Damien Marie AtHope’s Art

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#Japan #Jōmon #Torii #Skyburial #Shinto #Buddhism #Yayoi #Confucian #Zen

Japanese Paleolithic

“The Japanese Paleolithic period is the period of human inhabitation in Japan predating the development of pottery, generally before 10,000 BCE. The starting dates commonly given to this period are from around 40,000 BCE; although any date of human presence before 35,000 BCE is controversial, with artifacts supporting a pre-35,000 BCE human presence on the archipelago being of questionable authenticity. The period extended to the beginning of the Mesolithic Jōmon period, or around 14,000 BCE. The earliest human bones were discovered in the city of Hamamatsu in Shizuoka Prefecture, which were determined by radiocarbon dating to date to around 18,000–14,000 years ago.” ref

“The Japanese Paleolithic is unique in that it incorporates one of the earliest known sets of ground stone and polished stone tools in the world, although older ground stone tools have been discovered in Australia. The tools, which have been dated to around 30,000 BCE, are a technology associated in the rest of the world with the beginning of the Neolithic around 10,000 BCE or around 12,000 years ago. It is not known why such tools were created so early in Japan. Because of this originality, the Japanese Paleolithic period in Japan does not exactly match the traditional definition of Paleolithic based on stone technology (chipped stone tools). Japanese Paleolithic tool implements thus display Mesolithic and Neolithic traits as early as 30,000 BCE.” ref

“The Paleolithic populations of Japan, as well as the later Jōmon populations, appear to relate to an ancient Paleo-Asian group which occupied large parts of Asia before the expansion of the populations characteristic of today’s people of China, Korea, and Japan. During much of this period, Japan was connected to the Asian continent by land bridges due to lower sea levels. Skeletal characteristics point to many similarities with other aboriginal people of the Asian continent. Dental structures are distinct but generally closer to the Sundadont than to the Sinodont group, which points to an origin among groups in Southeast Asia or the islands south of the mainland. Skull features tend to be stronger, with comparatively recessed eyes.” ref

 “According to “Jōmon culture and the peopling of the Japanese archipelago” by Schmidt and Seguchi, the prehistoric Jōmon people descended from a paleolithic populations of Siberia (in the area of the Altai Mountains). Other cited scholars point out similarities between the Jōmon and various paleolithic and Bronze Age Siberians. There were likely multiple migrations into ancient Japan. According to Mitsuru Sakitani, the Jōmon people were an admixture of two distinct ethnic groups: A more ancient group (carriers of Y chromosome D1a) that were present in Japan since more than 30,000 years ago and a more recent group (carriers of Y chromosome C1a) that migrated to Japan about 13,000 years ago (Jomon). Genetic analysis on today’s populations is not clear-cut and tends to indicate a fair amount of genetic intermixing between the earliest populations of Japan and later arrivals (Cavalli-Sforza). It is estimated that modern Japanese have about 10% Jōmon ancestry.” ref

“Jōmon people were found to have been very heterogeneous. Jōmon samples from the Ōdai Yamamoto I Site differ from Jōmon samples of Hokkaido and geographically close eastern Honshu. Ōdai Yamamoto Jōmon were found to have C1a1 and are genetically close to ancient and modern Northeast Asian groups but noteworthy different to other Jōmon samples such as Ikawazu or Urawa Jōmon. Similarly, the Nagano Jōmon from the Yugora cave site are closely related to contemporary East Asians but genetically different from the Ainu people, which are direct descendants of the Hokkaido Jōmon. One study, published in the Cambridge University Press in 2020, suggests that the Jōmon people were rather heterogeneous, and that many Jōmon groups were descended from an ancient “Altaic-like” population (close to modern Tungusic-speakers, represented by Oroqen), which established itself over the local hunter gatherers.” ref

“This “Altaic/Transeurasian-like” population migrated from Northeast Asia in about 6,000 BCE, and coexisted with other unrelated tribes and or intermixed with them, before being replaced by the later Yayoi people. C1a1 and C2 are linked to the “Tungusic-like people“, which arrived in the Jōmon period archipelago from Northeast Asia in about 6,000 BCE and introduced the Incipient Jōmon culture, typified by early ceramic cultures such as the Ōdai Yamamoto I Site. Another study, published in Nature in 2021, combined linguistic, archaeological, and genetic evidence to suggest that the Transeurasian, or “Altaic”, population, originated in the West Liao basin of northeastern China, and farmed millet around 9,000 years ago. The study concluded that this population spread through Korea to Japan, bringing their agricultural practices, and triggering a genetic shift from the Jōmon to the Yayoi people, as well as a shift to the Japonic language.” ref

“The origins of the Japanese people is not entirely clear yet. It is common for Japanese people to think that Japan is not part of Asia since it is an island, cut off from the continent. This tells a lot about how they see themselves in relation to their neighbours. But in spite of what the Japanese may think of themselves, they do not have extraterrestrial origins, and are indeed related to several peoples in Asia.” ref

“During the last Ice Age, which ended approximately 15,000 years ago, Japan was connected to the continent through several land bridges, notably one linking the Ryukyu Islands to Taiwan and Kyushu, one linking Kyushu to the Korean peninsula, and another one connecting Hokkaido to Sakhalin and the Siberian mainland. In fact, the Philippines and Indonesia were also connected to the Asian mainland. This allowed migrations from China and Austronesia towards Japan, about 35,000 years ago. These were the ancestors of the modern Ryukyuans (Okinawans), and the first inhabitants of all Japan. The Ainu came from Siberia and settled in Hokkaido and Honshu some 15,000 years ago, just before the water levels started rising again. Nowadays the Ryukuyans, the Ainus and the Japanese are considered three ethnically separate groups. We will see why.” ref

Mitochondrial haplogroups A, B and G originated about 50,000 years ago, and bearers subsequently colonized Siberia, Korea, and Japan, by about 35,000 years ago. Several phenotypical traits associated with Mongoloids with a single mutation of the EDAR gene, dated to c. 35,000 years ago. A Paleolithic site on the Yana River, Siberia, at 71°N, lies well above the Arctic Circle and dates to 27,000 radiocarbon years before present, during glacial times. This site shows that people adapted to this harsh, high-altitude, Late Pleistocene environment much earlier than previously thought. ref

Ust’-Ishim man has been classified as belonging to Y-DNA haplogroup K2a*, belonged to mitochondrial DNA haplogroup R*. Before 2016 they had been classified as U*. Both of these haplogroups and descendant subclades are now found among populations throughout Eurasia, Oceania and The Americas. When compared to other ancient remains, Ust’-Ishim man is more closely related, in terms of autosomal DNA to Tianyuan man, found near Beijing and dating from 42,000 to 39,000 years ago; Mal’ta boy (or MA-1), a child who lived 24,000 years ago along the Bolshaya Belaya River near today’s Irkutsk in Siberia, or; La Brañaman – a hunter-gatherer who lived in La Braña (modern Spain) about 8,000 years ago. ref

“Whole-genome studies reveal a split between Europeans and Asians dating to around 17,000 to 43,000 years ago.  The rise of modern Asians dates to around 25,000 to 38,000 years ago.” ref

“Comparing the DNA sequences of these individuals revealed that, between 15,000 to 34,000 years ago, the humans living in Eurasia had genetic profiles similar to either Europeans or Asians — that is, they had become distinct. This hinted to Fu and Yang that a genetic separation between Asians and Europeans likely happened well before that, around 40,000 years ago. But in younger Eurasian fossils, those from around 7,500 to 14,000 years ago, the genetic gap appeared to have shrunk again, showing humans with genetic similarities to both Asians and Europeans. This suggests that, during this time, the once-distinct Asian and European populations had interacted once again, thereby complicating the genetic history of these groups.” ref

From a cave in South Korea have found evidence that suggests human beings were using sophisticated techniques to catch fish as far back as 29,000 years ago. Pryor to the South Korean find, the oldest fishing implements were believed to be fishing hooks, made from the shells of sea snails, that was found on a southern Japanese island and said to date back some 23,000 years. ref

The Korea Strait was, however, quite narrow at the Last Glacial Maximum from 25,000 to 20,000 years BP. The earliest firm evidence of human habitation is of early Upper Paleolithic hunter-gatherers from 40,000 years ago, when Japan was separated from the continent. Edge-ground axes dating to 32–38,000 years ago found in 224 sites in Honshu and Kyushu are unlike anything found in neighbouring areas of continental Asia, and have been proposed as evidence for the first Homo sapiens in Japan; watercraft appear to have been in use in this period. Radiocarbon dating has shown that the earliest fossils in Japan date back to around 32,000-27,000 years ago; for example in the case of Yamashita Cave 32,100 years ago, in Sakitari Cave cal 31,000–29,000 years ago, in Shiraho Saonetabaru Cave c. 27,000 years ago among others. ref

Jōmon period 

The Jōmon period of prehistoric Japan spans from about 14,000 years ago (in some cases dates as early as 16,500 years ago are given) to about 2,800 years ago. Japan was inhabited by a hunter-gatherer culture that reached a considerable degree of sedentism and cultural complexity. The name “cord-marked” was first applied by the American scholar Edward S. Morse who discovered shards of pottery in 1877 and subsequently translated it into Japanese as jōmon. The pottery style characteristic of the first phases of Jōmon culture was decorated by impressing cords into the surface of wet clay. ref 

Jōmon mtDNA

“At present, 131 Jōmon-period skeletons have been tested in several separate studies, with samples from Kanto (n=54), Tohoku (n=23) and Hokkaido (n=54). The haplogroups identified in Tohoku and Hokkaido were D4h2, M7a and N9b, with also D1a and G1 in Hokkaido.” ref

“Haplogroup N9b was clearly dominant in northern Japan during the Jōmon period, making up over 60% of the matrilineal lineages. Today, N9b is also found among the Udege people of eastern Siberia, just north of the islands of Hokkaido and Sakhalin.” ref

“Haplogroup G1 is a typically Siberian lineage, completely absent from China, and found only at low frequencies in Korea (2.5%). It most common in eastern Siberia, particularly among the Negidals in the Khabarovsk Krai, among the Chuvans of Chukotka, where it exceeds 25% of the female lineages, and among the Itelmens and the Koryaks of the Kamchatka Peninsula, who have over 50% of G1 lineages. G1 has a frequency of 2.5% in Japan, but 22% among the Ainu, who have intermarried over the centuries with tribes from eastern Siberia via Sakhalin and the Kuril Islands. It is therefore not surprising to find in in ancient Hokkaido as well as among modern Ainu.” ref

“Haplogroup D4h seems to be native to Japan, while D1 is not normally found among East Asians but among Native Americans. How did D1 end up in Palaeolithic Hokkaido is still unknown. D1 might first appeared in Siberia then migrated to the Americas, and that a few women carrying these lineages married into other Siberian tribes that eventually came into contact with the Ainu, after many generations of geographic drift. It should be said, however, that D1 now extremely rare in the modern Japanese population and may even have become extinct since the Jōmon period. Samples from Kantō were more varied and suggests that migrations from the continent might have happened before the Yayoi period. They included haplogroups A (7.4%), B (9.3%), D4h (18.5%), F(1.9%), G2 (1.9%), M7a (3.7%), M7b (1.9%), M8a (9.3%), M10 (33%) and N9b (5.6%).” ref

“Like N9b, haplogroups M7 and M10 are extremely ancient lineages that are associated with the some of the earliest migrations of Homo sapiens to East Asia over 50,000 years ago. M7b, M7c and M7e have been found in southern China, Indochina, and the Philippines. M7a, M7b and M7c were all found during the Jōmon period and are still found in modern Japan. However, about 60% of Japanese M7 members belong to M7a, which is really specific to Japan. M10 is considerably more common in China and Korea than in Japan.” ref

“Haplogroup G2 is found in 5% of the Japanese population, but only 4% of the Ainu. It has a very different geographic distribution, being absent from eastern Siberia, but relatively common in Korea (6%), northern China (6.5%), Mongolia (10%), Tibet (11%), Nepal (14%) and even Central Asia.” ref

Did South Chinese Neolithic farmers colonise Japan during the Jōmon period?

