studies would aligntogether with Chinese Studies or Korean Studies to shape a broader field under the general
heading of Area Studies, itself a development from Cultural Anthropology, but provided with awider, multidisciplinary scope.
But when we turn to the subject of Japanese Studies in European countries like Spain orPortugal, we are in great trouble to recognise the general features described above. In a word,
The precedents of this essay can be found in Solano/Rodao/Togores (eds. 1988) El Extremo Oriente
ibérico. Investigaciones históricas: Metodología y estado de la cuestión, CSIC 1989. Fl. Rodao (1992)“Los estudios sobre Japón en España y Portugal: Una aproximación” Revista Española del Pacífico no. 1,
vol. 1, 167-172. E. Barlés (2003) “Luces y sombras en la historiografía del arte japonés en España”
Artigrama no. 18, 23-82.
12

the history of Japanese Studies in these countries only shares a partial ground with the rest ofEuropean countries, and must be considered on its own as a marginal but relevant contributor to
the general field. Something similar happens on the far eastern side of the continent, withcountries like the Russian Federation, with a totally original history of academic and cultural
relations with Japan. Generally speaking, we must admit that the Iberian contribution to thefield of Japanese Studies has a very special pre-history, so important in relation to the whole
picture, that should it not exist, we would be impelled to conclude this report right away bynoting the fact that these studies started recently and that there is a long way ahead.
The relevance of the close contacts between Spain, Portugal and Japan in the sixteenthand seventeenth centuries makes us shift our focus from the modern period to pre-modern Japanand the Europe of the Renaissance. For the amount of documentation produced during the socalled “Iberian century” in Japan, is such and of such a historical importance that it makes themodern period of Japanese Studies in Spain and Portugal irrelevant comparatively speaking. In
fact, the documentation just referred to being missionary to a great extent, the field of researchcalled Missionary Studies stands on its own in these countries, having a long disciplinary
history reaching us today, and independent from the constitution of Area Studies as outlined
above. The “Japanese” part of these Missionary Studies integrates with the Chinese and Indianpart belonging to the Oriental Provinces. The problem regarding to what extent and how canthese Missionary Studies contribute to the field of Japanese Studies remains open, for theformer are carried out by members of the religious orders concerned. Then we should make abasic distinction between Missionary Studies and Historical Research on the Missionary Periodof Portugal and Spain.
As a matter of fact we have both kinds of research traditions. The Jesuits, Dominicans
and other orders have a consistent modern history of editing and publishing the sources fromtheir own archives, together with missionary histories and biographies of their martyrs andsaints in Japan. To these we should add some lesser contributions in the field of theological andreligious discussion concerning their Japanese experience. On the other hand, scholars in thefield of Spanish History have studied the documents pertaining to the period of the Oceanic
Expansion, and among them some have analysed the documents related with Japan. But still thiskind of research cannot be labelled under “Japanese Studies” properly speaking. The main
reason is that these historians do not learn the Japanese language and are unable to confront the
Spanish documentation with other Japanese sources. Their concern is not Japanese history, but
Spanish. Thirdly, there is still a thin but important tradition of Spanish scholars contributing to
the field of Japanese Studies strictu sensu, and with relevant research on the Japanese Iberian
century. In all we can perceive the disciplinary complexity of dealing with the documentation of
the missionary period in the history of Japanese Studies in Spain, and the same can be said
about Portugal.

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The missionary period. The Iberian century in JapanThe encounter between Spain and Japan in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries raises
several problems when considered from the point of view of the history of Japanese Studies. Let
us point out to some of them:Firstly, it is meaningless to talk about the Spanish contribution to the field, independently
from the Portuguese share of the experience. As long as we discuss about the Macao-based
historical contacts, since the Treaty of Tordesillas up to the annexation of Portugal to the
Spanish crown (1580), Portugal had the lead, but the Portuguese naos carried to Japan Spanish,
as well as Portuguese and Italian padres and irmaos, all belonging to a trans-national company
called the Jesuits. These were the real ambassadors, commercially, culturally and spiritually
speaking. And they worked for the Company as well as for the Crown. The situation changed
somehow when the Spanish settlement in Manila took the initiative. Other orders entered thefield to become competitors to the Jesuit monopoly, and among them the strongest one, theDominicans produced their documents in Spanish language for the first time, adding to theexisting documents in Portuguese and in the language of culture, Latin. In all, when we talkabout this period it is impossible to draw a sharp distinction between the Spanish and thePortuguese contribution to Japanese Studies, hence the term “Iberian” being most adequate forthe period.
Secondly, the encounter between the Jesuits and the Japanese was of a radically different
sort from the project of evangelization of the West Indies. True, the aim of the Company was toevangelize pagan peoples, but in the case of the American natives, whether they were “people”
in the same sense as the Europeans or the Asians had to be ascertained in the first place, and aharsh discussion ensued in missionary, intellectual and governmental circles. The Christianmedieval notion of man was contested by the new “humanism”, the mark of identity of theRenaissance. And here arose the first foundation of the future science of Anthropology, fromthe moment a distinction had to be made between “primitive” peoples and “civilized” ones. The
former were compared to children who needed to be taught everything, not only religion. The
European civilization, model for the rest of the world, bore the historical destiny of becoming
the tutelary hand of God. But why were Europeans unable to recognise the highly evolved
cultures of Central America? One of the clues to understand the missionary difference ofapproach between the West and the East Indies is the fact that there were no previous reports on
the former, they were undocumented peoples. Not so with the latter, including Japan, about
whom there were references in Europe since medieval times. Mostly legendary accounts, but
after all pagan peoples belonging to the realm of the known world. They had language, andcivilization. Francisco de Xavier compiled all available information in Macao before carryingout the trip to Japan. He wore a substantial mental image to contrast later with what he did findout. He knew he was not aiming towards an “out of civilization” territory. He carried with him,
perhaps somewhat unconsciously, an agenda for religious and cultural comparison.

