Get Known if you don't have an account. That sure is one " piece of work ". What are you thinking there?! Here is not motor circuit! Watch where you step! What on Earth were you thinking?! This is not the Grand Prix! Kagura While crashing through a wall with a motorcycle: Gintoki After receiving a fallacious report from a doctor that his balls will explode if he keeps eating sugar: He can fly beneath the sea.
Whoever uses English from here on loses. You just used English. Well, you didn't say to in English "start" so I'm in English "safe". I should use a bunch of English words now before I say to start. Do you know a lot of English? Occasionally they are hung on a shoro, the house which shelters a great bell.
Sometimes, in smaller size, they are on large outdoor lanterns. They are almost never placed on secular buildings; or if so, it is only to affect a Japanese style in the architecture. An exception may be the Japanese National Railways' station at Nara. There, they could have a deeper meaning. Hundreds of pilgrims to the Buddhist shrines in the region arrive at this station daily. Its predecessor was destroyed by bombs from the air in World War II.
Navigation menu
What that bell was like we do not know. None of those we have been discussing would have been very suitable. To spiritual beings their sounds may have been powerful, but to crude and insensitive human ears they were not strong. A bell that could be heard by mortals at a distance must make a louder sound. To do this it must be larger, thicker, heavier. Such a bell was produced in Korea and China around the sixth century A.
The model for it could have been the po-chung, a large bell added to the pien-chung series for Confucian temple music, for this larger bell closely resembled the po-chung. To make it required more foundry space than a cell off a temple court. It called for large amounts of copper and tin, and means of heating all this metal to melting point at the same time. Above all, it demanded the knowledge and skill to make a mold which would both shape the fluid metal into a bell of good tone, and withstand its great weight until it solidified.
The Chinese called it t'e-chung, the Koreans, jong. Its principal features were its cylindrical to barrel shape, a height nearly one and one-half times its diameter, and a large loop on top for suspending it. Its size averaged about 60 cm. It was very expensive to produce, so that a temple could not expect to possess more than one, but its cost was justified because its low tenuous sound, radiating simultaneously in all directions, instantly informed a whole community and awakened it to the call of the Buddha.
This large bell was introduced into Japan, along with other impressive paraphernalia of Buddhist worship, by Koreans in the latter part of the sixth century. The Japanese called the type sh5 -- hanging bell. A number of sh5 of the Nara and Heian periods are extant, of which a few carry dates. The oldest, of the year , is said to be of Chinese provenance. It shows that bellfounders on the continent had discovered the tonal advantages of a bell of this shape,35 and had learned how to make a cope for it, in sections, without running ties through the bell.
They found that sections made to fit tightly together, and laid circularly like bricks around a well, could be bound on the outside, or held together by earth packed around them in a pit, and not spring out from the pressure of the metal. In this way a cope for a bell of very large diameter could be constructed, and it could be made as high as it was possible to stack courses of these rings one on top of the other and tie them down firmly to prevent metal from seeping through the horizontal joints between. The next oldest dated bell, of , was cast in Japan, on Kyushu Island.
The founder was likely a Korean, as were most of the makers of the earliest large bells. These men started casting on Kyushu, and spread eastward. Within about a generation their work was taken over by Japanese founders, and a bell somewhat different in shape from the Korean evolved in Japan. The bell of , known as the Ojikich5 bell, 36 is interesting not only as the oldest dated bell made in Japan. It is, as far as can be ascertained, the oldest bell in the world in regular service today.
It now hangs in the Myoshin-ji temple in Kyoto, where it is sounded for a quarter of an hour every evening at sunset, alternating with strokes on a large drum and on a kei see footnote Furthermore, it has the raised 'nipples' or yu on its upper flank, which are lacking on the bell of , but which afterwards appear on all Japanese bells of this type, regardless of size or use, down to the present time.
These stud-like projections arouse curiosity among Westerners, and a word about them may be interjected. They are seen in most primitive form on a Chinese bell of the tenth century B. Their use was no doubt symbolic, but of what, we do not know.
Gyo Books by Junji Ito and Annette Roman from Simon & Schuster
Soon we find the spikes greatly elongated, and then either elaborated into representations such as coiled serpents with tiger's heads, or simply rounded into plain bosses. We also find that, while they always remain grouped in four matched panels around the bell, these become crowded more towards the top, that is, farther away from the area of greatest vibration. The ancient Chinese considered them -- quite wrongly from our scientific standpoint -- an aid to the tone of the bell. They spoke of the singing of the nipples. The bell of , of Chinese provenance, is without them.
The Koreans imitated them in the form of flat rosettes, usually only 36 in number. A possible explanation of their persistent use on the Japanese sho is that the Chinese missionaries of the seventh century who brought the rei to Japan39 also established a conservative Chinese design for the surface of the sho which emphasized the nipples. The form of back-to-back dragons for the suspension loop on top of the bell is also persistently used, and came from China. The tone of the bell soon came to be considered the Voice of the Buddha, and the nipples were to help spread that Voice.
In modern terminology as given to Westerners, it is that, just as Christ used disciples to send forth His message, so these send forth the message of Holy Buddha. The number of nipples has been increased, and though it is not always the same, they are still always grouped in four matching panels around the circular bell, just as they were around the pointed-oval, fish-mouthed Chinese bell of three thousand years ago.
- Quick Links?