“It is not clear at present why typically Chinese mtDNA haplogroups like A, B, F, M8a and M10 were already present in the Kanto during the Late Jōmon period (1500–300 BCE). These may represent early migration of farmers from the continent, many centuries or millennia before the Yayoi invasion. Catherine D’Andrea reported evidence for Late Jōmon rice, foxtail millet, and broomcorn millet dating to the first millennium BCE in Tohoku. However, there is evidence of plant cultivation in Japan long before that. Arboriculture was practiced by Jōmon people in the form of tending groves of nut- and lacquer-producing trees (see Matsui and Kanehara 2006 and Transitions to Agriculture in Japan, Gary W. Crawford). A domesticated variety of peach, apparently from China, appeared very early at Jōmon sites circa 4700–4400 BCE. Several sites (including Torihama, Sannai Maruyama and Mawaki in central and northern Honshu) of the Early Jōmon (4,000–2500 BCE) and Middle Jōmon (2500–1500 BCE) periods show evidence of cultivated plants, including barley, barnyard millet, buckwheat, rice, bean, soybean, burdock, hemp, egoma and shiso mint, mountain potato, taro potato, and bottle gourd. Many archeologists believe that these cultivated plants were only used to supplement the Jōmon diet, which still relied heavily on hunting, fishing and gathering.” ref

“Most of these domesticated plants, including rice and millet, are very unlikely to have been domesticated independently by the Jōmon hunter-gatherers, and almost certainly required the migration of farmers from China or Korea. The hundreds of ancient DNA samples from the Middle East and Europe have confirmed that the spread of agriculture always involved the migration of farmers and did not propagate purely by cultural diffusion. Consequently, it is extremely likely that Chinese Neolithic farmers brought these crops to Japan, perhaps in several waves of migration which would have taken place between 4500 and 2500 BCE.” ref

“The presence of typically South Chinese paternal (D1a1, O1a, O2a, O3a1, O3a2) and maternal lineages (M7b, M7c, M9, M12) strongly suggests that at least one of these Neolithic migrations originated in South China. These specifically South Chinese haplogroups represent approximately 5-10% of the modern Japanese maternal lineages and up to 15% of paternal ones. However, South Chinese farmers would have also carried haplogroups shared by the Yayoi people, such as other Y-DNA O3 subclades, and mtDNA A, B D4, D5 and F. Late Jomon mtDNA samples from the Kanto region shows that Chinese lineages made up about 65 to 75% of the maternal lineages at the time. A fairer approximation of the share of modern lineage of Neolithic South Chinese origin might be anywhere between 5 and 35% for maternal lineages, and perhaps around 10 to 20% for paternal ones. More data would be needed to give a more accurate estimation.” ref

“It remains to be confirmed how South Chinese Neolithic farmers reached Japan, but the easiest and safest route is via Taiwan and the Ryukyu Islands. Agriculture appears to have taken root in Taiwan between 4000 and 3500 BCE. The The southern Ryukyu Islands were re-settled by around 2300 BCE as part of the Neolithic Austronesian expansion from Taiwan (Austronesian and Jōmon identities in the Neolithic of the Ryukyu Islands, Mark J. Hudson (2012)), and could have reached Kyushu by 2000 BCE. However, this does not account for the evidence of crops during the Early Jōmon period, which might have come through another route, either following the coastline until the Korean peninsula, or crossing directly from China to Kyushu. A third possibility is that the first migration from Southeast China followed the chain of islands from Taiwan to Kyushu without stopping along the way and only settling in Japan itself, while Taiwan and the Ryukyus were settled by another later migration from mainland China. In fact, these Austrnesian Neolithic farmers reached the Philippines by 5000 BCE and the rest of Southeast Asia by 4000 BCE, so there is no reason they couldn’t have reached Japan by then. There is reliable evidence of a minor but very real linguistic connection between Austronesian languages (notably Malay) and Japanese (see Linguistic evidence below), and the Austronesian expansion from south-eastern China is the best way to explain it.” ref

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“Anatomically modern humans expanded into Southeast Asia(SEA) at least 65,000 years ago, leading to the formation of the Hòabìnhian hunter-gatherer tradition first recognized by ~44,000 years ago. Though Hòabìnhian foragers are considered the ancestors of present-day hunter-gatherers from mainland Southeast Asia (MSEA), the East Asian phenotypic affinities of the majority of Present-day Southeast Asian populations suggest that diversity was influenced by later migrations involving rice and millet farmers from the north. These observations have generated two competing hypotheses: One states that the Hòabìnhian hunter-gatherers adopted agriculture without substantial external gene flow, and the other (the “two-layer” hypothesis) states that farmers from East Asia (EA) replaced the indigenous Hòabìnhian inhabitants ~4,000 years ago. Studies of present-day populations have not resolved the extent to which migrations from East Asia affected the genetic makeup of Southeast Asia.” ref

“Outgroup f3 statistics show that group 1 shares the most genetic drift with all ancient mainland samples and Jōmon. All other ancient genomes share more drift with present-day East Asian and Southeast Asian populations than with Jōmon. This is apparent in the fastNGSadmix analysis when assuming six ancestral components (K= 6), where the Jōmon sample contains East Asian components and components found in group 1. Finally, the Jōmon individual is best-modeled as a mix between a population related to group 1/Önge and a population related to East Asians (Amis), whereas present-day Japanese can be modeled as a mixture of Jōmon and an additional East Asian component. The remaining ancient individuals are modeled in fastNGSadmix as containing East Asian and Southeast Asian components present in high proportions in present-day Austroasiatic, Austronesian, and Hmong-Mien speakers, along with a broad East Asian component. A principal component analysis including only East Asian and Southeast Asian populations that did not show considerable Papuan or Önge-like ancestry separates the present-day speakers of ancestral language families in the region: Trans-Himalayan (formerly Sino-Tibetan), Austroasiatic, and Austronesian/Kradai. The ancient individuals form five slightly differentiated clusters (groups 2 to 6), in concordance with fastNGSadmix and f3 results.” ref

“The best model for present-day Dai populations is a mixture of group 2 individuals and a pulse of admixture from East Asians. Group 6 individuals (1,880 to 299 years ago) originate from Malaysia and the Philippines and cluster with present-day Austronesians. Group 6 also contains Ma554, having the highest amounts of Denisovan-like ancestry relative to the other ancient samples, although we observe little variation in this archaic ancestry in our samples from mainland Southeast Asia. Group 5 (2,304 to 1,818 years ago) contains two individuals from Indonesia, modeled by fastNGSadmix as a mix of Austronesian- and Austroasiatic-like ancestry, similar to present-day western Indonesians, a finding consistent with their position in the principal component analysis. Indeed, after Mlabri and Htin, the present-day populations sharing the most drift with group 2 are western Indonesian samples from Bali and Java previously identified as having mainland Southeast Asian ancestry. Treemix models the group 5 individuals as an admixed population receiving ancestry related to group 2 and Amis.” ref

‘Despite the clear relationship with the mainland group 2 seen in all analyses, the small ancestry components in group 5 related to Jehai and Papuans visible in fastNGSadmix may be remnants of ancient Sundaland ancestry. These results suggest that group 2 and group 5 are related to mainland migration that expanded southward across mainland Southeast Asia by 4,000 years ago and into island Southeast Asia (ISEA) by 2,000 years ago. A similar pattern is detected for Ma555 in Borneo (505 to 326 years ago, group 6), although this may be a result of recent gene flow. Group 3 is composed of several ancient individuals from northern Vietnam (2,378 to 2,041 years ago ) and one individual from Long Long Rak (LLR), Thailand (1,691 to 1,537 ,000 years ago ). They cluster in the principal component analysis with the Dai, Amis, and Kradai speakers from Thailand, consistent with an Austro-Tai linguistic phylum, comprising both the Kradai and Austronesian language families. Group 4 contains the remaining ancient individuals from LLR in Thailand (1,570 to 1,815 years ago), and Vt778 from inland Vietnam (2,750 to 2,500 years ago).” ref

“These samples cluster with present-day Austroasiatic speakers from Thailand and China, in support of a South China origin for Long Long Rak. Present-day Southeast Asian populations derive ancestry from at least four ancient populations. The oldest layer consists of mainland Hòabìnhians (group 1), who share ancestry with present-day Andamanese Önge, Malaysian Jehai, and the ancient Japanese Ikawazu Jōmon. Consistent with the two-layer hypothesis in mainland Southeast Asia, researchers observed a change in ancestry by ~4,000 years ago, supporting a demographic expansion from East Asia into Southeast Asia during the Neolithic transition to farming. However, despite changes in genetic structure coinciding with this transition, evidence of admixture indicates that migrations from East Asia did not simply replace the previous occupants. Additionally, late Neolithic farmers share ancestry with present-day Austroasiatic-speaking hill tribes, in agreement with the hypotheses of an early Austroasiatic farmer expansion. By 2,000 years ago, Southeast Asian individuals carried additional East Asian ancestry components absent in the late Neolithic samples, much like present-day populations. One component likely represents the introduction of ancestral Kradai languages in mainland Southeast Asia, and another is the Austronesian expansion into island Southeast Asia reaching Indonesia by 2,100 years ago and the Philippines by 1,800 years ago. The evidence described here favors a complex model including a demographic transition in which the original Hòabìnhians admixed with multiple incoming waves of East Asian migration associated with the Austroasiatic, Kradai, and Austronesian language speakers.” ref

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The Origins of Japanese Culture Uncovered Using DNA

“The Jomon people were not homogeneous”

“Samples discovered at the Odake shell mound dig in Toyama City, a site from around 6,000 years ago (Early Jomon period), but an enormous amount of artifacts have been unearthed. Although the total amount of Early Jomon period human remains excavated nationwide up to that point had been around only eighty sets of remains altogether, a further ninety-one sets of remains came from just this one site. As luck would have it, we ended up in charge of analyzing the “mitochondrial DNA” of those remains. Let me explain simply what we can tell from this analysis.” ref

“Mitochondria are organelles (tiny organs) contained in the cytoplasm in the cells of the human body. Because mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) is passed genetically from mother to child, if we analyze a certain person’s mtDNA we can trace the maternal line of that person’s ancestry. By comparing different people’s DNA, we can tell in what kind of order branching occurred from a common ancestral line. There are two things that became clear from the analysis of the human remains found at the Odake shell mound. The first is that none of the D4 type mtDNA that one-in-three modern day Japanese people possesses was detected whatsoever. In other words, it reinforces the theory—as has been said conventionally—that the D4 type comes from immigrant-type Yayoi peoples.” ref

“It’s reasonable to think that a group of rice-growing farmers from the continent became one of the fundamental bases for the modern Japanese people. Only, this D4 group is classified down more finely from “a” to “n”—for example, D4b occurs frequently in the indigenous peoples of Siberia, and so on—and there are many aspects of the roots of these that have yet to be explained. In actual fact, type D4 DNA has been found in the remains of other Jomon people that we have examined. What we can say at this point in time is that it (the D4 type) was born on the continent around 20,000–30,000 years ago, and that later it gave birth to various other types, some of which also came to Japan during the Jomon period. But the main group is that which came to Japan together with rice farming during the Yayoi period.” ref

The second distinguishing feature of the Odake shell mound site is that a mixture of the Southern “M7a” type and the Northern “N9b” type was found there. Although the former type (M7a) is possessed by between 7 and 8% of modern day Japanese, in Okinawa as high as around 24% has been detected—so it is considered that this is the oldest group, which came to the Japanese archipelago first from the south. However, since there is nobody in Taiwan with this type and it is limited exclusively to the Japanese islands, the route by which it entered has yet to be identified. In contrast to this, remains containing the latter type (N9b) have been found in quite large numbers at shell mounds from Hokkaido, along the Tohoku (north-eastern Japan) coast and in the Kanto area; and given the fact that it is found frequently in the indigenous peoples of the Primorsky Krai (Maritime Province) area of Russia it is thought that this is a group that entered Japan from the north at a time not too different from that of the former (M7a) group.” ref

“The southern M7a type is a type that is unique to Japan. If somewhere in the world we examine some DNA and we find this type, we can judge that it is the DNA of someone who is related to a Japanese person or people in some shape or form. Actually, there are around 2 or 3% in the Korean Peninsula, but we think that there is a high probability that they are the descendants of a group that entered there from Japan. In any case, what we can say from the characteristics of the human remains found at the Odake shell mound is that it’s unreasonable to suppose that the people who were living in Japan before the Yayoi people came were “homogenous” Jomon people.” ref

“Since some time ago, in the world of archeology too, it has been pointed out—from the differences in the shapes of pottery and stone tools and so on—that Jomon culture was not uniform. For example, in the case of the earliest Jomon period pottery, there is Chinsenmon pottery, which is often found in eastern Japan, and Oshigatamon pottery, which is distributed around western Japan, and it has been acknowledged that there are clear differences in the patterns. When we tried analyzing the DNA—in other words the genome—of the Jomon people using the latest technology, we found that the Jomon people are not similar to anyone, in any period in history, anywhere else in the world. If we look at it another way, they are also slightly similar in small ways to each of the various peoples of regions across a wide area of Asia. What this means is that the Jomon people were probably born within the Japanese archipelago. In other words, in Japanese history there is an extremely long Paleolithic (stone age) period (between 40,000 and 15,000 years ago) leading up to the Jomon period, but during that period—roughly speaking—various different peoples came to the Japanese archipelago from the north and south. What I’m saying is, I wonder if it wasn’t that the Jomon people were born out of the progressive mixing/blending amongst the group brought about by this influx.” ref

“Haplogroup M7 (mtDNA)– found in East Asia and Southeast Asia, especially in Japan, southern China, Vietnam, Laos, and Thailand; also found with low frequency in Central Asia and Siberia