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Thirdly, a global approach to the Iberian century and its signification in the history ofJapanese Studies, cannot be made solely from the isolated points of view of missionary history
or religious history. Not even from political history as such. The momentum of the events
produced in this period affects deeply our present notion of global cultural history. Recently,
scholars from different fields and even leading intellectuals are calling attention to the real
meaning of the Iberian century in this sense. The trans-Oceanic project nurtured in the Iberianpeninsula was the response to the need of a global apprehension of the world. The precedents
were in the commercial impulse of the new merchant class and the Renaissance humanistic
culture. The world experienced the first great movement towards globalization. It was on the
crest of this wave that the missionaries and merchants appeared in Japan. As a result, Japan
entered world history. Therefore, the documentation produced in this period is relevant notsolely for religious or political history, but also for the history of global economy and culture.
In the fourth place, and as a consequence of what we have just argued, the exchanges
carried out during this period between the visitors and the natives greatly surpassed the field of
religion and naval or military craft, they also affected the arts and literature and philosophy. We
cannot forget the two first Western expeditions launched from Japanese territory happened inthis period, the result of which left in Spain an indelible trace which runs up to the present.
Besides, the introduction of the European press in 1590 opened a new chapter in the field of
documentation, with a number of originals to add to the new history of literature written inromaji, the first dictionaries of the Japanese language ----- Latin-Japanese, Portuguese-Japanese,
and Japanese-Spanish -----, the first grammars, the first translations of European and Japanese
literature.2
Fifth, part of the so called “missionary literature” should have become the foundation of
the new science of Cultural Anthropology, three centuries ahead of the discipline we know
today. For no other way can the exhaustive reports on customs and beliefs registered since theletters of Xavier and Vilela be read, through the Treatise on Differences in Customs (1585) by
Frois, up to the rigorous rendering of the Japanese way of tea by the hand of Rodrigues. This
great leap in the European literature of the Renaissance did not succeed in creating a new
discipline, and was relegated to the missionary field. The reason for this cannot just be
explained by remarking that the missionaries were expelled from Japan and the printings closed.
The fact was that this historical event coincided with a change of cultural paradigm in Europe.
North and South Europe were further split as a result of the Reform and the Counter-reform,
knowledge was secularised and the New Science was to be founded on physics not language orculture. The drive towards cultural comparison or literary exchange gave way under thepressure of modern, universal, monolithic science. European culture gave another step towards
self-centeredness and after a couple of centuries a new sort of evangelism arose, this time in the
Of paramount importance was the work of the Dominicans D. Collado and J. Orfanel, particularly their
Historia ecclesiastica de los sucesos de la christiandad de Iapon: desde el año 1602, que entro en el laOrden de Predicadores, hasta el de 1620.
2