- Shouldve Listened;
- Results?
- .
The bell of already referred to has its flank divided horizontally by a double band formed by three parallel lines around the middle. It is also divided vertically into four equal quarters by vertical bands, described by two lines above the middle and three below. The upper part of these quarters is again horizontally divided by a single line. The Ojikicho bell of is similarly marked off, except that the bands are described by three parallel lines, the horizontal band is slightly below the middle, and the upper subdivisions of the panels above it are each filled with 28 nipples.
The breaking up of the surface by lines is a very ancient practice on Chinese bells. Among other things, lines helped to hide traces of seams where cope sections joined. But only on the Japanese sh5 has a particular arrangement of bands been retained down to present times. In appearance it gives the effect of a package tied with ribbons horizontally and up the four sides. The tendency has been gradually to move the horizontal band lower, and tb put inscriptions or iconography in the panels between it and the nipples.
Inscriptions, on the other hand, are found on the earliest Japanese bells on the vertical bands, in the panels, and sometimes on the inside surface. They are in raised characters which are almost certain to have been cast with the bell and incised which could have been added any time after and both may be on the same bell. The legends consist of Buddhistic names and phrases, and the name and date by sovereign of the donor.
This last is not placed for the information of posterity, but as the visible sign of the religious merit which the donation gives to the donor, and which is carried in its sound to all parts of the world, and even into purgatory. The rosette shuza or tsukiza , thought of as a lotus from the sacred Indian symbol marks the place where the bell is to be struck. There are usually two shuza on opposite sides of the bell; and on earlier bells they were placed at right angles to the line through the points where the loop ryiizu on top joins the bell.
When the horizontal band was moved lower, this also brought the striking point closer to the rim; and as a result, when the bell was struck repetitiously it started to sway. Waist The lines shown at the top and bottom are optional.
Inscriptions are usually placed near the lines, iconography in the middle. Soundbow Striking point at the thickest part, at angle shown, and usually on the inside. Rim or lip It may be variously shaped. It comes to a point. Ryuzu A single loop. Ibonamachi Place of the nyu or nipples. Ikenomachi May hold inscriptions or iconography.
Shuza Striking point at marked places around the bell. Komanatsume Called 'hoof' because profile suggests a horse's hoof. It is the thickest part of the bell. On a few bells a choice of position is given by having four shuza; very rarely is there only one. The lowering of the point of striking also affected the tone of the bell, and required making the rim thicker so as to prevent it from cracking.
The sho is hung stationary, and is struck either by a wooden mallet or a ramrod with a force controlled by the ringer. The Western bell is most commonly swung, and it is struck at two opposite points on the inside by a freely suspended iron clapper moved by the oscillation of the bell, from which it receives its force.
Diagram II illustrates how the sh5 is shaped to withstand an outside blow and the Western bell an inside one, and how the Western bell is flared to provide space for the pendular travel of its clapper. The Western bell may be struck on the outside also, as is generally done for sounding the time on stationary bells in clock towers.
But it will be seen that while the direction of the strike is parallel to the lip on the sho, it is always at an angle to it on the Western bell. Thus, each shape is adapted to its method of ringing. It was called bonsho, literally Brahmin bell. Since, according to Buddhist concept, the sacred word was conjunct with'the sacred corpus; to the mind of the believer its sound was the actual Essence of Buddha. In order to let its note radiate more freely, a separate house for it called a shoro was built on the temple grounds. This was of wood, fashioned after either the one-story stone pavilion of the Koreans, in which the bell's appearance aroused wonder, or the two-story brick 'tower' of the Chinese, in which its concealment betokened mystery.
Temples which could afford it ordered larger bonsh5. Around the end of the seventh century the To-in Garan Eastminster at Horyui near Nara acquired one cm. The kings of Silla Korea were making enormous bells. In the emperor of China installed a bell of over twenty tons at Nanking. There, at the temple of Todai-ji, a bell cm. In the meantime smaller sh6 appeared, as different needs for a signal bell arose. Actual differentiation according to use did not crys. The K6ryuji-ji in Kyoto retains an iron bell of height, 46 cm.
They were called kansh6, densho, kane, or ogane, and in proportions and surface finish were like the bonsho, complete even to the nyu or nipples. They were generally hung on a wall bracket in a passageway overlooking a court, and served to announce within a smaller area than the whole temple compound the times of services and other routine happenings in particular buildings.
In some places these were indicated on a board beside the bell, and next to it a nail on which the striker hung. The bonsho, on the other hand, was rung with a ramrod. We see this first depicted on an embroidery made in the year , preserved at the Chugd-ji nunnery at H6ryiuji. At this early date the bell was suspended close to the floor, so that the shuza or striking point was at about the height of a standing man's hand. The embroidery shows a man standing close to the bell and holding a rounded log in front of him in the palms of his hands.
The apparent action is to swing the log from side to side and hit the bell with the end of it. Later the bell was raised well above the floor, so that the striking point was as high as the ringer's head. The log was made longer to give it the weight of a true ramrod, and suspended by chains or ropes from an overhead beam of the sh5r. This is the ringing device today. The ringer moves the rope back and forth to set the ramrod in motion, and then, with one very strong pull, swings it to strike the bell, retaining his grip on the rope so as to check the ramrod' s momentum and prevent it from immediately making an undesired second stroke.