• Haplogroup M7a
  • Haplogroup M7a* – Japan
  • Haplogroup M7a1
    • Haplogroup M7a1* – Japan, Jiangsu, Shandong
    • Haplogroup M7a1a
      • Haplogroup M7a1a* – Japan, Korea, Beijing, Hebei, Henan, Sichuan, Shanghai, Shandong
      • Haplogroup M7a1a1
        • Haplogroup M7a1a1* – Japan, Korea, Jiangsu, Shandong, Liaoning, Henan
        • Haplogroup M7a1a1a – Japan
      • Haplogroup M7a1a2
        • Haplogroup M7a1a2* – Japan, Jiangsu
        • Haplogroup M7a1a2a – Japan
      • Haplogroup M7a1a3 – Japan
      • Haplogroup M7a1a4
        • Haplogroup M7a1a4* – Japan, Zhejiang
        • Haplogroup M7a1a4a – Japan
      • Haplogroup M7a1a5
        • Haplogroup M7a1a5* – Japan
        • Haplogroup M7a1a5a – Japan, Korea, Tianjin
      • Haplogroup M7a1a6
        • Haplogroup M7a1a6* – Japan, Philippines, Jiangsu, Shanxi, Shandong
        • Haplogroup M7a1a6a – Japan
      • Haplogroup M7a1a7
        • Haplogroup M7a1a7* – Japan, Korea
        • Haplogroup M7a1a7a – Uyghur
      • Haplogroup M7a1a8 – Japan, Jiangsu
      • Haplogroup M7a1a9 – Japan, Korea, Tianjin
      • Haplogroup M7a1a10 – Japan
    • Haplogroup M7a1b
      • Haplogroup M7a1b1
        • Haplogroup M7a1b1* – Japan, China (Minnan Han)
        • Haplogroup M7a1b1a – Japan
      • Haplogroup M7a1b2 – Japan
  • Haplogroup M7a2
    • Haplogroup M7a2* – Japan
    • Haplogroup M7a2a – Japan, Ulchi, Yakut
      • Haplogroup M7a2a1 – Japan
      • Haplogroup M7a2a2
        • Haplogroup M7a2a2* – Japan
        • Haplogroup M7a2a2a
          • Haplogroup M7a2a2a* – Japan (Gunma)
          • Haplogroup M7a2a2a1 – Japan (Aichi)
      • Haplogroup M7a2a3
        • Haplogroup M7a2a3a
          • Haplogroup M7a2a3a* – Udihe
          • Haplogroup M7a2a3a1 – Udihe
        • Haplogroup M7a2a3b – Evenk (Nyukzha River basin), Buryat
      • Haplogroup M7a2a4 – Japan” ref

“Haplogroup N9b – Japan, Udegey, Nanai, Korea [time to most recent common ancestor 14,885 years ago]

• • Haplogroup N9b1 – Japan [time to most recent common ancestor 11,859 years ago]
    • Haplogroup N9b1a – Japan [time to most recent common ancestor 10,645 years ago]
    • Haplogroup N9b1b – Japan [time to most recent common ancestor 2,746 years ago]
    • Haplogroup N9b1c – Japan [time to most recent common ancestor 6,987 years ago]
      • Haplogroup N9b1c1 – Japan
  • Haplogroup N9b2 – Japan [time to most recent common ancestor 13,369 years ago]
    • Haplogroup N9b2a – Japan
  • Haplogroup N9b3 – Japan [time to most recent common ancestor 7,629 years ago]
  • Haplogroup N9b4 – Japan, Ulchi” ref

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Prehistoric Japan’s Migrations

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Bridging the Boreal Forest: Siberian Archaeology and the Emergence of Pottery among Prehistoric Hunter-Gatherers of Northern Eurasia

Pic ref

Globalization and the Emergence of Ceramic-using Hunter-gatherers in Northern Eurasia 

A comparative perspective on the ‘western’ and ‘eastern’ Neolithics of Eurasia: Ceramics; agriculture and sedentism

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Maps showing ice age migration routes from northern coastal China to the Americas and Japan.

“Graphical abstract showing ice age migration routes from northern coastal China to the Americas and Japan. A team of scientists discovered that Native Americans share a female lineage with ancient populations from northern coastal China, adding complexity to the ancestry of Native Americans. By analyzing mitochondrial DNA, the researchers found evidence of two migrations from northern coastal China to the Americas during the last ice age and the subsequent melting period. Another branch of the same lineage migrated to Japan during the second migration, which may explain archeological similarities between the Americas, China, and Japan. This study broadens the understanding of Native American ancestry, which was previously thought to have come mainly from Siberia, Australo-Melanesia, and Southeast Asia.” ref 

“Scientists have used mitochondrial DNA to trace a female lineage from northern coastal China to the Americas. By integrating contemporary and ancient mitochondrial DNA, the team found evidence of at least two migrations: one during the last ice age, and one during the subsequent melting period. Around the same time as the second migration, another branch of the same lineage migrated to Japan, which could explain Paleolithic archeological similarities between the Americas, China, and Japan. Though it was long assumed that Native Americans descended from Siberians who crossed over the Bering Strait’s ephemeral land bridge, more recent genetic, geological, and archeological evidence suggests that multiple waves of humans journeyed to the Americas from various parts of Eurasia.” ref

“To shed light on the history of Native Americans in Asia, a team of researchers from the Chinese Academy of Sciences followed the trail of an ancestral lineage that might link East Asian Paleolithic-age populations to founding populations in Chile, Peru, Bolivia, Brazil, Ecuador, Mexico, and California. The lineage in question is present in mitochondrial DNA, which can be used to trace kinship through the female line. The first radiation event occurred between 19,500 and 26,000 years ago during the Last Glacial Maximum, when ice sheet coverage was at its greatest and conditions in northern China were likely inhospitable for humans. The second radiation occurred during the subsequent deglaciation or melting period, between 19,000 and 11,500 years ago. There was a rapid increase in human populations at this time, probably due to the improved climate, which may have fueled expansion into other geographical regions. Mitogenome evidence shows two radiation events and dispersals of matrilineal ancestry from Northern Coastal China to the Americas and Japan.” ref

Damien Marie AtHope’s Art

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Damien Marie AtHope’s Art

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Damien Marie AtHope’s Art

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The emergence of writing in Japan artifacts from the second century BCE

“The emergence of writing in Japan has been dated based on pottery from the period decorated with written characters that ink stone manufacturing. Which was likely underway in the second and first centuries BCE in present-day Fukuoka and Saga prefectures in southwestern Japan. Stone artifacts from the second century BCE Uruujitokyu ruins in Itoshima, Fukuoka Prefecture, Nakabaru ruins in Karatsu, in neighboring Saga Prefecture, and the first century B.C. Higashi Oda Mine ruins in the town of Chikuzen, Fukuoka Prefecture.” ref

“Among the artifacts are thin stones with fan-shaped ends, polished on one side and left rough on the other — typical features of ink stones. However, the items appear to have been broken before they were finished. The artifacts also include unfinished stone files for making ink from the ink stones, and stone saws. The collection of items together led Yanagida to conclude the people in the area had been making ink stones. Ink stones are thought to have first been made in China in the third century BCE, toward the end of the Warring States period, and flat, rectangular stones became widespread during the Western Han dynasty. Many Yayoi period stones have been found in recent years, primarily in northern Kyushu where Fukuoka and Saga prefectures are now, but it was unknown whether they had been made in Japan.” ref

“Furthermore, even the oldest of the artifacts dated to about the first century. Yanagida’s findings put the start of ink stone manufacturing in Japan at least 100 years earlier than that, and in nearly the same period as the rectangular stones were being made in China. “There is nothing to say but that the stones were used by Wajin (Yayoi period Japanese people),” Yanagida said of the artifacts he analyzed. “There was a demand for the written word, and that’s why (the ink stones) were being made. I suspect (Japanese producers) copied Chinese stones and began making them domestically,” Professor Yasuo Yanagida from Kokugakuin University added after research.” ref

“The inkstone is Chinese in origin and is used in calligraphy and painting. Extant inkstones date from early antiquity in China. The device evolved from a rubbing tool used for rubbing dyes dating around 6000 to 7000 years ago. The earliest excavated inkstone is dated from the 3rd century BCE and was discovered in a tomb located in modern Yunmeng, Hubei. Usage of the inkstone was popularized during the Han Dynasty. Stimulated by the social economy and culture, the demand for inkstones increased during the Tang Dynasty (618–905) and reached its height in the Song Dynasty (960–1279).” ref

“Song Dynasty inkstones can be of great size and often display a delicacy of carving. Song Dynasty inkstones can also exhibit a roughness in their finishing. Dragon designs of the period often reveal an almost humorous rendition; the dragons often seem to smile. From the subsequent Yuan Dynasty, in contrast, dragons display a ferocious appearance. The Qianlong Emperor had his own imperial collection of inkstones catalogued into a twenty-four chapter compendium entitled Xiqingyanpu (Hsi-ch’ing yen-p’u). Many of these inkstones are housed in the National Palace Museum collection in Taipei.” ref

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Genetic evidence

“It is now believed that the modern Japanese descend mostly from the interbreeding of the Jōmon Era people (15,000-500 BCE), composed of the above Ice Age settlers, and a later arrival from China and/or Korea. Around 500 BCE, the Yayoi people crossed the see from Korea to Kyushu, bringing with them a brand new culture, based on wet rice cultivation and horses. As we will see below, DNA tests have confirmed the likelihood of this hypothesis. About 54% of paternal lineages and 66% the maternal lineages have been identified as being of Sino-Korean origin.” ref  

“Evidence has emerged from ancient DNA testing that there may have been two major waves of migration from the continent to Japan. The Iron Age Yayoi invasion from Korea was only the most recent of them. Kenichi Shinoda (2003) found Chinese-looking maternal lineages (haplogroups A, B, F, M8a and M10) in the Kanto region dating from the late Jōmon period mixed with typical Jōmon lineages (M7a, N9b). Although this hasn’t been completely confirmed yet, this could indicate that farmers from mainland China colonised Japan several millennia before the Yayoi invasion, which would explain why the Japanese also possess typically South Chinese Y-haplogroups not found in Korea, such as O1a, O2a, O3a1c (JST002611) and O3a2 (P201).” ref   

DNA analysis of the Japanese people

“Two kinds of DNA tests allow to trace back prehistoric ancestry. The first one is mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA), DNA found outside the cells’ nucleus and inherited through the mother’s line. The other is the Y-chromosome (Y-DNA), inherited exclusively from father to son (women do not have it). They are both inherited in an unaltered fashion for many generations, which allow geneticists to identify very old lineages and ancient ethnicities.”  ref 

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Shintoism

“Shinto (Japanese: 神道, romanized: Shintō) is a religion originating from Japan. Classified as an East Asian religion by scholars of religion, its practitioners often regard it as Japan’s indigenous religion and as a nature religion. Scholars sometimes call its practitioners Shintoists, although adherents rarely use that term themselves. There is no central authority in control of Shinto, with much diversity of belief and practice evident among practitioners. A polytheistic and animistic religion, Shinto revolves around supernatural entities called the kami (神). The kami are believed to inhabit all things, including forces of nature and prominent landscape locations. The kami are worshipped at kamidana household shrines, family shrines, and jinja public shrines. The latter are staffed by priests, known as kannushi, who oversee offerings of food and drink to the specific kami enshrined at that location. This is done to cultivate harmony between humans and kami and to solicit the latter’s blessing.” ref

“Other common rituals include the kagura dances, rites of passage, and seasonal festivals. Public shrines facilitate forms of divination and supply religious objects, such as amulets, to the religion’s adherents. Shinto places a major conceptual focus on ensuring purity, largely by cleaning practices such as ritual washing and bathing, especially before worship. Little emphasis is placed on specific moral codes or particular afterlife beliefs, although the dead are deemed capable of becoming kami. The religion has no single creator or specific doctrine, and instead exists in a diverse range of local and regional forms. Although historians debate at what point it is suitable to refer to Shinto as a distinct religion, kami veneration has been traced back to Japan’s Yayoi period (300 BCE to 300 CE). Buddhism entered Japan at the end of the Kofun period (300 to 538 CE) and spread rapidly. Religious syncretization made kami worship and Buddhism functionally inseparable, a process called shinbutsu-shūgō.” ref

“The kami came to be viewed as part of Buddhist cosmology and were increasingly depicted anthropomorphically. The earliest written tradition regarding kami worship was recorded in the 8th-century Kojiki and Nihon Shoki. In ensuing centuries, shinbutsu-shūgō was adopted by Japan’s Imperial household. During the Meiji era (1868 to 1912), Japan’s nationalist leadership expelled Buddhist influence from kami worship and formed State Shinto, which some historians regard as the origin of Shinto as a distinct religion. Shrines came under growing government influence, and citizens were encouraged to worship the emperor as a kami.” ref

“With the formation of the Japanese Empire in the early 20th century, Shinto was exported to other areas of East Asia. Following Japan’s defeat in World War II, Shinto was formally separated from the state. Shinto is primarily found in Japan, where there are around 100,000 public shrines, although practitioners are also found abroad. Numerically, it is Japan’s largest religion, the second being Buddhism. Most of the country’s population takes part in both Shinto and Buddhist activities, especially festivals, reflecting a common view in Japanese culture that the beliefs and practices of different religions need not be exclusive. Aspects of Shinto have been incorporated into various Japanese new religious movements. There is no universally agreed definition of Shinto. However, the authors Joseph Cali and John Dougill stated that if there was “one single, broad definition of Shinto” that could be put forward, it would be that “Shinto is a belief in kami“, the supernatural entities at the center of the religion.” ref