5name of a secular God. This is the Europe that would meet Japan in the nineteenth century.
Between the old and the new, an un-fillable gap had opened, and this is why the huge amount of
documentation ever produced by the Iberian century has remained isolated in files and archives
as well as museums of the religious orders, and also national archives and museums spreadthrough Spain, Portugal and the Vatican. This documentation and its sequel by the hand ofpriests and scholars of the orders up to the present, played no part in the foundation of the new
Linguistics and Anthropology in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries.
Sixth, the Eastern missions had in fact little support ever from the Vatican, the Portuguese
and the Spanish crowns. This is also repeatedly exposed in the missionary literature since theearlier letters of Xavier. However, in the Spanish seventeenth century, the missionary adventure
in Japan had pervaded popular literature up to some extent. The humanist B. Gracián had given
expression to a popular view on the character of the Japanese, when he refers to them as the“Spaniards of the East”. The playwright Lope de Vega wrote a piece named “Triunfo de la fe en
los reynos del Oriente” founding the so called “Missionary Theatre”, a minor genre cultivatedexclusively within religious circles but with popular acceptance in Counter-reformist Spain. The
subsequent editions of the Lives of martyrs in Japan added to popular tastes in Catholic Spain.
But all this literary and documentary work was carried on without governmental support. The
Spanish crown never planned seriously to profit from a possible Japanese market, so it neverinvested enough. In seventeenth century Spain the weight of the American enterprise on theexternal side, plus the increasing inner weakness in the European arena, turned the state into ahuge bureaucracy, and the original humanistic outlook which underlay expansionism declined
into a self-defensive, self-centred, conservative mood. Japan was out of this map, all themissionary efforts remained confined in monasteries, and a great wealth of documentation
forgotten in the archives and libraries ever after. The Spanish state never valued this part ofnational history enough. Spanish society evolved into a progressive alienation from themissionary history.3
Seventh, influences and vestiges of the Iberian century are present in the field of arts andcrafts. The “nanban art” stands in a privileged position as the first example of a hybridisation ofWestern motives and Japanese techniques in painting and handicrafts. On the other hand, South
Spain architecture bears witness of the Iberian century in Japan, and even a probable Japanese
influence in the Spanish baroque, as is being investigated by a promising research team led byThis is so, even though the Spanish state had in store important documentation relative to Japan in the
Oceanic Expansion era. Let us just cite four significant examples:
Navigation Map of Columbus (1494): flat map, cloth and painting, kept in the Museum of the Treaty ofTordesillas. “Zipangu” makes appearance.
“Typus orbis terrarum”: of the 53 maps published in Antwerp there are three originals extant, one ofthem kept in the Hall of Lost Paces, Monastery of El Escorial, the summer palace of the Phillips.
World Globe by the printer Jean Blaeu (c. 1660), upon designs of the astronomer Tycho Brahe, kept in
the Library of El Escorial.
World Globe of the Royal Society of London (1761), also kept in the Library of El Escorial.
3

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José M. Cabeza at the University of Sevilla. Besides, Spanish museums treasure a significant
amount of Japanese weaponry.
Further, we cannot dismiss the fact that among the Iberian missionaries there were two
radically opposed approaches towards the Japanese mission. On the one hand, the first
generation of missionaries led by Xavier were open-minded in matters of cultural exchange,
they learned the language, adopted some customs, and had the Japanese nation in high esteem.
In their reports they repeated that the Japanese were not like the Indians found in America, but ahighly cultivated people, which made the mission bear fine prospects concerning conversion.
The Japanese were an intelligent race, so they would eventually drop their pagan attachments
and embrace the luminaries of universal faith. This view was to be held exemplarily by the
Visitor Valignano, but when we approach the turn of the century, the European drive towards
conservative nationalistic policies influenced mentalities, and as a result contrary strategies
would prevail among the high ranks of the missionary hierarchy. In all, we have examples ofboth early nipophilia and nipofobia.
It remains a topic for further discussion how to connect the Iberian period with the historyof Japanese Studies. It is obvious that Japanese Studies as such were not constituted then andthere, for should anyone sustain this view, he would be obliged to state that Japanese Studies in
Spain and Portugal predate their constitution in Holland or Britain one century, and Germany orFrance three centuries. Neither Holland nor Britain date their own tradition of Japanese Studies
up to the seventeenth century, although these countries have a long documentary history related
to Japan, too. It is commonly understood that the foundation of this field of studies cannot
predate the constitution of the modern social, anthropological and historical sciences. But at thesame time perhaps we should also admit that if not formally, at least materially, the legacy of
the Iberian century leaves us a whole body of documents, among which a great number ofreports represent a certain kind of discourse with an aspiration towards an objective
understanding of Japanese civilization. An understanding gained from direct experience andknowledge of the language. What would have naturally yielded a basic framework for the
eventual constitution of a field of human knowledge should there have been a path for its
development, actually turned into a historical failure, for the reasons already pointed out.
Rediscovery of Japan
Spain had to re-discover Japan. This time not across the ocean, but through the eyes of
their neighbouring European nations. Between the seventeenth century and its legacy, and the
new import of knowledge starting with the re-opening of Japan to Western nations, lies a
profound gap never filled. Nineteenth century Spain was living a long decline of its status as aworld empire, and wholly lacked the strength to perceive the momentum of establishing new
diplomatic ties with an old acquaintance. And this in spite of the fact that the Manila Governor
was officially invited by the Meiji Government to set a diplomatic office in Tokyo. The