This manner of ringing produces a very different tone from that made by an iron clapper on a swinging bell. The total sound of a bell is made up of a number of partial notes which cover a wide range of pitch, and the hard iron clapper sets them all vibrating, including many high ones at the beginning of the stroke.
Gyo, Vol. 1 (2nd Edition): The Death-Stench Creeps (Gyo (2nd Edition))
These make some dissonance at each stroke, varying with different bells and often not noticeable except near the bell. The isolation in towers of Westen bells of a size comparable to the bonsho prevents the listener from hearing them close at hand. It is otherwise with the bonsh5. The Japanese Buddhist wants to be able to be close to his bell when it is sounded.
He regards its tone almost as an element like water, and delights in the sensation of its vibrations against his body. This is the virtue of eliminating bonno -- the use of the sound of the bonsho to cleanse the soul and take away all sorrow, i. A low-pitched sound of long duration is sought after. Having a relatively soft end, the wooden ramrod is admirably suited for this, because it sets only the lower partial notes vibrating. A slow beat or pulse is also preferred in the tone.
In modern bells, "sentimentalists" and "purists" are divided on how much clarity of tone should be sacrificed on this account. Even the kansh5 sounds relatively sweet. But the same bell, taken out of the temple court and put up in a fire-watcher's lookout as was gradually found necessary in every urban ward , and struck rapidly with heavy blows by a very hard hammer, gives an alarmingly jarring sound. In this location it is called ginsho -- warning bell. Japanese cypress is the most customary wood, although zelkova and oak are also used for large bonsh5.
The ramrod must not be too light or it will give a poor tone. Nowadays it is swung by only one ringer, or at the most two on the largest bells. Formerly there were as many as eighteen men for a giant such as that at Nara, but probably they worked in relays. In modern practice, more than eight men have been found to make little difference.
Each morning and evening strokes used to be sounded on every temple bonsh6. Between each stroke a priest recited a sutra. The number represents the number of worldly desires which Buddhism says come within us. The ceremony, called hyakuhachi, is to remove them all. It is not effective unless all worldly accounts have been settled before the first stroke.
Nowadays hyakuhachi is performed only on New Year's Eve at midnight. Then, to hear all the temple bells sounding together is an experience comparable to hearing all the church bells on the same occasion in a Christian city. The regular times of ringing at most temples is now limited to once, twice, or three times daily. This is usually morning or evening, morning and evening, or morning, noon, and evening. Generally it occurs with a regularity one could set the watch by; a few temples shift the times according to seasonal sunrise and sunset. At the annual or semi-annual fairs and festivals held at the larger temples there is usually extra ringing.
Some of this is connected with prayers for the dead. At the newly-rebuilt Shitenno-ji in Osaka two bonsho in separate shoro are kept constantly ringing on these occasions. People line up to give requests for the bell to be sounded along with the recitation of sutras. An attendant snatches the tally away so that he can glance at the next one without letting the ramrod lose its momentum, and stamps it so that it can be handed back to the purchaser as a certificate that the requested sutras, vocalized, have been mingled with the sound of the bell. Besides this priestly ringing of private prayers, the lay person is allowed to do his own ringing at some temples.
There is customarily a small fee per stroe for this, and the number allowed per person may be limited. Otherwise, the bell is inaccessible, the door of the two-story shoro being kept locked, while at the one-story pavilion the pull-rope is removed or wound up out of reach. There is usually a strict concern t he appointed ringer shall ring.
This person is not necessarily a priest, a monk, or a nun. It may be a lay man; rarely it is a lay woman. Their number varies greatly according to the meaning of the ringing and the custom of the temple. This usually takes place in a two-story shoro, with the drum in the lower story. In some urban temples the shoro is placed on a knoll at the edge of the grounds so as to raise the bell above nearby sound interferences, yet not too high above persons who wish to be near it when it rings. In rural temples the shoro is often built above other buildings on a hillside.
Bonsh5 in this position have been heard up to 15 kilometers 9 miles away. In the latter the strokes are fast. The sound of the bonsho in temples along the coast has a deep meaning for seafarers, because there it is used as a warning of approaching storms. There is no Old Cow, as in the Palazzo Vecchio of Florence, which spurred its citizens to combat the Sienesi; no Roland, which aroused the burghers of Ghent to withstand the demands of Charles V; no Big Ben, symbolizing the "mother of parliaments"; and certainly no Liberty Bell, as in Philadelphia and Mexico City.
There are no gate bells like those which used to announce the locking in of the city every night and opening it up every morning, not only in Europe, but in China and Korea. There are no gates. Nevertheless, the bell by no means remained a 'sacred vessel'. The kansho especially was taken out of the temple and put to various profane uses. We have already noted it as a ginsho in the fire watcher's lookout. As hontsuri-gane it went into the kabuki theatre, to hang behind a bamboo screen among other instruments for off-stage musical effects.
For this purpose, bells in more modest sizes than for temple use were procurable at fairs and shops. Small domestic bells never became so common as in Western homes. The master might have a flat crotal on a long handle which he shook to call his servant; his lady would have a round one on little legs and with a tiny loop on top which she lifted delicately and rang to summon her maid. The visitor at the door neither rang nor knocked; he called out. The electric doorbell, like the telephone bell, is an acquisition of the twentieth century. So are the equally universal bicycle bell, fire-reel bell and ambulance bell.