“Kami (Japanese: 神, [kaꜜmi]) are the deities, divinities, spirits, mythological, spiritual, or natural phenomena, or holy powers that are venerated in the Shinto religion. They can be elements of the landscape, forces of nature, beings and the qualities that these beings express, and/or the spirits of venerated dead people. Many kami are considered the ancient ancestors of entire clans (some ancestors became kami upon their death if they were able to embody the values and virtues of kami in life). Traditionally, great leaders like the Emperor could be or became kami. Kami is the Japanese word for a deity, divinity, or spirit. It has been used to describe mind, God, supreme being, one of the Shinto deities, an effigy, a principle, and anything that is worshipped. Although deity is the common interpretation of kami, some Shinto scholars argue that such a translation can cause a misunderstanding of the term.” ref

“Some etymological suggestions are:

• Kami may, at its root, simply mean spirit, or an aspect of spirituality. It is written with the kanji 神, Sino-Japanese reading shin or jin. In Chinese, the character means deity.
• In the Ainu language, the word kamuy refers to an animistic concept very similar to Japanese kami. The matter of the words’ origins is still a subject of debate; but it is generally suggested that the word kami was derived from Ainu word kamuy.
• In his Kojiki-den, Motoori Norinaga gave a definition of kami: “…any being whatsoever which possesses some eminent quality out of the ordinary, and is awe-inspiring, is called kami.” ref

“A kamuy (Ainu: カムィ; Japanese: カムイ, romanized: kamui) is a spiritual or divine being in Ainu mythology, a term denoting a supernatural entity composed of or possessing spiritual energy. The Ainu people have many myths about the kamuy, passed down through oral traditions and rituals. The stories of the kamuy were portrayed in chants and performances, which were often performed during sacred rituals. In concept, kamuy are similar to the Japanese kami but this translation misses some of the nuances of the term (the missionary John Batchelor assumed that the Japanese term was of Ainu origin). The usage of the term is very extensive and contextual among the Ainu, and can refer to something regarded as especially positive as well as something regarded as especially strong. Kamuy can refer to spiritual beings, including animals, plants, the weather, and even human tools. Guardian angels are called Ituren-Kamui. Kamuy are numerous; some are delineated and named, such as Kamuy Fuchi, the hearth goddess, while others are not. Kamuy often have very specific associations, for instance, there is a kamuy of the undertow. Batchelor compares the word with the Greek term daimon. Personified deities of Ainu mythology often have the term kamuy applied as part of their names.” ref

“The Ainu legend goes that at the beginning of the world, there was only water and earth mixed together in a sludge. Nothing existed except for the thunder demons in the clouds and the first self created kamuy. The first kamuy then sent down a bird spirit, moshiri-kor-kamuy, to make the world inhabitable. The water wagtail bird saw the swampy state of the earth and flew over the waters, and pounded down the earth with its feet and tail. After much work, areas of dry land appeared, seeming to float above the waters that surrounded them. Thus, the Ainu refer to the world as moshiri, meaning “floating earth”. The wagtail is also a revered bird due to this legend. Once the earth was formed, the first kamuy, otherwise known as kanto-kor-kamuy, the heavenly spirit, sent other kamuy to the earth. Of these kamuy was ape-kamuy (see also kamuy huchi, ape huchi), the fire spirit. Ape-kamuy was the most important spirit, ruling over nusa-kor-kamuy (ceremonial altar spirit), ram-nusa-kor-kamuy (low ceremonial altar spirit), hasinaw-kor-kamuy (hunting spirit), and wakka-us-kamuy (water spirit). As the most important kamuy, ape-kamuy’s permission/assistance is needed for prayers and ceremonies. She is the connection between humans and the other spirits and deities, and gives the prayers of the people to the proper spirits.” ref

“Though kamuy yukar is considered to be one of the oldest genres of Ainu oral performance, anthropologist Emiko Ohnuki-Tierney supposed that there are more than 20 types of genres. Originally, it seems kamuy yukar was performed solely for religious purposes by the women who took on the role of shamans. The shamans became possessed and recanted the chants, possibly explaining why kamuy yukar is performed with a first-person narrative. As time passed, kamuy yukar became less of a sacred ritual, serving as entertainment and as a way to pass down traditions and cultural stories. Today, the kamuy yukar is no longer performed in the Horobetsu tradition. The only hints of the traditional chants are in written records, including those of Yukie Chiri (1903-1922), a Horobetsu Ainu woman who wrote fragments of traditional chants that her grandmother performed. She compiled the historical chants from her aunt Imekanu in a book titled Ainu shin’yoshu.” ref

“The Ainu have rituals in which they “send back” the kamuy to the heavens with gifts. There are various rituals of this type, including the iomante, the bear ceremony. The rituals center around the idea of releasing the kamuy from their disguises, their hayopke, that they have put on to visit the human world in order to receive gifts from the humans. The kamuy in their hayopke choose the hunter that will hunt them, giving them the flesh of the animal in turn. Once the hayopke is broken, the kamuy are free to return to their world with the gifts from the humans. The iomante (see also iyomante), is a ritual in which the people “send-off” the guest, the bear spirit, back to its home in the heavens. A bear is raised by the ritual master’s wife as a cub. When it is time for the ritual, the men create prayer sticks (inau) for the altar (nusa-san), ceremonial arrows, liquor, and gifts for the spirit in order to prepare for the ritual. Prayers are then offered to ape-kamuy, and dances, songs, and yukar are performed.” ref

“The main part of the ritual is performed the next day, taking place at a ritual space by the altar outside. Prayers are offered to various kamuy, and then the bear is taken out of its cage with a rope around its neck. There is dancing and singing around the bear, and the bear is given food and a prayer. The men shoot the ceremonial decorated arrows at the bear, and the ritual master shoots the fatal arrow as the women cry for the bear. The bear is strangled with sticks and then taken to the altar where the people give gifts to the dead bear and pray to the kamuy again. The bear is dismembered, and the head brought inside. There is a feast with the bear’s boiled flesh, with performances of yukar, dances, and songs.” ref

“On the third and final day of the ritual, the bear’s head is skinned and decorated with inau and gifts. It is then put on a y-shaped stick and turned to face the mountains in the east. This part of the ritual is to send the bear off to the mountains. After another feast, the skull is turned back towards the village to symbolize the kamuy’s return to its world. In Ainu mythology, the kamuy are believed to return home after the ritual and find their houses filled with gifts from the humans. More gifts mean more prestige and wealth in the kamuy’s society, and the kamuy will gather his friends and tell them of the generosities of the humans, making the other kamuy wish to go to the human world for themselves. In this way, the humans express their gratitude for the kamuy, and the kamuy will continue to bring them prosperity.” ref

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“Haplogroup C is another extremely old lineage that left Africa approximately 60,000 years ago and spread over most of Eurasia. Two subclades of C are found in Japan: C1a1 (aka C-M8, formerly C1) and C2a (aka C-M93, formerly C3). Both are likely to have been in the Japanese archipelago since the first human beings reached the region 35,000 years ago.” ref 

“Haplogroup C1a seems to have split around 45,000 years ago in the middle of Eurasia, one group going west to Europe, and the other east to Japan. C1a2 was found among the first Palaeolithic Europeans (Cro-Magnons) during the Aurignacian period, and was still relatively common 7,000 years ago, both among Mesolithic West Europeans and Neolithic farmers from Anatolia. C1a2 is now nearly extinct in Europe. C1a1 is particularly common in Okinawa (7%), Shikoku (10%) and Tohoku (10%), but is apparently absent from Hokkaido and Kyushu.” ref  

“Haplogroup C2a, representing also 3% of the population, is typically found among the Mongols, Manchus, Koreans and Siberians, which suggests a propagation by the Yayoi farmers. The last surviving tribes of ‘pure’ Ainu people, living on the island of Sakhalin in Russia, just north of Hokkaido, possess 15% of C2a (the remaining 85% being D1b). There is therefore a good chance that C2a could also have come to Japan from Siberia through Sakhalin and Hokkaido. C2a is indeed found at both extremities of the country, peaking in Kyushu (8%), Hokkaido (5%), but is rare in central Japan, which supports the theory of two separate points of entry.” ref  

“Over 40% of Japanese men belong to haplogroup D, a paternal lineage thought to have originated in East Africa some 50,000 to 60,000 years ago. Its first carriers would have migrated along the coasts of the Indian Ocean, from the Arabian peninsula all the way to Indonesia, then following the chain of islands up through the Philippines and using the land bridge from Taiwan through the present-day Ryukyu islands to Japan. Korea and Sakhalin would have been connected to Japan during the Ice Age, allowing D tribes to continue their migration to eastern Siberia, Mongolia, northwest China, and ultimately ending up in Tibet. Nowadays haplogroup D only survives scattered in very specific regions of Asia: the Andaman Islands (between India and Myanmar), Indonesia (only a small minority), Southwest China, Mongolia (also a small minority) and Tibet.” ref 

“Haplogroup D1b (aka D-M55 or D-M64.1, formerly known as D2) is 23,000 years old and would have arrived in Japan around the time of the Last Glacial Maximum (c. 24,500 to 17,500 years before present), when a land bridge connected northern Japan to Siberia. D1b is found almost exclusively in Japan, with a small minority in places who have had historical ties with Japan, such as Korea. D1b is most common in Hokkaido (60-65%), followed by Tohoku and Kanto (40-50%), and its frequency declines as one moves towards western Japan (25-30% in Kyushu, Chugoku and Shikoku), which have higher percentages of Y-haplogroup O. Okinawans also have high levels of D1b (45%). If D1b colonized Japan from the north, it would explain why its frequency is highest in northern Japan and, conversely also why pre-LGM lineages like C1a1 survived better in southern Japan, notably Okinawa, and Shikoku.” ref  

“The only other variety of D identified among the Japanese is D1a1 (D-M15), which only makes up 0.5% of the Japanese male population. This haplogroup is particularly common among some ethnic groups from Southwest China and Indochina, such as the Hmong and Ksingmul in Laos, the Qiang in Sichuan, and the Yao people in Guanxi and Vietnam. Tibetans carry about 54% of haplogroup D, including 15.5% of D1a1 and 30% of D1a2a (P47). D1a1 might have come to Japan with Neolithic farmers from southern China.” ref  

“Andaman Islanders belong to the basal D*. It means that their most recent common ancestors goes back tens of thousands of years. In other words the genetic gap between these ethnic groups is immense, despite false appearances of belonging to a common haplogroup. Haplogroup D1b was formed 45,000 years ago, but the most recent common ancestor of Japanese D1b members lived 23,000 years ago, which means that other D1b branches may have become extinct outside Japan. Haplogroup D1b is found among the Ryukyuans as well as the Ainus, and is thought to have been the dominant paternal lineage of the Jōmon people.” ref  

“Almost exactly half of Japanese men belong to haplogroup O, a paternal lineage of Paleolithic Sino-Korean origin that is now found all over East and Southeast Asia.” ref  

“Haplogroup O2b (aka O-SRY465) is found especially in Manchuria, Korea, and Japan, and very probably came to Japan with the Yayoi people. It reaches its highest frequency in western Japan (35%) and is least common in Hokkaido (12.5%) and Okinawa (22%). In the rest of the country, its frequency is around 30%. Approximately two thirds of the Japanese O2b belong to the O2b1 subclade, which is much less common in Korea and Manchuria, possibly due to a founder effect among the Yayoi invaders.” ref  

“Haplogroup O3 (aka O-M122) is the main Han Chinese paternal lineage. It is an extremely diverse lineage, with numerous subclades, including many associated with the expansion of agriculture from northern China. Most of them are found in Korea and would have been part of the Yayoi migration to Japan. However, some specific subclades, notably O3a1c (JST002611) and O3a2(P201) are considerably more common in southern China and among non-aboriginal Taiwanese (25%) than in Korea (6%). Within Japan, it reaches a maximum frequency in Okinawa (16%), a region with low Yayoi ancestry. Its frequency among non-Okinawan Japanese is of 10-15%, about twice higher than in Korea, a fact that cannot be explained by the Yayoi invasion. O3a1c and O3a2 could have come to Japan during the Jomon period with Neolithic farmers from southern China associated with the Austronesian expansion via Taiwan (see below). The most common O3 subclade in Korea is O3a2c1(M134, formerly known as O3e), which is found in 25-30% of the population. In Japan, its frequency ranges from 7.5% to 10%, except in Okinawa and Hokkaido where it is only 5%.” ref  

“A negligible percentage of the Japanese belong to haplogroup O1a (aka O-M119), a lineage especially common in southern China, Taiwan, the Philippines, Malaysia, and Indonesia, and haplogroup O2a1 (aka O-M95), which is found in south-west China, Indochina, around Malaysia and in central-eastern India. Both of them might have also have come with South Chinese Neolithic farmers during the Jomon period.” ref  

“Approximately 3% of Japanese men belong to haplogroup N, a lineage that is thought to have originated in China some 35,000 years ago, but underwent a serious population bottleneck during the Last Glacial Maximum, and re-expanded after that. Japanese people belong to N1, a subclade that is associated with the diffusion of the Neolithic lifestyle from northern China to Siberia. Haplogroup N1 was found at high frequency (26 out of 70 samples, or 37%) in Neolithic and Bronze Age remains (4500-700 BCE) from the West Liao River valley in Northeast China (Manchuria) by Yinqiu Cui et al. (2013). Among the Neolithic samples, haplogroup N1 represented two thirds of the samples from the Hongshan culture (4700-2900 BCE) and all the samples from the Xiaoheyan culture (3000-2200 BCE). Haplogroup N1c is found especially among Uralic and Turkic peoples nowadays, including among the Finns, Estonians, and Sami in Northeast Europe, and among the Turks in Central Asia and Turkey. It is found at low frequencies in Korea and could have arrived with the Yayoi people. Alternatively, N1 could also have entered Japan via Sakhalin and Hokkaido, as it is present among eastern Siberia tribes.” ref  

“Haplogroup Q is the dominant lineage of Native Americans, but originated in Siberia. Nowadays it is found at varying, but generally low frequencies throughout Siberia, Central Asia, as well as parts of the Middle East and Europe. While haplogroup N1 seems to have propagated from northern China to Siberia, haplogroup Q would have spread the other way round, apparently only reaching northern China and Korea some 3,000 years ago with invasions from Mongolia. As this was before the Yayoi invasion of Japan, it is possible that the tiny fraction of Japanese Q lineages came with Yayoi farmers. It is unlikely to have entered Japan through Hokkaido as it is not found among tribes at the eastern extremity of Siberia, nor among the Ainus.” ref 

“In conclusion, approximately 44% to 48% of modern Japanese men carry a Y-chromosome of Paleolithic Jōmon origin. The highest proportions of Y-DNA haplogroup C and D is found in northern Japan (over 60%) and the lowest in Western Japan (25%). This is concordant with the history of Japan, the Yayoi people of Sino-Korean origins having settled first and most heavily in Kyushu and Chūgoku, in Western Japan.” ref  

‘Sky Burial’ theory and its possible origins at least 12,000 years ago to likely 30,000 years ago or older.