7invitation was turned down and the opportunity of sharing destiny with other European nations
missed. Japan had transformed from a neighbouring nation (in terms of the Philippines frontier)into a totally exotic and mystified country. However, the religious orders settled again in
Japanese soil, and Japan was on the focus of some diplomats, travellers and men of letters, allon a private basis.4 During the period that goes from Meiji Japan to WWII other Western
European nations normalized their relations with Japan, and Japanese Studies were formallyconstituted with official and academic support, in some cases even before the Meiji Restoration.
Not so in Spain. To better understand the conditions that underlie this period in the pre-historyof Japanese Studies in Spain, we should bear in mind the following points.
First, contrary to what happened in the case of other European countries with a previous
history of relations with Japan, there is no connection between the new period of Japan related
awareness in Spain and the Iberian century. The constitution of Japanese Studies in the
University of Leiden is a natural result from the exchanges in the seventeenth century. The
British legacy from the same period inspired the British pioneers of Japanese Studies in Meiji
Japan. Even in Russia, a long entertained linguistic and scholarly interest in their neighbour
bore fruit in the constitution of academic studies. But Spain started anew, revealing acharacteristic feature in Spanish history ----- a lack of sensitivity towards historic legacy, ahistory made of twists and turns, breaches and leaps, never looking back. As a result there wasno sense of historic continuity in the new era of interest towards Japan.
Second, also contrary to the case of other European nations, all approaches to Japaneseculture were made on a private basis. The Spanish government was ever too absorbed with innertroubles, and the disaster of the international experience of the late two centuries had turned theeyes inwards. In spite of the flourishing interest in the Japanese arts, and the influence of French
culture and then of japoneries in Barcelona and Madrid intellectual circles, there was never anofficial response and no Spanish governmental or academic institution ever supported materiallythe new seeds of interest in Japan.
Third, it is especially noticeable that, in spite of having a very long and pioneer traditionof publishing grammars and dictionaries of the Japanese language since the Iberian period, a
tradition that was intermittently continued by the Dominicans and the Jesuits up to the twentiethcentury, in the modern period there was no Spanish central language school or institution that
supported the new initiatives related to Japan. The consequences of this fact have been fatal topresent day Japanese Studies in Spain, for against the case of other European nations, the studyof Japanese culture, art, history and religious thought has been carried out through indirectsources or Spanish translations. The lack of a governmental support towards the study of theJapanese language is also the main reason why Spanish Universities have ignored the tradition
set up by missionary pioneers, and up to the present the academic study of Japanese topics has
been undertaken without the accompanying study of the language.
4

Such was the case of the novelist V. Blasco Ibáñez, who travelled to Japan in 1923-1924.

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Fourth, Spanish knowledge of Japan in the nineteenth century and first half of twentiethcentury has depended mainly on external sources. This is not to say that there were absolutely
no primary testimonies from Spaniards. The thin diplomatic contacts, some scarce intellectual
mutual acquaintances made in Spain or France, a very few cases of travellers in all, account for
the whole of what we can record. Nineteenth century Spanish intellectual life concerned withinternational topics drew its acumen mainly from France, and secondarily from Britain or
Germany. Paris played the role of pivoting cross-cultural encounter for South Europe. The riseof japoneries in the artistic field, interest in the Noh theatre and kabuki always concomitant withjaponeries, the acquaintance with haiku, the romantic search for the hidden tenets of Japanese
civilization and culture, related to old customs, to Buddhism and to archaic Shinto, literature
about geisha and samurai, all this entered Spain from Paris and had a reflection in the media ofBarcelona and Madrid. This was fostered from within Japan by certain strategies towards theexport of their own culture to the world.
Fifth, Spain took part in the fever for Japanese art objects that rushed from Paris to therest of Western Europe. This was made possible in part thanks to the Spanish participation in
the organization of Universal Expositions, privileged places for the exchange of art andknowledge with the Japanese representatives. The Expositions provided not only with a locus
for artistic exchange but also fostered collectionism and general appreciation of Japaneseculture. Cities like Barcelona and Madrid saw the spread of Japanese collections of artistic
pieces in the public as well as in the private sector. As a result there is a considerable amount ofJapanese artistic objects in public museums and private foundations.
Sixth, when we try to locate the activities and initiatives related to Japan in nineteenth
century Spain, we should not overlook the fact that as to what refers to cultural initiatives,
Barcelona and Catalonia worked de facto independently from the rest of Spain. Quantitatively
and qualitatively speaking, the amount of objects of art and publications related to Japan in thisregion surpasses that of Madrid as the reference of centralized Spain. From Barcelona,
Catalonian artists could have easy access to artistic circles in France, so that this region worked
more like an extension of French exchanges and initiatives, than as a part of Spain. This
explains the impact of japoneries in the work of so many painters and designers from thisregion, and the particular tradition of Japanese related activities in Catalonia, from economic toacademic, which perhaps should be accounted for as an exception to the general conditions
applying to the rest of Spain. In time this unbalance has not been corrected, and the gap between
Catalonia and the rest of Spain is still extant.
Seventh, exchanges with Japanese representatives on occasion of the encounters provided
for in Expositions and other artistic or literary circles contributed to a general trend of
encyclopedism. Under this approach, from the end of the nineteenth century Spanish publishers
released volumes on Japan within multi-volume world encyclopedias. Interest in Japanesegeography and customs increased. Translations appeared. Besides, interest in Japanese theatre

