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Does anyone know how much of the 2,700 year 'official genealogy' is credible?

by lovart 10y ago

twblalock 10y ago
Not a lot of it. Before the 6th century AD, things get very murky, and belong more to the discipline of archaeology than to history. Aside from some nutty right-wingers, the Japanese are not under any illusions about this.
- BurningFrog 10y ago
  That's still 1500 years.
  - twblalock 10y ago
    It is very long. It gets a little bit murky in the 1300s because there were rival claimants to the throne, but they were all related to each other. It's very likely that the dynasty has been in the same family since the 6th century. Some historians think some of the early emperors might have been unrelated to their predecessors, but even those emperors reigned during or before the 6th century. The throne was not always passed from father to son, but sometimes among close relatives, which means that an emperors lack of children was not a problem for the continuation of the dynasty. Furthermore, emperors have been figureheads for most of Japanese history, so there was no significant benefit to usurping the throne as there was in Europe. People who wanted to control the country wanted to be the emperor's advisers, and later the shogun.
justusw 10y ago
Even better: There is even some Korean ancestry mixed into the genetic stew (https://www.theguardian.com/world/2001/dec/28/japan.worlddispatch https://www.theguardian.com/world/2001/dec/28/japan.worlddis...) Luckily, the state-worship of the emperor as a descendant of Amaterasu and Jimmu has been abolished after Hirohito declined being divine after WWII. Maybe now is a good time to take this one step further and to abolish the monarchy once and for all?
- Navarr 10y ago
  While doable, it's worth stopping to consider whether the Emperor is considered a part of the Japanese national identity. Tradition and such can be very important for cultural identity, and should not be overlooked in any discussion about whether or not it should be abolished.

Does anyone know how much of the 2,700 year 'official genealogy' is credible?

by lovart 10y ago

Does anyone know how much of the 2,700 year 'official genealogy' is credible?

Not a lot of it. Before the 6th century AD, things get very murky, and belong more to the discipline of archaeology than to history. Aside from some nutty right-wingers, the Japanese are not under any illusions about this.

BurningFrog 10y ago
That's still 1500 years.
- twblalock 10y ago
  It is very long. It gets a little bit murky in the 1300s because there were rival claimants to the throne, but they were all related to each other. It's very likely that the dynasty has been in the same family since the 6th century. Some historians think some of the early emperors might have been unrelated to their predecessors, but even those emperors reigned during or before the 6th century. The throne was not always passed from father to son, but sometimes among close relatives, which means that an emperors lack of children was not a problem for the continuation of the dynasty. Furthermore, emperors have been figureheads for most of Japanese history, so there was no significant benefit to usurping the throne as there was in Europe. People who wanted to control the country wanted to be the emperor's advisers, and later the shogun.

justusw 10y ago

Even better: There is even some Korean ancestry mixed into the genetic stew (https://www.theguardian.com/world/2001/dec/28/japan.worlddispatch https://www.theguardian.com/world/2001/dec/28/japan.worlddis...) Luckily, the state-worship of the emperor as a descendant of Amaterasu and Jimmu has been abolished after Hirohito declined being divine after WWII. Maybe now is a good time to take this one step further and to abolish the monarchy once and for all?

Navarr 10y ago
While doable, it's worth stopping to consider whether the Emperor is considered a part of the Japanese national identity. Tradition and such can be very important for cultural identity, and should not be overlooked in any discussion about whether or not it should be abolished.