Sacred Bird Shrine (to me this is now hidden but still Sky burial connected beliefs)

Sky burial (Animal worship mixed with ancestor worship) is a funeral practice in which a human corpse is placed on a mountaintop to decompose while exposed to the elements or to be eaten by scavenging animals, especially carrion birds. And, Animal worship (or zoolatry) refers to rituals involving animals, such as the glorification of animal deities or animal sacrifice. According to most accounts of the Sky burial practice, vultures are given the whole body. Then, when only the bones remain, these are broken up with mallets, ground with tsampa (barley flour with tea and yak butter, or milk), and given to the crows (possibly expressing a Sacred bull)and hawks that have waited for the vultures to depart. ref, ref 

Torii Gates (Japanese 鳥居, literally bird abode )

A torii (鳥居, literally bird abode) is a traditional Japanese gate most commonly found at the entrance of or within a Shinto shrine, where it symbolically marks the transition from the profane to sacred. The presence of a torii at the entrance is usually the simplest way to identify Shinto shrines, and a small torii icon represents them on Japanese road maps. The first appearance of Torii gates in Japan can be reliably pinpointed to at least the mid-Heian period because they are mentioned in a text written in 922. The oldest existing stone torii was built in the 12th century and belongs to a Hachiman Shrine in Yamagata prefecture. The oldest wooden torii is a ryōbu torii (see description below) at Kubō Hachiman Shrine in Yamanashi prefecture built in 1535. Torii gates were traditionally made from wood or stone, but today they can be also made of reinforced concrete, copper, stainless steel or other materials. They are usually either unpainted or painted vermilion with a black upper lintel. Inari shrines typically have many torii because those who have been successful in business often donate in gratitude a torii to Inari, kami of fertility and industry. ref 

Fushimi Inari-taisha in Kyoto has thousands of such torii, each bearing the donor’s name. The function of a torii is to mark the entrance to a sacred space. For this reason, the road leading to a Shinto shrine (sandō) is almost always straddled by one or more torii, which are therefore the easiest way to distinguish a shrine from a Buddhist temple. If the sandōpasses under multiple torii, the outer of them is called ichi no torii (一の鳥居, first torii). The following ones, closer to the shrine, are usually called, in order, ni no torii (二の鳥居, second torii) and san no torii (三の鳥居, third torii). Other torii can be found farther into the shrine to represent increasing levels of holiness as one nears the inner sanctuary (honden), core of the shrine. Also, because of the strong relationship between Shinto shrines and the Japanese Imperial family, a torii stands also in front of the tomb of each Emperor. Whether torii existed in Japan before Buddhism or, to the contrary, arrived with it (see section below) is, however, an open question. In the past torii must have been used also at the entrance of Buddhist temples. Even today, as prominent a temple as Osaka‘s Shitennō-ji, founded in 593 by Shōtoku Taishi and the oldest state-built Buddhist temple in the world (and country), has a torii straddling one of its entrances. ref 

(The original wooden torii burned in 1294 and was then replaced by one in stone.) 

Many Buddhist temples include one or more Shinto shrines dedicated to their tutelary kami (“Chinjusha“), and in that case a torii marks the shrine’s entrance. Benzaiten is a syncretic goddess derived from the Indian divinity Sarasvati which unites elements of both Shinto and Buddhism. For this reason halls dedicated to her can be found at both temples and shrines, and in either case in front of the hall stands a torii. The goddess herself is sometimes portrayed with a torii on her head (see photo below). Finally, until the Meiji period (1868–1912) torii were routinely adorned with plaques carrying Buddhist sutras. The association between Japanese Buddhism and the torii is therefore old and profound. Yamabushi, Japanese mountain ascetic hermits with a long tradition as mighty warriors endowed with supernatural powers, sometimes use as their symbol a torii. The torii is also sometimes used as a symbol of Japan in non-religious contexts. For example, it is the symbol of the Marine Corps Security Force Regiment and the 187th Infantry Regiment, 101st Airborne Division and of other US forces in Japan. The origins of the torii are unknown and there are several different theories on the subject, none of which has gained universal acceptance. Because the use of symbolic gates is widespread in Asia—such structures can be found for example in India, China, Thailand, Korea, and within Nicobarese and Shompen villages—historians believe they may be an imported tradition. They may, for example, have originated in India from the torana gates in the monastery of Sanchi in central India. ref  

According to this theory, the torana was adopted by Shingon Buddhism founder Kūkai, who used it to demarcate the sacred space used for the homa ceremony. The hypothesis arose in the 19th and 20th centuries due to similarities in structure and name between the two gates. Linguistic and historical objections have now emerged, but no conclusion has yet been reached. In Bangkok, Thailand, a Brahmin structure called Sao Ching Cha strongly resembles a torii. Functionally, however, it is very different as it is used as a swing. During ceremonies Brahmins swing, trying to grab a bag of coins placed on one of the pillars. Other theories claim torii may be related to the pailou of China. These structures however can assume a great variety of forms, only some of which actually somewhat resemble a torii. The same goes for Korea’s “hongsal-mun”. Unlike its Chinese counterpart, the hongsal-mun does not vary greatly in design and is always painted red, with “arrowsticks” located on the top of the structure (hence the name). Various tentative etymologies of the word torii exist. ref  

According to one of them, the name derives from the term tōri-iru (通り入る, pass through and enter). Another hypothesis takes the name literally: the gate would originally have been some kind of bird perch. This is based on the religious use of bird perches in Asia, such as the Korean sotdae(솟대), which are poles with one or more wooden birds resting on their top. Commonly found in groups at the entrance of villages together with totem poles called jangseung, they are talismans which ward off evil spirits and bring the villagers good luck. “Bird perches” similar in form and function to the sotdae exist also in other shamanistic cultures in China, Mongolia and Siberia. Although they do not look like torii and serve a different function, these “bird perches” show how birds in several Asian cultures are believed to have magic or spiritual properties, and may therefore help explain the enigmatic literal meaning of the torii’s name (“bird perch”). Poles believed to have supported wooden bird figures very similar to the sotdae have been found together with wooden birds, and are believed by some historians to have somehow evolved into today’s torii. Intriguingly, in both Korea and Japan single poles represent deities (kami in the case of Japan) and hashira (柱, pole) is the counter for kami. ref 

In Japan birds have also long had a connection with the dead, this may mean it was born in connection with some prehistorical funerary rite. Ancient Japanese texts like the Kojiki and the Nihon Shoki for example mention how Yamato Takeru after his death became a white bird and in that form chose a place for his own burial. For this reason, his mausoleum was then called shiratori misasagi (白鳥陵, white bird grave). Many later texts also show some relationship between dead souls and white birds, a link common also in other cultures, shamanic like the Japanese. Bird motifs from the Yayoi and Kofun periods associating birds with the dead have also been found in several archeological sites. This relationship between birds and death would also explain why, in spite of their name, no visible trace of birds remains in today’s torii: birds were symbols of death, which in Shinto brings defilement (kegare). Finally, the possibility that torii are a Japanese invention cannot be discounted. ref 

 The first toriicould have evolved already with their present function through the following sequence of events:

• Four posts were placed at the corners of a sacred area and connected with a rope, thus dividing sacred and mundane.
• Two taller posts were then placed at the center of the most auspicious direction, to let the priest in.
• A rope was tied from one post to the other to mark the border between the outside and the inside, the sacred and the mundane. This hypothetical stage corresponds to a type of torii in actual use, the so-called shime-torii (注連鳥居), an example of which can be seen in front of Ōmiwa Shrine‘s haiden in Kyoto (see also the photo in the gallery).
• The rope was replaced by a lintel.
• Because the gate was structurally weak, it was reinforced with a tie-beam, and what is today called shinmei torii (神明鳥居) or futabashira torii (二柱鳥居, two pillar torii) (see illustration at right) was born. This theory however does nothing to explain how the gates got their name. ref 

The shinmei torii, whose structure agrees with the historians’ reconstruction, consists of just four unbarked and unpainted logs: two vertical pillars (hashira (柱)) topped by a horizontal lintel(kasagi (笠木)) and kept together by a tie-beam ( nuki (貫)). The pillars may have a slight inward inclination called uchikorobi (内転び) or just korobi (転び). Its parts are always straight. ref 

• Torii may be unpainted or painted vermilion and black. The color black is limited to the kasagiand the nemaki (根巻, see illustration). Very rarely torii can be found also in other colors. Kamakura‘s Kamakura-gū for example has a white and red one.
• The kasagi may be reinforced underneath by a second horizontal lintel called shimaki or shimagi (島木).
• Kasagi and the shimaki may have an upward curve called sorimashi (反り増し).
• The nuki is often held in place by wedges (kusabi (楔)). The kusabi in many cases are purely ornamental.
• At the center of the nuki there may be a supporting strut called gakuzuka (額束), sometimes covered by a tablet carrying the name of the shrine (see photo in the gallery).
• The pillars often rest on a white stone ring called kamebara (亀腹, turtle belly) or daiishi (台石, base stone). The stone is sometimes replaced by a decorative black sleeve called nemaki (根巻, root sleeve).
• At the top of the pillars there may be a decorative ring called daiwa (台輪, big ring).
• The gate has a purely symbolic function and therefore there usually are no doors or board fences, but exceptions exist, as for example in the case of Ōmiwa Shrine‘s triple-arched torii(miwa torii, see below). ref 

ref

The Torii and Its Meaning in the Shinto Religion

“In order to understand the Torii, we must first know the basic belief of Shinto (神道) the shamanic religion, ethnic of the people of Japan. This religion is heavily based on its rituals and practices, held at the local shrines, built where the Shinto kami (神) are believed to reside. This is the key principle needed to understand the meaning of the Torii. Given this extremely basic introduction to the Shinto religion, we can finally explore the meaning of the Torii. The Torii is, in fact, a gateway, that signals the transition from the profane to the sacred, as it is usually located at the entrance to Shinto shrines, though it isn’t rare to find them even at the entrance of Buddhist temples. As a matter of fact, the first documentation of the Torii dates back to the mid-Heian period, in 922, when Buddhism had already been introduced in Japan. Because of this, and the existence of similar structures in the rest of Asia, typically associated with Buddhist sites, it is quite hard to find a clear-cut origin of the Torii, there are many theories, none of which seems to satisfy the question of its origin. However, it is a matter of fact that today, the Torii, though present in Buddhist sites as well, is more closely associated to Shinto, for instance, the Shinto shrines are signaled on maps with Torii icons. On a final note, it’s worth saying that the Torii doesn’t necessarily mark the entrance to a shrine, but is sometimes used to simply mark an area believed to have a deep religious meaning, such as the Torii of the Meoto Iwa.” The Meoto Iwa, is a particular complex, also called the Married Couple Rocks, as it features two rock stacks in the off of Futami, Mie, tied by a shimenawa, with a Torii places on top of the bigger stack.” ref 

“Onehypothesis takes the name literally: the gate would originally have been some kind of bird perch. This is based on the religious use of bird perches in Asia, such as the Korean sotdae (솟대), which are poles with one or more wooden birds resting on their top. Commonly found in groups at the entrance of villages together with totem poles called jangseung, they are talismans which ward off evil spirits and bring the villagers good luck. “Bird perches” similar in form and function to the sotdae exist also in other shamanistic cultures in China, Mongolia, and Siberia. Although they do not look like torii and serve a different function, these “bird perches” show how birds in several Asian cultures are believed to have magic or spiritual properties, and may therefore help explain the enigmatic literal meaning of the torii’s name (“bird perch”). Poles believed to have supported wooden bird figures very similar to the sotdae have been found together with wooden birds, and are believed by some historians to have somehow evolved into today’s torii.” ref

“Intriguingly, in both Korea and Japan single poles represent deities (kami in the case of Japan) and hashira (柱, pole) is the counter for kami. In Japan birds have also long had a connection with the dead, this may mean it was born in connection with some prehistorical funerary rite. Ancient Japanese texts like the Kojiki and the Nihon Shoki for example mention how Yamato Takeru after his death became a white bird and in that form chose a place for his own burial. For this reason, his mausoleum was then called shiratori misasagi (白鳥陵, white bird grave). Many later texts also show some relationship between dead souls and white birds, a link common also in other cultures, shamanic like the Japanese. Bird motifs from the Yayoi and Kofun periods associating birds with the dead have also been found in several archeological sites. This relationship between birds and death would also explain why, in spite of their name, no visible trace of birds remains in today’s torii: birds were symbols of death, which in Shinto brings defilement (kegare).” ref

I think Torii Gates, rope between trees/hanging off trees, or an accompanying hammock of some sort, was still likely an evolution of hanging bodies from trees similar to ritual behaviors seen within a Horrifying moment a live bull is hung from a tree until it dies for Chinese ‘luck’ festival. Chinese villagers have defended their tradition of hanging a live bull from a tree until it dies as part of a ritual to bring them luck and a bumper harvest. The ‘cow-hanging ceremony’ has been carried out by the minority Dong people of southern China for almost 500 years. The ‘cow hanging ceremony’ is supposed to bring a bumper harvest, the Bull is decorated with flowers before being hoisted up and left to die.” ref

Damien Marie AtHope’s Art 

ref, ref, ref, ref, ref, ref, ref, ref

“Sky Burial” and its possible origins at least 12,000 years ago to likely 30,000 years ago or older.