9gave rise to several publications and translations of classical as well as modern plays. Finally,haiku poetry caught the attention of most literary circles with an avant-gardist vision, as well as
many intellectuals. The most prominent Spanish poets and playwrights of late nineteenth
century and first decades of the twentieth, R. Valle-Inclán, F. García Lorca, A. Machado, allwere acquainted with the Japanese haiku and theatre traditions. On the intellectual foreground,
we can remind the debate on the character of the Japanese held between leading intellectuals inthe beginnings of the twentieth century, R. de Maeztu and M. de Unamuno (1907),5 or the
speculations on haiku and literary style made by the latter in the liberal press. The Spanish haiku
tradition initiated then, had two important consequences. First, haiku poetry has beennationalized, and has become a consistent line of poetic expression in the Spanish and theCatalan languages,6 with an ever thriving history that reaches its climax in the present moment.
And secondly, haiku essays and research play an important role in the recent history of JapaneseStudies in Spain, as well as outside this field, as is the case with philosophers and literary
critics.
Eighth, in the beginning of the twentieth century, religious catholic orders, old and new,settled in Japan, of which again the Jesuits7 and the Dominicans would eventually come to playa relevant part in the constitution of Japanese Studies in Spain. Their role, however, must be
taken into consideration in two different periods. Up to WWII, they were unable to restore
Japanese Studies, and they produced inside literature and reports regarding Meiji, Taisho or
Showa Japan. But after WWII they have been instrumental in the formation of the present short
tradition of Japanese Studies.
Finally, the impact of japanism in Spain, mainly through the mediation of French
influence, which pervades intermittently all the history of Spanish perceptions and cultural
fashions related to Japan, operates as a permanent factor in Spanish society since the modern
period up to the very present, lying behind practically all advances in the slow progression
towards the eventual constitution of Japanese Studies. The general traits of Spanish japanism do
not differ basically from the same phenomenon in the rest of Western European Countries. It
reveals its essential ambiguity between the two poles of bold admiration and racial
discrimination, common to European japanism. It left a large imprint in the minds of people ingeneral, thanks to the diffusion of images about the Japanese which circulated in the illustratedpress of the first decades of the twentieth century. Besides, it contributed decisively to thefostering of collectionism and aesthetic appreciation among wealthy citizens and artists. As aresult, many artists of the avant-garde reflected the influence of Japanism in their works. Thereis a whole sub-field of study in Spanish modern art history dedicated to Japanist influenced
artists, whose works provide us with one more bulk of materials for study within the general
See “El problema religioso en el Japón” and “Más sobre el japonismo” in Unamuno, M. Libros y
autores españoles contemporáneos. Espasa-Calpe 1972.
6
Recently also in Galician.
7
They returned to Japan in 1908.
510field of Japanese Studies. Japanism also helped in the thirst for knowledge about Japanesesociety and civilization. In a parallel line to the introduction of japanism, we find a number ofcontemporary history-type reports, which start from the coverage of Japan’s expansionism since
the Sino-Japanese war of 1895, and runs up to books of propaganda in favour of Japanese
heroes of WWII.
The sources of Spanish japanism are triple. First, translations of French celebrated
japoneries like the writings of P. Loti, and other foreign travellers, some of the latest trying to
go beyond mere amazement to historic understanding. However, narratives around the myth ofJapanese geishas predominated. Second, Spanish language sources like travellers to Japan orworld-round travellers whose Orientalist reports were covered in books as well as in illustrated
magazines, and who informed about Japanese ladies, girls and beauties, rickshaws, famous
restaurants, Kyoto, Tokyo, Yokohama, kabuki actors, masks, cards. Among these the travel
reports of the Guatemalan E. Gómez Carrillo written around 1910,8 played a similar role in
Spain to the one played in France by P. Loti. Gómez Carrillo transmitted to the Spanish
speaking readers his enthusiasm for the “soul” of Japan, understood as the “heroic” spirit of thesamurais and the “gallant” demeanour of geishas. Third, translations of a few Japanese modern
classics and books of cultural propaganda. Among them we also find apologetic narratives of
WWII, but most interesting are the translations of works such as Nitobe’s Bushido: The Soul ofJapan in 1909, Okakura’s The Book of Tea, and L. Hearn’s Kwaidan in 1941.
A couple of further remarks should not be amiss in the context of the precedent
discussion. First, it is wrong to argue as is generally done that European (including Spanish)
Japanism as part of the general trend of Orientalism is a ready-made product of westerners.
Perhaps this may be consistently alleged about Middle Eastern Orientalism or even about
Chinese Orientalism, but in the case of Japan, we cannot ignore the fact that since the period of
the Meiji incorporation to the world of Western powers, one of the clues for the acceptance of
this Eastern nation in the family of the Western states was an aggressive campaign of Japanesecultural exportation, especially prominent since the turn of the century. Several books like theones quoted above reached Spain and were translated not because of a special interest of
Spanish publishers in them, but because they were part of a huge apparatus of Japanese national
propaganda in the cultural level. Second, the forties were a good moment for Japanese
propaganda in Spain. The Bushido was reprinted in a Spanish campaign of moralisation of the
youth inspired in heroic literature of that type. This is due to dictator Franco’s inconsistent
strategy of alignments with the tripartite Axis first and then with USA.9
We should also notice that if we compare the strength shown in the initiatives toward
mutual approach during the whole of the twentieth century between Spain and Japan, theheaviest part relies on the Japanese side, Spain mostly playing the role of the receptive mate. An
89El alma japonesa (around 1910) and El Japón heroico y galante (1912).
See Rodao, Fl. (2002) Franco y el imperio japonés. Plaza & Janés.