Formerly, the only small bells heard in the streets apart from the occasional horse bells and priests' bells already referred to were those of the post courier, the peddler, and the odd-job man kofu. If the small Western bell made its entry into Japan only recently; the larger one came much earlier. We have no record of whether they brought a bell, 65 but we cannot imagine them arriving without an altar bell. This, if like those carried to America, resembled a town crier's handbell. We learn of the fathers in ringing handbells in the streets of Hirado, Kyushu, to attract potential converts.
Before this happened, however, they had erected churches. Since we know next to nothing about the bells these contained, it is easy for us to imagine them swinging in towers, with an amazed populace wondering why they were sounded that way when simply hitting them with a hammer would have been so much easier. Such was likely not the case. Scanty evidence, which underscores the Jesuits' desire not to appear different from the Japanese except in their religious beliefs, pictures a wooden structure with overhanging roof in the style of a Buddhist temple, but entered from the end.
In Kyoto, from inside the unprepossessing Shunko-in in a remote part of the precinct of My6shin-ji, a strange companion answers the Call of the Buddha on the oldest bell still rung. Its height and diameter are each 44 cm. On its straight conical flank is the date , and in two places the symbol -- There is no indication of its place of casting, but if it were not in Japan perhaps made from metal of a destroyed bonsho , it was probably in Macao or Goa.
How it came to Kyoto can only be supposed. It may have been brought from the western end of the country at the end of the seventeenth century, to give evidence in the capital that the pernicious religion of the Europeans had been eradicated. Perhaps it came later, along with the bell of cast on Kyushu Island, it will be remembered as a prize of war. He who could carry away the bonsho ruled the monastery. Benkei, who as an historical character may have lived five hundred years earlier, continued to exist as the fabulous giant who single-handed hauled a three-ton bell up Mount Hiei from Lake Biwa.
Scratches said to have been caused by his dragging it over rocks are visible on its flanks today. Kyoto, however, did not have to go to Lake Biwa for large bells. It cast bronze giants in its own domain. In a bell of nearly 30 metric tons was hung in the HokJ-ji. Its sound rolled over the capital like thunder; but a visible aspect of it caused a still greater effect.
The bell had been ordered to please Ieyasu, chief of the Tokugawa clan, yet had been paid for largely by gold which the rival Toyotomi clan had been storing for war purposes. At the imposing ceremony of dedication and doubtless, thanks to the bell hanging close to the ground Ieyasu discovered the Chinese characters "Ie" and "Yasu" on the inscription, in a position which he took to be an insult to his clan.
Immediately he ordered the ceremony halted. The result was convocations, which brought out rivalries both religious and political, to culminate in a battle in in which the Tokugawa defeated the Toyotomi, and brought in a new historical epoch. The bell still sounds over Kyoto, since joined by another of practically the same size in the Chion-in. The largest, of fifteen metric tons, was installed in in the Zoj6-ji. By this time the Japanese knew the bells of the West, and with a consciousness of their status among nations, they decided to make a bell which would rival Western ones.
It was a sign of the rise of a new industrial class that this bell was not to embellish a capital, ancient or modern, but -- what had once been the hideout for the Toyotomif s gold -- the now swelling commercial metropolis of Osaka. In this bell, of over 60 metric tons, was cast and hung in a new sh6r6 in the Shitenno-ji. There were no disturbances at this dedication, although here too there was a slight flaw in the bell's inscription: While not the heaviest bell ever cast, it was claimed to be the largest in volume. In every sense it was a Japanese Buddhist bonsho, complete with dragon loop on top ryuzu , nipples nyu , and two 'lotuses' shuza for striking with a ramrod.
If the people of Kyoto said with some justification that its tone was unrefined, those of Osaka could reply that one did not make human sacrifices at bell castings in the twentieth century. All the other rites were doubtless carried out: For this bell, in keeping with the times, was not born in a pit specially dug for it in a. After the permanent opening up of the country to foreign intercourse in , Christian churches began to appear in Japan and to make themselves known by the sound of their swinging bells. There was no ban on their ringing, no proscriptions on religious ground, as in some Muslim regions, or because of their making too much noise, as in some Christian.
This happy state continued until World War II, when all ringing was stopped except for alarm. Another factor then entered which Europe had known since it started using cannon, but which was new to Japan. Bells were sequestrated for their metal for war purposes. The government claimed the right to confiscate all bells, and in began to remove most of those cast since Bellfounders briefly experimented with a copper-silica alloy, which produced a strong bell of good tone; but a sharp rise in the price of silica made the cost exorbitant.
The general standard of workmanship is high. A bonsh5 is seldom delivered to the temple until its day of dedication. Few events combine so much color and gaiety with the dignity of a religious ceremony. The townspeople meet the bell on its arrival in the town and escort it in procession to the temple. In the vanguard a hundred or so children in bright costumes and with gold crowns on their heads hold onto long red and white ribbons, tokens of happiness, which stretch back behind them to the bell.
With these they symbolically draw it. Behind the bell carried on a truck walk musicians playing on ancientstyle reeds and flutes, followed by priests wearing colorful robes. They surround their abbot, whose appearance is distinguished chiefly by a hat extending extraordinarily far before and after him, and a pink parasol over his head. The laity bring up the rear. On arrival at the temple gate the great bell is greeted by singing and the bright metallic sounds of many small ain as a chorus welcomes it with goeika music.