 Sky Burials: Animism, Totemism, Shamanism, and Paganism

“In archaeology and anthropology, the term excarnation (also known as defleshing) refers to the practice of removing the flesh and organs of the dead before burial, leaving only the bones. Excarnation may be precipitated through natural means, involving leaving a body exposed for animals to scavenge, or it may be purposefully undertaken by butchering the corpse by hand. Practices making use of natural processes for excarnation are the Tibetan sky burial, Comanche platform burials, and traditional Zoroastrian funerals (see Tower of Silence).  Some Native American groups in the southeastern portion of North America practiced deliberate excarnation in protohistoric times. Archaeologists believe that in this practice, people typically left the body exposed on a woven litter or altar.” ref

“Sky burial (Tibetan: བྱ་གཏོར་, Wylie: bya gtor, lit. “bird-scattered”) is a funeral practice in which a human corpse is placed on a mountaintop to decompose while exposed to the elements or to be eaten by scavenging animals, especially carrion birds. It is a specific type of the general practice of excarnation. It is practiced in the Chinese provinces and autonomous regions of Tibet, Qinghai, Sichuan and Inner Mongolia, as well as in Mongolia, Bhutan, Nepal, and parts of India such as Sikkim and Zanskar. The Tibetan sky-burials appear to have evolved from ancient practices of defleshing corpses as discovered in archeological finds in the region. These practices most likely came out of practical considerations, but they could also be related to more ceremonial practices similar to the suspected sky burial evidence found at Göbekli Tepe (11,500 years before present) and Stonehenge (4,500 years BP). Most of Tibet is above the tree line, and the scarcity of timber makes cremation economically unfeasible. Additionally, subsurface interment is difficult since the active layer is not more than a few centimeters deep, with solid rock or permafrost beneath the surface. For Tibetan Buddhists, sky burial and cremation are templates of instructional teaching on the impermanence of life. Jhator is considered an act of generosity on the part of the deceased, since the deceased and his/her surviving relatives are providing food to sustain living beings. Such generosity and compassion for all beings are important virtues in Buddhism.” Ref 

“Although some observers have suggested that jhator is also meant to unite the deceased person with the sky or sacred realm, this does not seem consistent with most of the knowledgeable commentary and eyewitness reports, which indicate that Tibetans believe that at this point life has completely left the body and the body contains nothing more than simple flesh. Only people who directly know the deceased usually observe it, when the excarnation happens at night. The tradition and custom of the jhator afforded Traditional Tibetan medicine and thangkaiconography with a particular insight into the interior workings of the human body. Pieces of the human skeleton were employed in ritual tools such as the skullcup, thigh-bone trumpet, etc. The ‘symbolic bone ornaments’ (Skt: aṣṭhiamudrā; Tib: rus pa’i rgyanl phyag rgya) are also known as “mudra” or ‘seals’. The Hevajra Tantra identifies the Symbolic Bone Ornaments with the Five Wisdoms and Jamgon Kongtrul in his commentary to the Hevajra Tantra explains this further. The locations of preparation and sky burial are understood in the Vajrayana Buddhist traditions as charnel grounds. Comparable practices are part of Zoroastrian burial practices where deceased are exposed to the elements and birds of prey on stone structures called Dakhma.” Ref 

“Few such places remain operational today due to religious marginalisation, urbanisation and the decimation of vulture populations. The majority of Tibetan people and many Mongols adhere to Vajrayana Buddhism, which teaches the transmigration of spirits. There is no need to preserve the body, as it is now an empty vessel. Birds may eat it or nature may cause it to decompose. The function of the sky burial is simply to dispose of the remains in as generous a way as possible (the source of the practice’s Tibetan name). In much of Tibet and Qinghai, the ground is too hard and rocky to dig a grave, and, due to the scarcity of fuel and timber, sky burials were typically more practical than the traditional Buddhist practice of cremation. In the past, cremation was limited to high lamas and some other dignitaries, but modern technology and difficulties with sky burial have led to an increased use by commoners. The customs are first recorded in an indigenous 12th-century Buddhist treatise, which is colloquially known as the Book of the Dead (Bardo Thodol).” Ref  

“Tibetan tantricismappears to have influenced the procedure. The body is cut up according to instructions given by a lama or adept. Mongolians traditionally buried their dead (sometimes with human or animal sacrifice for the wealthier chieftains) but the Tümed adopted sky burial following their conversion to Tibetan Buddhism under Altan Khan during the Ming Dynasty and other banners subsequently converted under the Manchu Qing Dynasty. Sky burial was initially treated as a primitive superstition and sanitation concern by the Communist governments of both the PRC and Mongolia; both states closed many temples and China banned the practice completely from the Cultural Revolution of the late 1960s until the 1980s. Sky burial nonetheless continued to be practiced in rural areas and has even received official protection in recent years. However, the practice continues to diminish for a number of reasons, including restrictions on its practice near urban areas and diminishing numbers of vultures in rural districts. Where the vultures remain, they often react badly to corpses treated with medicine and disinfectants at modern hospitals. Finally, Tibetan practice holds that the yak carrying the body to the charnel grounds should be set free, making the rite much more expensive than a service at a crematorium. A traditional jhator is performed in specified locations in Tibet (and surrounding areas traditionally occupied by Tibetans). Drigung Monastery is one of the three most important jhatorsites.” Ref 

How Sky Burial Works?

“The procedure takes place on a large flat rock long used for the purpose. The charnel ground (durtro) is always higher than its surroundings. It may be very simple, consisting only of the flat rock, or it may be more elaborate, incorporating temples and stupa (chorten in Tibetan). Relatives may remain nearby during the jhator, possibly in a place where they cannot see it directly. The jhator usually takes place at dawn. The full jhator procedure (as described below) is elaborate and expensive. Those who cannot afford it simply place their deceased on a high rock where the body decomposes or is eaten by birds and animals. The birds are already circling as the man lays the dead woman out on the stones. Naked and stiff, the corpse is as cold as the surrounding landscape and her eyes as gray as the clouds that haunt the looming Himalayan peaks. The ritual plays out in staggering isolation; high on the Tibetan plateau and amid some of the least explored wilderness on Earth. The man draws his flaying knife and tests its sharpness with his thumb. Then he sets to work. With deep, determined slices, he separates hair from scalp, then limbs from torso and flesh from bone.” Ref 

“Ancient custom animates each movement, as he steadily reduces the corpse to mere fragments in the hallowed clearing. Vultures already surround him in huddled, black masses. Overhead, dozens more wind down the last of their spiral descent, tracing invisible circles in the air, and land at last to feast. Indifferent to the human in their midst, the birds tear into the meal with ravenous enthusiasm. Meanwhile the man, a rogyapa, or “breaker of bodies,” calmly sets aside his blade and grabs a hammer to pulverize the remaining bones. Known as sky burial or celestial burial to outsiders, this is the Tibetan practice of jhator, or the giving of alms to birds, in which the body of the deceased is dismantled to facilitate faster and more thorough consumption by vultures. To foreign eyes, this unique funeral rite may seem callous or morbid. Yet within the spiritual and geographic contexts of Tibetan culture, it is the perfect fate for the body humans leave behind in death. Humans have a complex relationship with death, and as we’ll see in the pages ahead, the Tibetan people are no exception. First, let’s strip away the layers of religion and myth surrounding sky burial and examine geography’s role.” Ref 

“The Chinese Tibet Autonomous Region (TAR) occupies roughly 471,700 square miles (1.2 million square kilometers) of Central Asia to the northeast of India. Encompassing some of the highest peaks of the Himalayan Mountains and the least explored regions on the planet, the average altitude for a Tibetan settlement is roughly 16,500 feet (5,000 meters) above sea level [source: Beall]. To put that in perspective, Leadville, Colo., ranks as the highest incorporated city in the United States at 10,152 feet (3,094 meters). No understanding of sky burial is complete without a glimpse into the spiritual heart of Tibet. While the rite of jhator may seem callous in regard to mortality, Tibetan Buddhists are deeply concerned with the reality of death. Recorded Tibetan history reaches back 2,300 years to a pre-Buddhist age ruled by warriors, shamans and a line of kings said to have descended from the sky on a magical ladder. The region’s early Bön religion was animistic; it viewed nonhumans as spiritual beings. While sky burial was not in vogue during the days of the original Tibetan kings, the holiness of sky and birds was already present.” Ref  

“Up until the 20th century, virtually the only application of the wheel in Tibetan culture was the use of mani, or prayer, wheels in spiritual blessings. This fact stresses the inward nature of the society, one that places a stronger emphasis on the exploration of consciousness and spirituality than the material world. Make no mistake: Science has its place in Tibetan culture. The region’s warrior kings of the seventh and eighth centuries imported a great deal of mathematics, medicine and architecture from neighboring areas. They also introduced Buddhism and its emphasis on karma, reincarnation and the middle path between extreme ideas. When anticipating an important journey, it pays to prepare. And since Tibetan Buddhists view death as the journey from this life to the next, they place tremendous importance on steps to ensure a safe voyage through the space betwixt death and rebirth — a dreamlike intermediate state known as bardo. If you were planning a trip to, say, Tibet, you’d probably pick up a guidebook written by people who have actually traveled there. When planning the ultimate trip, therefore, Tibetan Buddhists turn to the holy men who, through intense meditation, claim knowledge of both past lives and the death journey. A guide also exists in the form of the eighth-century text “Bardo Thodol” or “Liberation in the Intermediate State Through Hearing.” Westerners often call this work the “Tibetan Book of the Dead.” Ref

ref

 Yayoi period 

“New technologies and modes of living took over from the Jōmon culture, spreading from northern Kyushu. The date of the change was until recently thought to be around 400 BCE, but radio-carbon evidence suggests a date up to 500 years earlier, between 1,000 and 800 BCE. The period was named after a district in Tokyo where a new, unembellished style of pottery was discovered in 1884. Though hunting and foraging continued, the Yayoi period brought a new reliance on agriculture. Bronze and iron weapons and tools were imported from China and Korea; such tools were later also produced in Japan. The Yayoi period also saw the introduction of weaving and silk production, glassmaking and new techniques of woodworking.” ref 

“The Yayoi technologies originated on the Asian mainland. There is debate among scholars as to what extent their spread was accomplished by means of migration or simply a diffusion of ideas, or a combination of both. The migration theory is supported by genetic and linguistic studies. Hanihara Kazurō has suggested that the annual immigrant influx from the continent ranged from 350 to 3,000. Modern Japanese are genetically more similar to the Yayoi people than to the Jōmon people—though more so in southern Japan than in the north—whereas the Ainu bear significant resemblance to the Jōmon people. It took time for the Yayoi people and their descendants to fully displace or intermix with the Jōmon, who continued to exist in northern Honshu until the eighth century CE.” ref 

“The population of Japan began to increase rapidly, perhaps with a 10-fold rise over the Jōmon. Calculations of the population size have varied from 1.5 to 4.5 million by the end of the Yayoi. Skeletal remains from the late Jōmon period reveal a deterioration in already poor standards of health and nutrition, in contrast to Yayoi archaeological sites where there are large structures suggestive of grain storehouses. This change was accompanied by an increase in both the stratification of society and tribal warfare, indicated by segregated gravesites and military fortifications.” ref 

Yayoi mtDNA

“78 mtDNA samples from the ancient Yayoi people have been tested to date. Half of them belonged to haplogroup D4, while 15% belonged to haplogroup A and another 15% to haplogroup B. The remaining samples were made up of haplogroups F, M8, N9a and Z. The presence of haplogroup Z is particularly interesting as it is a typically Siberian lineage, also found among the Uralic populations of Northeast Europe, including the Sami of northern Fennoscandia. Uralic speakers share the patrilineal haplogroup N1c which seems to have originated with Neolithic farmers or herders from Manchuria (=> see Y-DNA section above). Modern Japanese possess about 1.5% of mtDNA Z and Y-DNA N, which could both represent ancestry from those Manchurian Neolithic farmers.” ref 