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outstanding example of this is found in the history of Japanese Hispanic Studies compared to
Spanish Japanology. We cannot express it otherwise than recognising that while Hispanic
Studies in Japan has followed a regular process of constitution and growth more or less in thewake of the academic societies concerned with the French or the German languages andliteratures, in Spain, due to the several anomalies that affect the first half of the twentiethcentury, which progressively isolated it from the rest of Europe, Japanology could not be
constituted. As a consequence, the first generation of Spanish Japanologists, most of themscholars still active, was formed in the post-war period, in Japan not in Spain. Calculated fromthe period when other academic pioneers in Japanology appeared in France, Britain or Germany
we have an astonishing result of at least forty years delay, which explains to a great extent thepresent day situation of Japanese academic studies in Spain.
From Japanology to Japanese Studies
The turnout from WWII and the subsequent normalization of academic and political life
in Japan proved decisive to opening for the first time an effective path towards the constitutionof Japanese Studies in Spain. No more depending exclusively on foreign translations or reports
from travellers. The era of Spanish Japanology finally emerged, mainly at the hands of a few
missionaries who entered Japan in the fifties and sixties, with new energies, and in programs
which included extensive study of the language. Catholic educational institutions in Japan were
the platform which supported their work, and among them Sophia University10 has been
seminal. Most part of this first and single generation of japanologists come from Sophia
University. They carried the double task of catholic evangelism and at the same time providing
Spain with studies on Japanese culture and translations of Japanese classics. Most of themstayed in Japan for very long, some of them forever, and others returned to fill positions at
Spanish Universities. The double task required of them proved to be excessive in many cases.
Many of the eventual fathers of Spanish Japanese Studies experienced some kind of inverse
conversion and have turned to the apostolate of Japanese culture in Spain. Before returning,many of them became lay people. But others in fact never returned, and this produced a rift inthis generation making it less strong than it might have been should the ones who stayed havealso joined forces with the returnees. In fact it was not so, and still newer generations ofscholars keep having difficulties on returning if they stay in Japan longer than a couple of years
or if they go there on their own. For this generation of Spanish japanologists, coming from theranks of the catholic seminaries in Japan, did not have any other governmental or academic
support on returning to Spain. They occupied marginal positions in the Spanish academic world,
were unable to bring academic authorities to initiate study programs of Japanese language andculture, and in some cases even had to share their Japanese vocation with their responsibilities
as professors in Departments of Spanish or English Language. Still, their mastery of the
10

Founded in 1913.