The children disperse, and the priests retire while the bell is suspended in its shoro and covered with a white sheet. From the top of it, the red and white ribbons with which the children had guided it to the temple are stretched across the court to the great commemorative stone in the burial plot and fastened securely to it.
This visibly connects the happy occasion of dedication and first sounding of the new bonsh5 with the earth and souls of the ancestors. We are reminded that two thousand years ago the Japanese buried the dotaku in the earth. When the bell is in place, an altar is set up in front of the shoro.
On it are flowers and gifts to the bell. Music sounds from the temple porch, and the musicians lead the priests out in procession to the altar. The abbot ceremonially purifies the air around the shoro and censes its pillars. Prayers are offered, silent except for the exotic instrumental music pouring forth, punctuated by resonant strokes on a dohachi. Then a boy, a son of the donor, comes forward from the.
The abbot intones an address to the bell. After more prayers, this time spoken, with responses from the priests, one of them invites the abbot to sound the bonsho. He goes up into the shor6, swings the ramrod and gives one stroke. There is absolute stillness while, for the first time, the new Voice of Buddha vibrates the temple air. The donor and his wife are each invited to give it a stroke. After more ceremony the priests retire, and the congregation is free to ring the bell. For special guests the occasion concludes with dinner in the temple refectory. It is outside the scope of this article to discuss whether the Japanese are religious or not.
They love their temple bells. While Christians are replacing theirs with electronic substitutes more in keeping with the Computer Age and because they cannot get ringers , Buddhists sound theirs with fervor in the centuries-old way. Both the throaty note of the Shinto crotal heard close by and the tenuous roll of the bonsho over the hills are part of their life and their land. It is expressed in the words of the poet Basho: Who said there were only eight views of Biwa? The ninth view is the sound of Mii-dera's bell. Date s Type cm. Made in- Made for - Date s Types cm.
Sino-Japanese cylindrical shape; hung stationary. Korean barrel shape; hung stationary. European flared shape; hung stationary. European flared shape; hung to swing. European flared shape; hung to swing, but primarily sounded stationary in a carillon, for which it is tuned. We must point out that this last is the figure generally given as height in museum statistics, etc. The reliefs on many European bells in the Middle Ages were made in this way. Two other methods have been used on both Oriental and Occidental bells: This, known as the cire perdue method, w as not used on Japan ese bells of any size until int roduc ed by Ko rean bellfounders about the sixth century A.
It was not si mi larly used on European bells until the close of the Middle Ages. It is dated, "not later than the 14th cent. Some larger bells of the Shang and Chou dynasties have two or four flanges, very elaborately outlined. IV Cambridge, , pp. See also text, following. We find no evidence that the Japanese used re-usable molds, and think this extremely unlikely, except for very small, plain bells.
The highly ornamented bell, made with great skill out of a costly amount of bronze, becomes an individual treasure in every culture. This is well confirmed for eastern Asiatic bells in written references to them. We should therefore presume that the owner of such a bell would want its mold destroyed as soon as the bell was taken out of it, as is done today. Barnard ignores the use of stamps, which has long been Japanese practice, and most likely came from the mainland. The Koreans, from Silla times to the present, place a pipe in the top of a large bell, "to let the sound out.
Dotaku may have rested on the ground. Corrin; also Satis N. Coleman, Bells New York, , p. They have been used in China from West Han times; the Zhuang national minority there now uses them. It is found on some Korean bells contemporary with those in Japan of which we are speaking.
The custom of a Japanese man carrying a bell-shaped fob attached to his tobacco pouch nejime , may have had its origin in this. IV Tokyo, , pp. Frazer, The Golden Bough, 3rd edition, vol. IX London, , p. It is also a proper name. According to legend, suzu were originally of iron. Malm, Japanese Music Tokyo, , p. When a devout Hindu rings an open-mouth bell on completion of his preparations for devotion, "the lesser devas must come.
In Buddhism, the sound of this bell is an integral part of the rite -- as much so as, for example, the spoken "Amen" in a Christian ritual. It is also called dohai, kaisu, rin, orin, and kin Chinese heng. We know of no bell of this shape found in Roman remains. Rather, its ovoid horizontal profile see above, p. The late James A. Plumer of the University of Michigan brought two such small bells, of the Warring States period, from China.
While Hickmann's artifact implies only the travel of a bell, by the same token a knowledge of uses of bells may have been transferred from one culture to another -- see note following. The Shingon sect originated in India. It was brought to China in A. It is related to the Chinese yung-lo. Existing examples in situ give no clue, because windbells are easily re. Those hung on very old buildings, where examination has been possible, appear to be newer than the buildings.
Yet we have them as isolated artifacts over years old. It was evolved from the Chinese stone ch'ing. The bell is now in the private collection of Gentar5 Inoue. There may be a similar undated bell in Japan which is as old. The bell hums c. See Tch'ou To-yi, Bronzes antiques appartentant a C. Loo Paris, , pp. Sullivan, Introduction to Chinese Art London, , pp. Linear divisions were never a feature on Korean bells. Instead, iconography flourished, and we find it copied on some Japanese bells, along with stylized vine and honeysuckle borders, as on the large By6od-in bell of at Uji, near Kyoto.