 The Korean connection

“Japanese and Korean languages are both classified by linguists as relatives of Altaic languages, which includes Mongolic, Tungusic and Turkic, among others. Nevertheless, Japanese is so distant from Mongolic and Turkic than the similarities are hardly more evident than those with Indonesian.” ref  

“Korean language, however, is much closer to Japanese. The grammar is very similar, and both have imported about half of their vocabulary from Chinese, which makes these three languages almost mutually understable in the written form, thanks to Chinese characters (rarely used in Korea nowadays, except in place names). Native Korean and Japanese words are often related when comparing Old Korean and Old Japanese, but few of them are really obvious to modern speakers.” ref  

“Ancient Korea was divided in three kingdoms, Baekje, Silla and Goguryeo, each with their own distinct language. Jared Diamond, a renowned UCLA anthropologist, argues in an article for Discovery Magazine that the modern Korean language is derived from that of the ancient Kingdom of Silla, the eastern Korean kingdom that unified Korea, whereas the Old Japanese spread by Yayoi farmers would be derived from the ancestral language of the northern Kingdom of Goguryeo.” ref  

“Mindset and values in Japan and South Korea are deeply intertwined, thanks to the strong influence of Confucianism, Taoism and Buddhism in both countries. This is obvious from the corporate culture (e.g. discipline, seniority system), the strict politeness system, or the Taoist/Buddhist value of simplicity and humility. These cultural aspects all ultimately stem from China. That’s why Japan and Korea are considered branches of the Chinese civilization.” ref  

Linguistic Austronesian connection

“A comparison of Malay (Bahasa Indonesia/Melayu) and Japanese languages reveals a few uncanny similarities. Apart from the very similar phonetics in both languages, the same hierarchical differences exist in personal pronouns. For example ‘you’ can be either anda or kamuin Malay, and anata and kimiin Japanese. Not only are the meaning and usage of each identical, but they also sound almost the same. Likewise, the Japanese verb suki (to like) translates suka in Malay. The chances that this is a pure coincidence is extremely low, and may reveal a common origin. Furthermore, in both languages the plural can be formed by simply doubling the word. For instance, in Japanese hito means ‘person’, while hitobito means ‘people’. Likewise ware means ‘I’ or ‘you’, whereas wareware means ‘we’. Doubling of words in Japanese is so common that there is a special character used only to mean the word is doubled (々) in written Japanese. In Malay, this way of forming the plural is almost systematic (person is orang, while people is orang-orang). Furthermore, expressions like ittekimasu, itteirashai, tadaima and okaeri, used to greet someone who leaves or enter a place, and which have no equivalent in Indo-European languages, have exact equivalents in Malay/Indonesian (selamat jalan, selamat tinggal…). One could wonder how Malay and Japanese ever came to share such basic vocabulary and grammatical features, considering that there is no known historical migration from one region to other.” ref 

“The Palaeolithic Jōmon people are thought to have arrived from Austronesia during the Ice Age. The original inhabitants of Indonesia and the Philippines might have been related to Dravidians of Southern India. Y-haplogroup C, which has been associated with the first migration of modern humans out of Africa towards Asia, is relatively frequent in Kerala (southern tip of India) and Borneo. These early Austronesians are thought to have been the ancestors of the Ice Age settlers of Japan (Y-haplogroups C1a1 and D1b). Nevertheless, it is doubtful that any meaningful linguistic connection remains between the Dravidians, Andamanese, Austronesians and Japanese after tens of thousands of years of separation. The common root of the two languages must be more recent, and indeed there is one migration that could explain the connection between the two groups: the Neolithic Austronesian expansion from southern China.” ref 

“From approximately 5,000 BCE, South Chinese farmers expanded southward to Taiwan and Southeast Asia, bringing Y-haplogroups O1, O2 and O3 to the region, which are still the dominant paternal lineages today. There is evidence of farming in Taiwan at least from 4000 BCE, but agriculturalists would probably have arrived earlier considering that the Neolithic reached the Philippines circa 5000 BCE, and Vietnam, Thailand, Malaysia and Indonesia around 4,000 BCE. As I have argued above, the same migration could have followed the Ryukyu archipelago until Kyushu, then colonised Honshu and Shikoku. In fact, there is no good reason why these seafaring farmers would travel as far as Indonesia and not to Japan, which is much closer.” ref 

“Many more Japanese words could be of Austronesian origin. The linguist David B. Solnit estimates that among 111 common Japanese words he analysed, 28% had Austronesian cognates only, while 40% had Altaic cognates, 23% competing cognates, and 9% no cognate in either. Considering that the various branches of Proto-Austronesian split over 6,000 or 7,000 years ago, longer than Indo-European languages, it is not surprising that even languages that are undeniably classified as Austronesian today have evolved very diverging vocabularies today (except Polynesian languages, which only started to diversify with the Polynesian expansion 2,000 years ago). ” ref 

“It is generally more useful to look at the Proto-Autronesian root of words rather than to try to find direct matches between modern Japanese and modern Austronesian languages. For example, the Proto-Austronesian root for fish is *sikan, which gave sakana in Japanese (and maybe also ika, which means squid), ikan in Malay, ika in Fijian, and isda in Tagalog. Cases of high lexical-semantic retention over six millennia like kamu/kimi, anda/anata and suka/suki are extremely rare. The Austronesian connection with Japanese was first suggested in 1924 by the Dutch linguist Dirk van Hinloopen Labberton. Many linguists have since proposed the hypothesis that the Japonic language family evolved from an Austronesian substratum (Jōmon) onto which was added an Altaic superstratum (Yayoi).” ref 

“However, if Austronesian speakers came to Japan with South Chinese Neolithic agriculturalists, the original Jomon people would have spoken another language, either one of Siberian origin, in light of the mtDNA ties between Jomon and Ainu people and eastern Siberians, or a language isolate, reflecting the uniqueness of the Jomon paternal D1b lineage. Therefore, Middle and Late Jomon people would already have spoken a hybrid language. Likewise, the Koguryoic Korean language of the Yayoi people would also be a hybrid incorporating Altaic elements of Mongolian origin into an older Korean substratum of Paleosiberian origin. Since the 6th century CE, the Japanese started incorporating words from Chinese after adopting Buddhism and Chinese characters, in the same way that English absorbed a huge amount of Norman French and Latin words in the late Middle Ages. Nowadays, approximately half of the Japanese vocabulary is of Chinese origin. This explains why Japanese does not neatly fit in one or even two linguistic families, but is a hybrid of at least five separate sources: aboriginal Jomon, Austronesian, Korean, Altaic and Chinese.” ref 

Cultural Austronesian connection

Cultural and religious similarities also exist between Japan and Austronesia. Of course nowadays most ethnic Malays and Indonesians are Muslim, but traditional religion survives in some islands, including Bali, which practices a syncretic form of Hinduism and aninism. Basically, Balinese religion is a form of Hinduism that has incorporated the aboriginal animistic religion. The parallel with Japan is obvious for people familiar with this culture. Japanese Shintoism is also a form of animism, and is practised side-by-side with Buddhism, a religion derived from Hinduism, sometimes blending the two religions in a syncretism known as Shinbutsu-shūgō. The relation between Hinduism and Buddhism is irrelevant here, and both are relatively recent imports in historical times. Before that, however, Jomon people and Neolithic Austronesians would have practised a very similar form of animism.” ref 

“Japanese matsuri (festivals) resemble so much Balinese ones that one could wonder if one was not copied from the other. During cremations in Bali, the dead body is carried on a portable shrine, very much in the way that the Japanese carry their mikoshi. Balinese funerals are joyful and people swinging the portable shrine in the streets and making loud noise to scare the evil spirits.” ref 

“There are lots of other cultural similarities between ancient cultures of Indonesia and Japan. For example, both Balinese temples and Japanese shrines, as well as traditional Japanese and Balinese houses have a wall surrounding them, originally meant tp prevent evil spririts from penetrating the property. Despite the radical changes that Indonesian culture underwent after the introduction of Islam and Christianity, and the changes that Buddhism brought to Japan, it is still possible to observe clear similarities between the supposed original prehistoric cultures of the two archipelagoes.” ref 

Sexism in Shintoism

Religious transfer to Japan 6th century

In 513 Dan Yangi a “confucian” scholar was dispatched to Japan from Baekje in southwest Korea further distributing Chinese philosophies such as Wu Xing (five elements) as well as yin and yang. It was accepted as a practical system of divination. These practices were influenced further by Taoism, Buddhism and Shintoism, and around 675 it had evolved into the system of onmyodo (The Way of Yin and Yang) is a traditional Japanese esoteric cosmology. It is thought that Onmyodo took in elements from Taoism including magical elements such as katatagae (changing directions), monoimi (talismans with monoimi on it), henbai (protection ceremony), and ceremonies to Taoistic gods such as the Taizan Fukun originally a Chinese deity of the Eastern mountain Taizan (where the souls of the dead congregated then judged for good and evil deeds by Taizan Fukun) also known as the Great Emperor of the mountain peak. Taizan Fukun was also identified with Enma/Yama the god of hell in Buddhism who is believed to have power over life and judges souls of the dead deciding who goes to heaven or hell. The word Enma comes from Yama in Sanskrit and Pali, a language for Buddhist writings in Sri Lanka, Myanmar and Thailand. He is said to be a human ancestor in the Rigveda (an ancient Indian sacred book). Ref, Ref, Ref, Ref, Ref, Ref   

Damien Marie AtHope’s Art

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Damien Marie AtHope’s Art

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Ainu people

“The Ainu are the indigenous people of the lands surrounding the Sea of Okhotsk, including Hokkaido Island, Northeast Honshu Island, Sakhalin Island, the Kuril Islands, the Kamchatka Peninsula, and Khabarovsk Krai, before the arrival of the Yamato Japanese and Russians. These regions are referred to as Ezo (蝦夷) in historical Japanese texts. In 1966 there were about 300 native Ainu speakers, while in 2008, there were about 100 native Ainu speakers.” ref

Official estimates place the total Ainu population of Japan at 25,000. Unofficial estimates place the total population at 200,000 or higher, as the near-total assimilation of the Ainu into Japanese society has resulted in many individuals of Ainu descent having no knowledge of their ancestry. As of 2000, the number of “pure” Ainu was estimated at about 300 people.” ref

“This people’s most widely known ethnonym, “Ainu” (Ainu: アィヌ; Japanese: アイヌ; Russian: Айны) means “human” in the Ainu language, particularly as opposed to kamui, divine beings. Ainu also identify themselves as “Utari” (“comrade” or “people”). Official documents use both names.” ref

“The Ainu are the native people of Hokkaido, Sakhalin and the Kurils. Early Ainu-speaking groups (mostly hunters and fishermen) migrated also into the Kamchatka Peninsula and into Honshu, where their descendants are today known as the Matagi hunters, who still use a large amount of Ainu vocabulary in their dialect. Other evidence for Ainu-speaking hunters and fishermen migrating down from Northern Hokkaido into Honshu is through the Ainu toponyms which are found in several places of northern Honshu, mostly among the western coast and the Tōhoku region. Evidence for Ainu speakers in the Amur region is found through Ainu loanwords in the Uilta and Ulch people.” ref

“Research suggests that Ainu culture originated from a merger of the Okhotsk and Satsumon cultures. According to Lee and Hasegawa, the Ainu-speakers descend from the Okhotsk people which rapidly expanded from northern Hokkaido into the Kurils and Honshu. These early inhabitants did not speak the Japanese language; some were conquered by the Japanese early in the 9th century. In 1264, the Ainu invaded the land of the Nivkh people. The Ainu also started an expedition into the Amur region, which was then controlled by the Yuan Dynasty, resulting in reprisals by the Mongols who invaded Sakhalin. Active contact between the Wa-jin (the ethnically Japanese, also known as Yamato-jin) and the Ainu of Ezogashima (now known as Hokkaidō) began in the 13th century. The Ainu formed a society of hunter-gatherers, surviving mainly by hunting and fishing. They followed a religion which was based on natural phenomena.” ref

“The Ainu have often been considered to descend from the diverse Jōmon people, who lived in northern Japan from the Jōmon period (c. 14,000 to 300 BCE). One of their Yukar Upopo, or legends, tells that “[t]he Ainu lived in this place a hundred thousand years before the Children of the Sun came”. Recent research suggests that the historical Ainu culture originated from a merger of the Okhotsk culture with the Satsumon culture, cultures thought to have derived from the diverse Jōmon-period cultures of the Japanese archipelago. The Ainu economy was based on farming, as well as on hunting, fishing, and gathering.” ref

“According to Lee and Hasegawa of the Waseda University, the direct ancestors of the later Ainu people formed during the late Jōmon period from the combination of the local but diverse population of Hokkaido, long before the arrival of contemporary Japanese people. Lee and Hasegawa suggest that the Ainu language expanded from northern Hokkaido and may have originated from a relative more recent Northeast Asian/Okhotsk population, which established themselves in northern Hokkaido and had significant impact on the formation of Hokkaido’s Jōmon culture.” ref