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Japanese language helped them to publish translations of classical and modern literature as wellas produce seminal studies in the fields of literature, culture, history or philosophy, some ofwhich have appeared in print but recently, as a kind of legacy handed down from the authors.
The historian and essayist L. Díez del Corral (1998) represents an isolated exception in
the Spain of the fifties, when he launched a global re-interpretation of the problem of the destinyof Europe, applying a fine analysis of the mythical power of old tales in the context of thepresent dilemmas. His work, The Rape of Europa: A Historic Interpretation of Our Times (1954)
had an impact in other European countries, Britain, France, Germany, Holland, and then also inJapan. The reason was that in Chapter 1 “Europe and Universal History”, he devoted one
section to the problem of “East and West in a world culture”.11 Here he argues that inindustrialized Japan the sense of discipline, productivity, and social organization can only be
explained if we look for the roots in Medieval Europe. His main thesis was that after centuriesof euro-centrism, finally in the twentieth century the Faustian legacy of dominion throughscience and technology had changed its vortex, and had been displaced towards the East. Japanis the most relevant case study to support Díez’s thesis. The essay had a great reception in
Japan, and the author was invited to lecture here. The trip inspired a second book, From the New
to the Old World (1974, 38), again translated into Japanese, and its author was invited two moretimes. Three visits in all from 1961 to 1972. Two years later, in 1974, Díez del Corral wrote a
new prologue, where he confirmed his intellectual position about “Japan, the greatest rapist ofEurope” (1974, 33-38). Here, he traverses in a few strokes the whole cultural history of Japan totry to explain the enormous singularity of Japan’s case in the whole of Asia, as an able
assimilator of the most efficient elements of European civilization.12 Díez del Corral is a fineexample of the Quixotic character of a great part of the legacy of Spanish Japanology, being
himself an isolated scholar in the field, and leaving no disciples to follow.
The first literary products from the authors formed at Sophia University appeared in thesixties and seventies, some of which were published in Japan and had little diffusion in Spain.
Some translations made during these decades have not been published yet. During this period
some Spanish intellectuals from Sophia University engaged in inter-religious dialogue, andpromoted a sort of new humanism, inspired in the stress on the value of the individual as“person”. The translation into Spanish of Watsuji’s Fudo in 1973 by A. Mataix was part of a
project of translations that included other basic works of philosophical popularity in Japan, aproject that collapsed too soon. A. Mataix is representative of the type of intellectual that sprungthese years from Sophia University. The Jesuit J. Fernández is on his part a good representativeof the scholar specialised in comparative literature, but whose work remains basically ignored in
Spain. Other professors left the priesthood and became Spanish teachers all through Japan,
while pursuing their vocational study of Japanese culture. They made professional careers at
El rapto de Europa: Una interpretación histórica de nuestro tiempo, Alianza 1974, 93-96.
The “Prologue” has been also published independently as Perspectives of a Raped Europe(Perspectivas de una Europa raptada, Hora H 1974).
11
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Japanese universities. We have to mention with honours the case of another Jesuit later
secularised and married, Prof. J. L. Álvarez Taladriz, who was original from Sophia University
and spent his later years as professor of Spanish at Eichi University in Osaka, while devoting to
the edition of texts from the Iberian century with a scholarly and critical perspective. At Eichi
University he coincided with another lay Jesuit original from Sophia University, and with asimilar family name, J. López Álvarez, an astounding personality, being the first foreigner everto enter the Department of Buddhist Studies at Tokyo University, but who left his promisingscholarly career to marry and return to Spain, where he became the promoter of JapaneseStudies at Granada University.
The seventies mark another turning point for the history of Japanese Studies in Spain.
The first doctoral thesis on Japanese matters are read. There are only a few essays withscholarly acumen to be found, but they do not depend anymore on the work done by the
religious orders in Japan. The doctoral dissertation on Japanese haiku by first-rate translator F.
Rodríguez-Izquierdo, presented at Sevilla University and published in 197213, might beconsidered the point of departure of Japanese Studies in Spain.14 The reason is that its topic isproper of a specialist, and the methodology of research is subjected to general academic prerequisites in other fields. Besides, it is long enough to be reckoned as a research study and not
merely an essay. The dividing line between Japanology and Japanese Studies started to be
drawn in this decade. Generally speaking, returning missionaries have played the role of other
European early japanologists. They cover very wide fields, like history of Japanese culture,
history of thought, history of literature, history of art, and some of them have even to combine
research in more than one field. Perhaps an archetypical case is shown to us by emeritus Prof.
Antonio Cabezas. He went to Japan as a missionary and started his entrusted task at Sophia
University. He learned the language to the point of mastery. Studying Japanese literature hewent through a reverse conversion. He left the Jesuits and married, becoming Prof. of the
Spanish language at Kyoto Gaidai. Cabezas enjoyed his full professional career in Japan, andwhile learning and translating literature he got acquainted with the pioneering work of Prof.
Álvarez Taladriz, the expert in the Iberian century. He became a disciple of the latter, andstarted studying seriously the related documentation. After retiring he came to spend his days at
his hometown in Andalousia (Huelva) where he now resides. Cabezas is a japanologist in thefull sense, i. e. he masters the Japanese language, classic and modern, and Japanese culture. He
is the only Spaniard ever to write anything near a history of Japanese literature, 15 while being
the translator of old classics such as the Man’yoshu or the Ise monogatari, pre-modern classics
like Saikaku, Basho, modern poets like Takuboku and contemporaries like Mishima. At the