The Yakushi-ji bell is in the Nara Museum. Some figures go as high as 48 tons, but Aoki's estimate of 26 tons seems to be more likely. In some temples they were hung in the sanctuary, and might be used in the ritual. This is general in Korea see note 7 , where a short log hung from chains is used as a ramrod. The reason for hanging the bell closer to the earth and exposing the soil below it in cemeteries is because there the essence of the sound is intended primarily to benefit the souls of the ancestors, in the earth.
Here one senses a mystic link with the dotaku of seven centuries earlier. This is done by turning them on a lathe after they are cast. It is a delicate process, and has been practised very little on Japanese bells, although some of the newer ones have been tuned under the direction of Ichiro Aoki, following acoustical research at Kyoto Technical University. Bibliography relative to this is given in notes 53, 54, and A, vol XIV, no. The traditional type of bell, complete with nyu, is gradually being replaced by the remote-control electric siren on a steel pylon.
The old-fashioned lookout was a small platform on a mast. Every Two Hours Horyuiji, Saien-do 6, 8, 10 12, 14, 16 18 hrs. When the ringer feels indisposed, his wife can easily walk from her kitchen to the bell, and ring the required strokes for him. The Japanese An exception 63See Malm, op.
- Llanto por Ignacio Sanchez Meijas (Lament for Ignacio Sanchez Meijas).
- Informe sobre España: Repensar el Estado o destruirlo (Spanish Edition).
- History of Japanese Religion: With Special Reference to the Social and Moral Life of the Nation?
- Cest la vie - 4.
- The Magicians Workbook: A Modern Grimoire.
- Join Kobo & start eReading today;
A popular kabuki play, Dojoji, based on the legend Anchin and Kiyohime, uses a representation of a bonsho on stage. The story is one of magic vengeance in which the heroine, on being spurned by her lover, turns into a dragon. Monks hide him from her fury inside a bonsh5, but she heats it to white heat with her coils and reduces him to a cinder inside. A gong may be used instead. From this the Japanese developed similar indoor timepieces, which they equipped with small hemispherical bells, either copied from this gift or from later European clocks which they learn.
Before the Industrial Era such clocks were rare in Japan, as elsewhere. It remained because it was popularly believed to be a Korean bell. This is mentioned in the text, following. Bellfounding nowadays, in Japan as elsewhere, is a full-time occupation, and requires capital investment. There was a time, in Japan as in Europe, when it was largely seasonal, and required only portable permanent equipment.
Then, the Japanese bellfounder cast bells in winter and farmed in summer; his European counterpart was an itinerant bellfounder in summer and a home artisan in winter. However, the many uses of electricity vital to military operations in World War II created a high priority demand for tin for solder. After supplies from Java and the Malay States were cut off, the Japanese had to turn to their bells for tin. These proportions are the result of long experience in each region.
The Japanese say that the bonsh', due to its shape and usage, does not need a higher proportion of tin for hardening to withstand blows, and that an increase would raise its cost out of proportion to any tonal advantage. But southern Asiatic founders often build a flared flank in several sections. It does include all the countries in which one or more bells of over 15, kg.
There are unconfirmed statements that the largest bell cast in Portugal weighs 20, kg. Percival Price, carillonneur at The University of Michigan, received a degree in music from the University of Toronto. In one of his carillon compositions was accepted for the Olympics Music Exhibition in Helsinki.
He is the author of The Carillon , Campanology Europe and numerous contributions to professional journals. Hall who was then the director of the Center for Japanese Studies that I began this project in when my husband went to Okayama City as Field Director of the station maintained by the Center. Although my time was limited, children's game songs were not too difficult either to collect or to analyze and the enjoyment I found in obtaining the material made the project a most pleasurable one.
My special thanks go to Professor Hall for suggesting that I undertake this study. Despite the children's surprise and amusement to find an adult interested in their games and songs, they were unfailingly patient and took a rather indulgent attitude toward my work. As we became better acquainted and I became familiar with the songs and games myself, the children s interest grew in the whole project and they began to regard the affair as a game in itself.
For all these youngsters I have an affection that can never be diminished. I have had a great deal of help from a number of people. Professor Hide Shohara spent many hours of her time in explanation, aided me with a number of the translations, gave me advice and encouragement, and always had suggestions that were extremely valuable. Both Professor and Mrs. Yamagiwa were kind enough to lend me books, to refer me to source materials, to read the manuscript and make helpful suggestions, and to translate several elusive songs.
I am deeply indebted to Mrs. Seiko Miyakawa of Okayama City who accompanied me to the villages and arranged for me to meet groups of children; her help and guidance played a vital part in this project. Haruko Takahashi of Kyoto and Mrs. Barrett both assisted in translation. Gertrude Kurath gave me the benefit of her wide knowledge and experience and undertook the painstaking work of checking the transcriptions. Her advice has been of enormous help. Suggestions made by Professor Richard K. Beardsley were also very helpful. Professor William Malm kindly offered to read the manuscript critically and I deeply appreciate his interest and constructive comments.
I acknowledge most gratefully the generous grant from the Center for Japanese Studies for the completion of this project. I wish to thank Miss Alice Sano and Mrs. Irma DeArman for typing the manuscript. Groups of children were observed at play in school yards during recess or after school near their homes, and wherever possible the songs were taped.
In order to check on differences, if any, in the way city children played the games and sang the songs from the way in which village children performed them, Okayama City, Kurashiki City, and three near-by village communities were selected. The hamlet of Niiike in Kamo village, which had undergone intensive study by the Center, was naturally one of the localities chosen in addition to Imamura and Sanbanson. The material described here concerns the limited area of the two cities and three village communities in which the songs were collected.
