The Seven-Branched Sword and Other Essays

A strangely shaped sword preserved at Isonokami Shrine carries an inscription whose damaged characters provoke a historical puzzle. Kita Sadakichi examines competing readings, Chinese era names, and the possibility that a taboo changed the written record.

Five accompanying essays move between social history and the study of Japan’s earliest inhabitants. Tables chart the population growth of communities subjected to hereditary discrimination. An essay on language rejects the easy assumption that differences in speech prove differences of race, while an editorial account reveals the practical circumstances behind a special journal issue.

The longest essay compares written records, oral traditions, pit dwellings, and migration stories to investigate the relationship between the Emishi, Ainu, and legendary Korobokkuru. Its reasoning is preserved with its uncertainties and historical assumptions.