El haiku japonés: historia y traducción, Hiperión 1972 (2nd. Ed. 1994).
I. e. Related to the Spanish academia.
15
La literatura japonesa (1990) Hiperión.
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same time, Cabezas has written a long study on the Iberian century, 16 demonstrating that he is
the only successor of Álvarez Taladriz. This study has become the reference for future researchin the field of missionary history in Japan, or in general Japanese sixteenth and seventeenth
centuries. But the author never had an appointment at a Spanish University, although his
position in Spanish Japanology might be compared to that of D. Keene in USA.
Another important aspect in relation to the connection between Spanish Japanologists andthe constitution of Japanese Studies, is that these Japanologists, contrary to the case of their
European and American peers, have not had the chance to create their own legacy atuniversities. The new generation of researchers in the field of Japanese Studies, who haveenjoyed a scholarship and done research in Japan never had the chance of studying under thetutorship of these great pioneers.17 The result is that between this first generation of specialists
and the younger researchers there is again a gap, and between Japanology and Japanese Studies
in Spain there is no continuity. The principal initiative in the formation of a young generation ofresearchers must be credited to the Japanese government and its strategy on scholarships forforeign researchers. The popularly so called “Monbusho scholarships” in the first place, andadding to this the generous support of the Japan Foundation multiple programs have since theeighties been the main source of help for enabling many new young researchers fill the historicgap, and join forces with their colleagues in the rest of Europe to form a broader researchcommunity concomitant with the present European process of convergence at the level of higheducation.
We cannot but understand as part of this process the opening of BA degrees in JapaneseStudies at some key Universities all through Spanish territory, a process initiated in theacademic year 2003-2004. To the Autonomous Madrid University, the joint program of theAutonomous Barcelona University together with the private Pompeu Fabra University(Barcelona), and the virtual degree offered at the Universitat Oberta de Catalonia, the year
2004-2005 Salamanca University has joined the heading group. Other universities will join in
the near future,18 helping to consolidate an all but long expected academic platform that will
permit scholars to have a place to work, do research and educate younger disciples. JapaneseStudies in Spain are at a turning point. The number of researchers has grown enough to make asolid group to contribute to other European institutions in Japanese Studies.19 Now it isnecessary to open the doors of the academia to those young researchers who still are in the
periphery because of lack of institutional support, for them to have a chance to join the newacademic programs when they come back from Japan, and so not to join the lists ofEl siglo ibérico en Japón: La presencia hispano-portuguesa en Japón (1543-1643) [1995] U. de
Valladolid
17
See a profile of some of the most outstanding members of the Spanish old generation in Barlés, 57-64.
18Granada University will join since the academic term 2006-2007, starting with an opening Conference
to be held on September 2006.
19
For a data-base on researchers see www.casaasia.es.
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unemployment or emigration. It is foreseen that in the European process of convergence, anumber of MA, and eventually PhD degrees will be offered in the future.
It is urgently needed to establish research institutes for Japanese Studies. Historicallyspeaking we can mention the existence of several associations, like the Spain Asian Studies
Association and the Asia-Pacific Studies Association in Spain, formed basically by historians ofcolonial Spain. This latter recently experienced a new process of reorganisation widening its
scope, incorporating scholars from different fields, and establishing regional committees for
Area Studies, but after their latest national Congress it has relaxed apparently, and there is to be
seen whether it will be able to respond to its new frame of work and the new demands ofJapanese Studies. Then, the Spanish Association of Japanese Studies was founded by María
Rodríguez, and is still striving to overcome the phase of semi-private orientation.
At universities we do not find yet one single Research Institute, and Research Projects
related to Japanese Studies are still but a few. At Valladolid University, the late Pr. José M.
Ruiz founded the only Japanese Studies Institute, with high prospects, but insufficient support.
Now it has been converted into the Centre for Asian Studies. Another case is the Spain-Japan
Cultural Centre of Salamanca University, a joint project with support from the Japanese
Embassy, the Japan Foundation, and a number of Japanese companies and academic
institutions, another ambitious initiative with high prospects, but which still needs to be reorientated into a Research Institute. As to Research Projects, the Complutense University of
Madrid has been carrying along for years significant research and teaching on Asian Art,
including Japan. The Project is called “Group Asia”. At Zaragoza University, Pr. E. Barlés isheading a Research Project on East Asian art objects at Spanish museums and collections.
Finally, Pr. José M. Cabeza is leading another project related to architecture and the conceptionof space, drawing basically from East Asian materials, at Sevilla University. These threeisolated examples in the past years have certain features in common. First, none of them is
attached to an “East Asian Studies Area”, the only academic section approved by the Education
Ministry to regulate Japanese Studies at present. Second, none of them deals exclusively withJapan. And third, the first two projects are carried on without linguistic support in Japanese,while the third one (due to the stimulus of its director, fluent in Japanese) is in the process ofacquaintanceship with the language. 20 This shifts our attention to the already mentioned factthat many scholars who have contributed significant research on Japan do not belong toJapanese Studies. Such is the case of the historians J. Gil,21 E. Sola,22 and R. Valladar23 and mostof the researchers in Japanese art, although the Jesuit Pr. F. García Gutiérrez (Sevilla
Although the situation is changing quickly. Universities like Valladolid has started a Research Projecton Japanism in the European travel literature of nineteenth century (Dir. Lourdes Terrón), Zaragoza
University keeps having the lead in Japanese Art research, Madrid Autonomous University has launcheda Research Project on East Asia., and Granada University another one of the same characteristics.
21
Hidalgos y samurais: España y Japón en los siglos xvi y xvii (1991) Alianza.
22
Historia de un desencuentro: España y Japón, 1580-1614 (1999) Ed. Fugaz.
23
Castilla y Portugal en Asia (1580-1680): Declive imperial y adaptación (2001) Leuven U. P.
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University) has been teaching and publishing extensively for several decades. E. Barlésrecognises the debt of all young researchers in the field towards this champion of Japanese art. 24
She reminds us that Japanese art entered Spanish universities in the sixties and since the eighties
there is significant research in three fields ----- art objects in Spanish collections, influence ofJapanese models on Spanish artists, and the history of studies in Spain related to Japanese art.25
No need to stress that these lines of research confirm our thesis that Japanese art is also being
studied from outside the field of Japanese Studies. Finally, the only University offering a degreein Japanese language is Barcelona Autonomous University, which amply precedes the rest of
universities in three decades.
Since the previous government, the change of millennium has seen a new awareness growin Spain about the present and future importance of Asia in the European strategies related to
globalization. The government has declared Asia a first priority in its foreign policy, and since
2000, Casa Asia, a key organisation which combines the official status and support of theForeign Ministry with Catalonian vision of enterprise (it is located in Barcelona) is eager topromote all sorts of strategies and create the necessary programs to help the academic
community constitute itself strongly and efficiently. The stage is ready, let the play begin.
2006 Alfonso Falero Folgoso

24
25

Barlés, 59-64.
Barlés, 64-65.