Some of the songs are, of course, known in other parts of Japan. Out of the total number recorded a selection of fifty tunes seemed sufficient to represent the variety of games played by the children. These fifty also seemed to be the most popular. Okayama Prefecture is located about ninety miles west of Osaka. Stretching to the south lies the Inland Sea, and to the north the Chugoku mountain range forms a boundary with Tottori Prefecture. Okayama City, formerly a castle town, is the economic and cultural center of the Chugoku district. Kurashiki, about ten miles west of Okayama City was in the Edo period , a thriving port for the rice produced in the district.
Today it is one of the new industrial cities of Japan producing iron, steel, cotton yarn, rayon fabrics, and woven mats. Somewhat to the west of Okayama City, about eight miles away, is the hamlet of Niiike, much studied, much investigated, and much analyzed by members of the Center for Japanese Studies. Imamura is about five miles east of Okayama City and Sanbanson lies about the same distance to the south.
Some of the songs are known throughout Japan; some are sung only locally. A few are fairly old and are known to people in their sixties who declared that their grandparents also knew the songs; a number are of recent origin. How game songs come into being is hard to say, but it is possible to suggest how the many variations that exist come about. A child learns these songs not in class at school or from a book, but from other children, often an older sibling. Sometimes a word is changed because the child hears it that way - as, for instance, the American child who sang "Gladly the cross-eyed bear" for "Gladly the cross I'd bear," or in the case of the nursery rhyme "Diddle-diddle dumpling - Mice and John" for "My son John.
The replacements do not necessarily have to have the same meaning or, for that matter, any meaning. As one Japanese friend said, "I used to sing that song when I was a child, but I never thought about the meaning. However, most changes are likely to be small and both verse and tune remain recognizable. The child sings the altered version, the group hears and learns it, and a variation of the original song is thus created. Distance, too, plays a role in adding to the collection of variations. Children living eight to ten miles apart seldom sing a song in exactly the same way; some of the words are usually different and the tune may be somewhat altered.
At times the same song may be used to accompany a different game. It is not unusual to find that the children take a composed song and use it to accompany a game. Actions The games have the characteristics of games everywhere. They involve more than one participant and almost always contain the elements of a contest and resolution or climax. There is usually a winner and a loser. There are always rules according to which the games are played and these rules are either agreed upon beforehand or are already known to the players and taken for granted before the game starts.
Interestingly enough, the games are very much like the games the children of North America play. They include hide-and-seek, guessing and ring games, London Bridge types, hand clapping, ball bouncing, bean bag, rope skipping, tug-of-war, and counting games as well as counting-out games to determine who shall be the "it" or the oni devil.
It has been said that children's games are mimetic of the acts of their elders. They may imitate serious occupations of adults and may even preserve the remains of ceremonials of olden times. Both boys and girls participate in many of the games. Ball bouncing and bean bag games, however, are considered girls' games and boys rarely, if ever, join in.
In former times, before rubber bouncing balls came into vogue, bean bag games were quite popular, and girls and young women were very adept at handling five bean bags with ease. Low-bouncing balls, beautifully embroidered with colored thread were also used - but these too have now given way to the rubber bouncing ball which is the Japanese girls' delight.
The ball is bounced in innumerable ways - with the hand on the ball and bounced on the ground, on the instep, with the sole of the foot, touching hands between bounces, touching the leg between bounces, rolling the leg over or under the ball, turning around on the bounce, crouching on the bounce, throwing the ball up on the back of the hand, etc.
The long pause that often occurs at the end of the verse is made to give the player, who has just bounced the ball between her legs. Both tempo and rhythm are regulated by the action. The last syllable of the line is often accented as in watashita see No. The most common way of deciding who shall go first or who shall be the "it" in a game is to play "Jan-ken-pon" - itself a game played with hand and fingers by players facing each other. The open palm signifies kami paper ; the fist, ishi stone ; the forefinger and middle finger extended with the remaining fingers held down by the thumb hasami scissors.
Shaking their fists in time as they chant Jan-ken-po, the children, with an explosive burst on pon extend their hands simultaneously in one of the three positions. Stone wins over scissors, since scissors cannot cut stone; paper wins over stone, since paper can cover or be wrapped around stone; and scissors win over paper, since scissors can cut paper.
If the positions turn out to be the same, the children must try again. Song Texts Ball bouncing songs are often counting songs. Here the contents of the song combine with the counting, each line beginning with the same syllable as the number of the line. The short form hi-fu-mi for hitotsu, futatsu, mittsu is usually employed. The count generally starts with one and goes up to ten, although some go only to five or to nine.
One, "Nana ya ko to" No. Ingenious catalogues of shrines, cities, gods, and foods are worked into this mnemonic plan. The magic that numbers hold for children is abundantly evident. Seemingly chosen arbitrarily without any relation to realistic values, numbers that apparently have significance to the child are liberally sprinkled throughout the songs.
Weights, too, appear frequently. Curiously enough, the only colors that are mentioned in the songs given here are red and white. As is the case in folk-songs, there are numerous references to food, both the ordinary, everyday variety and that which is served on special occasions.
It is interesting to note that in the songs describing the famous battle of Kawanakajima No. The replacements are all food terms. They have no meaning in context and are obviously substituted for forgotten words. Japanese children, like children everywhere, sing of flowers, rivers, and mountains; bears, badgers, birds, and rats; historical events; place-names; national heroes; the moon, rain, and snow; heaven and hell; sickness and death; food and nonsense. But they also sing of feudal lords, shrines, Buddhas, and gods of good fortune. Rhyme is not used in Japanese poetry and does not occur in these songs.
The devices of onomatopoeia, as in suppon pon No. Internal repetition sometimes occurs as in Ten, tei, teenmari no te ga sorete No. For instance, in Yuki ga chira chira No. Both polite and impolite language are found. Arigat5 thank you occurs in a number of the songs, while in the song Bosani No. The children keep the songs up-to-date, so to speak. The question and answer pattern is a popular form; into this category fall Kagome No. The repetition of the first word of the song is fairly common as in Kagome, Toryalse, Hiraita No. Sometimes the last words of a line will be repeated with the accent occurring on a different syllable as horo horo No.
A few of the lines fall into the alternation of seven and five syllables characteristic of a great deal of Japanese poetry. The final n counts as a syllable and a long vowel counts as two syllables. Many of the songs are irregular in form and most are quite short, another trait common to Japanese poetry. The Japanese text is given as the children sing it, in the local dialect. The titles of the songs are either those designated by the children or by the first line. One often finds that the children do not know the actual titles of songs, but refer to them by the opening lines.
The translations are free rather than literal. MUSIC Two factors that contribute to the distinctive quality of these songs are their scale structure and a strong tendency to emphasize certain tonal relationships. Japanese scales have been analyzed by scholars in various ways. Hisao Tanabe, 1 Sir Francis Piggott2 and Noel Peri3 have made valuable contributions to the understanding of this complex subject.
To put it most simply, one may say that Japanese scales are pentatonic with variable notes. Or, one may regard the scale as consisting of seven notes, only five of which are considered vital and used in scale construction. Following Philippe Stern's excellent and comprehensive table4 of Japanese modes based on Noel Peri's work, the ryo scale is constructed as follows: Its characteristic feature is a major second followed by a minor third and it differs essentially from the ryO mode in the placement of the third tone Kaku.
In ascending passages the raised fifth is used and resolves to the tonic. The raised second, according to Peri, is used more in theory than in practice. The fifth degree corresponding to the third degree of the ritsu is always raised and is no longer variable. The variable fifth degree is used in ascending passages and resolves to the tonic.
Example VII Japanese folk songs are generally set in the yo or in modes which are said to have developed out of the ritsu scale. For example, "Senzo ya Manzo" No. In some cases the same song may be sung in one area in the yo mode and in another locale in the in mode. The songs described here run the gamut of ritsu plagal without variables,zokugaku, ryo and yo modes. As for the composed songs, No.
Range Three of the songs Nos. These four note tunes, the greater number of which have the same tonal relationships, seem to have the characteristics of the incomplete yo mode. Those songs having a complete scale vary from a seventh to a tenth with most falling within the spread of an octave. Intervals The intervals most frequently used are major seconds, major and minor thirds, and perfect fourths. The appearance of a. Since these songs were all sung by children, sometimes quite young children, the preciseness of the pitch is at times questionable.
Tonal Patterns Prominent emphasis is given to the notes just above and just below the tonic and to the fourth below the tonic as well see songs Nos. These tonal patterns appear so often they may well be called stereotypes. Example XI The dotted eighth followed by a sixteenth note appears frequently. Example XII The majority of the songs begin on the down beat but endings often fall on the weak beat of the bar.
Syncopation is used sparingly. As a rule most are fairly short. Phrases appear in lengths of one, two, three, four, five and seven measures. The most common, however, are two or four bar phrases. Small codas, often appended, tend to be of an emphatic nature and may contain exclamations such as "hoina" as in songs 3 and 4 or spoken words as in "Mari-chan" No. The coda also serves in Nos. Sometimes several themes are stated and then repeated with or without variations.
A number of songs consist of a single theme which is simply repeated throughout. Two tunes "Kyupii-chan" No. General Musical Characteristics While many of these songs begin on the tonic of the scale, eight begin on the note below the basic tone and seven on the fourth below. These tones 2nd below and 4th below the tonic are often emphasized in Japanese folk music. Special attention is frequently given to the final note of a song. It may be accented, cut short, or given an explosive burst.
M Example XV Cadences that occur most often are: Performance No instruments are used to accompany the singing but the bounce of the ball or the slap of the rope serves much the same purpose as a drum might. The start of a song is often quite ragged as far as pitch and tempo are concerned, but there are always one or two strong individuals in the group who have enough assurance to pull the others together and, after a bar or two of uncertainty, all join in lustily. Such well known songs as "Kagome," "Hiraita," "Antagata doko sa," "T5ryanse," "Uchi no Kompira-saii," and "Ho, ho hottaru koi" have appeared in print.
A good number of these tunes, have, so far as I know, never before been published. The songs are grouped according to game type with the ball bouncing songs leading the others in number. The words are by Kitahara, Hakushu. A few special signs and symbols have been used. Ayame ni suiseii 2.
Ichi geto ra 4. Ichi riki sha 5. Kinjo no omochi 7. Ten, ten, tenmari 9. Tsuki no miyako