“The linguist and historian Joran Smale similarly found that the Ainu language likely originated from the ancient Okhotsk people, which had strong cultural influence on the “Epi-Jōmon” of southern Hokkaido and northern Honshu, but that the Ainu people themselves formed from the combination of both ancient groups. Additionally, he notes that the historical distribution of Ainu dialects and its specific vocabulary corresponds to the distribution of the maritime Okhotsk culture.” ref

“Recently in 2021, it was confirmed that the Hokkaido Jōmon people formed from “Jōmon tribes of Honshu” and from “Terminal Upper-Paleolithic people” (TUP people) indigenous to Hokkaido and Paleolithic Northern Eurasia. The Honshu Jōmon groups arrived about 15,000 BC and merged with the indigenous “TUP people” to form the Hokkaido Jōmon. The Ainu in turn formed from the Hokkaido Jōmon and from the Okhotsk people.” ref

“Another study in 2021 (Sato et al.) analyzed the indigenous populations of northern Japan and the Russian Far East. They concluded that Siberia and northern Japan was populated by two distinct waves: “the southern migration wave seems to have diversified into the local populations in East Asia (defined in this paper as a region including China, Japan, Korea, Mongol, and Taiwan) and Southeast Asia, and the northern wave, which probably runs through the Siberian and Eurasian steppe regions and mixed with the southern wave, probably in Siberia. Archaeologists have considered that bear worship, which is a religious practice widely observed among the northern Eurasian ethnic groups, including the Ainu, Finns, Nivkh, and Sami, was also shared by the Okhotsk people. On the other hand, no traces of such a religious practice have ever been discovered from archaeological sites of the Jomon and Epi-Jomon periods, which were anterior to the Ainu cultural period. This implies that the Okhotsk culture contributed to the forming of the Ainu culture.” ref

“Bear worship (also known as the bear cult or arctolatry) is the religious practice of the worshipping of bears found in many North Eurasian ethnic religions such as among the Sami, Nivkh, Ainu, Basques, Germanic peoples, Slavs and Finns. There are also a number of deities from Celtic Gaul and Britain associated with the bear, and the Dacians, Thracians, and Getians were noted to worship bears and annually celebrate the bear dance festival. The bear is featured on many totems throughout northern cultures that carve them. In an article in Enzyklopädie des Märchens, American folklorist Donald J. Ward noted that a story about a bear mating with a human woman, and producing a male heir, functions as an ancestor myth to peoples of the northern hemisphere, namely, from North America, Japan, China, Siberia and Northern Europe. Bears were the most worshipped animals of Ancient Slavs. During pagan times, it was associated with the god Volos, the patron of domestic animals. Eastern Slavic folklore describes the bear as a totem personifying a male: father, husband, or a fiancé. Legends about turnskin bears appeared, it was believed that humans could be turned into bears for misbehavior. According to legend, Ungnyeo (literally “bear woman”) was a bear who turned into a woman, and gave birth to Dangun, the founder of the first Korean kingdom, Gojoseon. Bears were revered as motherly figures and symbolized patience.” ref

“The bear festival is a religious festival celebrated by the indigenous Nivkh in the Russian Far East. A Nivkh shaman (ch’am) would preside over the Bear Festival, which was celebrated in the winter between January and February, depending on the clan. A bear was captured and raised in a corral for several years by local women, who treated the bear like a child. The bear is considered a sacred earthly manifestation of Nivkh ancestors and the gods in bear form. During the Festival, the bear is dressed in a specially made ceremonial costume and offered a banquet to take back to the realm of gods to show benevolence upon the clans. After the banquet, the bear is killed and eaten in an elaborate religious ceremony. The festival was arranged by relatives to honour the death of a kinsman. The bear’s spirit returns to the gods of the mountain ‘happy’ and rewards the Nivkh with bountiful forests. Generally, the Bear Festival was an inter-clan ceremony where a clan of wife-takers restored ties with a clan of wife-givers upon the broken link of the kinsman’s death.

“The Ainu people, who live on select islands in the Japanese archipelago, call the bear “kamuy” in the Ainu language, which translates to mean “god”. Many other animals are considered to be gods in the Ainu culture, but the bear is the head of the gods. For the Ainu, when the gods visit the world of man, they don fur and claws and take on the physical appearance of an animal. Usually, however, when the term “kamuy” is used, it essentially means a bear. The Ainu people willingly and thankfully ate the bear as they believed that the disguise (the flesh and fur) of any god was a gift to the home that the god chose to visit. The Ainu believed that the gods on Earth, the world of man, appeared in the form of animals. The gods had the capability of taking human form but only in their home, the country of the gods, which is outside the world of man. To return a god to his country, the people would sacrifice and eat the animal sending the god’s spirit away with civility. The ritual was called Omante and usually involveed a deer or adult bear.” ref

“Omante occurred when the people sacrificed an adult bear, but when they caught a bear cub, they performed a different ritual which is called Iomante, in the Ainu language, or Kumamatsuri in Japanese. Kumamatsuri translates to “bear festival,” and Iomante means “sending off.” The event of Kumamatsuri began with the capture of a young bear cub. As if he were a child given by the gods, the cub was fed human food from a carved wooden platter and was treated better than Ainu children for they thought of him as a god. If the cub was too young and lacked the teeth to properly chew food, a nursing mother would let him suckle from her own breast. When the cub reached 2–3 years of age, the cub was taken to the altar and then sacrificed. Usually, Kumamatsuri occurred in midwinter, when the bear meat is the best from the added fat. The villagers would shoot it with both normal and ceremonial arrows, make offerings, dance, and pour wine on top of the cub corpse.  The words of sending off for the bear god were then recited. The festival lasted for three days and three nights to properly return the bear god to his home.” ref

Genetics: Genetic history of East Asians and Jōmon people

Paternal lineages

“Genetic testing has shown that the Ainu belong mainly to Y-DNA haplogroup D-M55 (D1a2) and C-M217. Y DNA haplogroup D M55 is found throughout the Japanese Archipelago, but with very high frequencies among the Ainu of Hokkaidō in the far north, and to a lesser extent among the Ryukyuans in the Ryukyu Islands of the far south. Recently it was confirmed that the Japanese branch of haplogroup D M55 is distinct and isolated from other D branches for more than 53,000 years.” ref

“Several studies (Hammer et al. 2006, Shinoda 2008, Matsumoto 2009, Cabrera et al. 2018) suggest that haplogroup D originated somewhere in Central Asia. According to Hammer et al., the ancestral haplogroup D originated between Tibet and the Altai mountains. He suggests that there were multiple waves into Eastern Eurasia.” ref

“A study by Tajima et al. (2004) found two out of a sample of sixteen Ainu men (or 12.5%) belong to Haplogroup C M217, which is the most common Y chromosome haplogroup among the indigenous populations of Siberia and Mongolia. Hammer et al. (2006) found that one in a sample of four Ainu men belonged to haplogroup C M217.” ref

Maternal lineages

“Based on analysis of one sample of 51 modern Ainu, their mtDNA lineages consist mainly of haplogroup Y [11⁄51 = 21.6% according to Tanaka et al. 2004, or 10⁄51 = 19.6% according to Adachi et al. 2009, who have cited Tajima et al. 2004], haplogroup D [9⁄51 = 17.6%, particularly D4 (xD1)], haplogroup M7a (8⁄51 = 15.7%), and haplogroup G1 (8⁄51 = 15.7%). Other mtDNA haplogroups detected in this sample include A (2⁄51), M7b2 (2⁄51), N9b (1⁄51), B4f (1⁄51), F1b (1⁄51), and M9a (1⁄51). Most of the remaining individuals in this sample have been classified definitively only as belonging to macro-haplogroup M.” ref

“According to Sato et al. (2009), who have studied the mtDNA of the same sample of modern Ainus (N=51), the major haplogroups of the Ainu are N9 [14⁄51 = 27.5%, including 10⁄51 Y and 4⁄51 N9 (xY)], D [12⁄51 = 23.5%, including 8⁄51 D (xD5) and 4⁄51 D5], M7 (10⁄51 = 19.6%), and G (10⁄51 = 19.6%, including 8⁄51 G1 and 2⁄51 G2); the minor haplogroups are A (2⁄51), B (1⁄51), F (1⁄51), and M (xM7, M8, CZ, D, G) (1⁄51).” ref

“Studies published in 2004 and 2007 show the combined frequency of M7a and N9b were observed in Jōmons and which are believed by some to be Jōmon maternal contribution at 28% in Okinawans [7⁄50 M7a1, 6⁄50 M7a (xM7a1), 1⁄50 N9b], 17.6% in Ainus [8⁄51 M7a (xM7a1), 1⁄51 N9b], and from 10% [97⁄1312 M7a (xM7a1), 1⁄1312 M7a1, 28⁄1312 N9b] to 17% [15⁄100 M7a1, 2⁄100 M7a (xM7a1)] in mainstream Japanese. In addition, haplogroups D4, D5, M7b, M9a, M10, G, A, B, and F have been found in Jōmon people as well. These mtDNA haplogroups were found in various Jōmon samples and in some modern Japanese people.” ref

“A study by Kanazawa-Kiriyama in 2013 about mitochondrial haplogroups, found that the Ainu people (including samples from Hokkaido and Tōhoku) have a high frequency of N9b, which is also found among Udege people of eastern Siberia, and more common among Europeans than Eastern Asians, but absent from the geographically close Kantō Jōmon period samples, which have a higher frequency of M7a7, which is commonly found among East and Southeast Asians. According to the authors, these results add to the internal-diversity observed among the Jōmon period population and that a significant percentage of the Jōmon period people had ancestry from a Northeast Asian source population, suggested to be the source of the proto-Ainu language and culture, which is not detected in samples from Kantō.” ref

Autosomal DNA

“A 2004 reevaluation of cranial traits suggests that the Ainu resemble the Okhotsk more than they do the Jōmon but there are large variations. This agrees with the references to the Ainu as a merger of Okhotsk and Satsumon referenced above. Similarly, more recent studies link the Ainu to the local Hokkaido Jōmon period samples, such as the 3,800-year-old Rebun sample.” ref

“Genetic analyses of HLA I and HLA II genes as well as HLA-A, -B, and -DRB1 gene frequencies links the Ainu to Indigenous peoples of the Americas. Genetic of variety Asian groups shows Ainu and of Native Americans are place relatively close can be traced back to Paleolithic groups in Siberia.” ref

“Hideo Matsumoto (2009) suggested, based on immunoglobulin analyses, that the Ainu (and Jōmon) have a Siberian origin. Compared with other East Asian populations, the Ainu have the highest amount of Siberian (immunoglobulin) components, higher than mainland Japanese people. A 2012 genetic study has revealed that the closest genetic relatives of the Ainu are the Ryukyuan people, followed by the Yamato people and Nivkh.” ref

“A genetic analysis in 2016 showed that although the Ainu have some genetic relations to the Japanese people and Eastern Siberians (especially Itelmens and Chukchis), they are not directly related to any modern ethnic group. Further, the study detected genetic contribution from the Ainu to populations around the Sea of Okhotsk but no genetic influence on the Ainu themselves. According to the study, the Ainu-like genetic contribution in the Ulch people is about 17.8% or 13.5% and about 27.2% in the Nivkhs. The study also disproved the idea about a relation to Andamanese or Tibetans; instead, it presented evidence of gene flow between the Ainu and “lowland East Asian farmer populations” (represented in the study by the Ami and Atayal in Taiwan, and the Dai and Lahu in Mainland East Asia).” ref

“A genetic study in 2016 about historical Ainu samples from southern Sakhalin (8) and northern Hokkaido (4), found that these samples were closely related to ancient Okhotsk people and various other Northeast Asians, such as indigenous populations in Kamchatka (Itelmens). The authors conclude that this points to heterogeneity among the historical Ainu, as other studies reported a rather isolated position of analyzed Ainu samples from southern Hokkaido.” ref

“Recent autosomal evidence suggests that the Ainu derive a majority of their ancestry from the local Jōmon period people of Hokkaido. A 2019 study by Gakuhari et al., analyzing ancient Jōmon remains, finds about 79.3% Hokkaido Jōmon ancestry in the Ainu. Another 2019 study (by Kanazawa-Kiriyama et al.) finds about 66% Hokkaido Jōmon ancestry. A genetic study in 2021 (Sato et al.) found that the Ainu probably derived about ~49% of their ancestry from the local Hokkaido Jōmon, ~22% from the Okhotsk (samplified by Chukotko-Kamchatkan peoples), and ~29% from the Yamato Japanese.” ref

“Population genomic data from various Jōmon period samples show that their main ancestry component split from other East Asian people at about 15,000 BCE. Following their migration into the Japanese archipelago, they became largely isolated from outside geneflow. However, geneflow from Ancient North Eurasians towards the Jōmon period population was detected along a North to South cline, with a peak among Hokkaido Jōmon.” ref

“A study by Adachi et al. 2018 concluded that: “Our results suggest that the Ainu were formed from the Hokkaido Jomon people, but subsequently underwent considerable admixture with adjacent populations. The present study strongly recommends revision of the widely accepted dual-structure model for the population history of the Japanese, in which the Ainu are assumed to be the direct descendants of the Jomon people.” ref

“The Ainu often resemble Native Americans, but exhibit a variation of phenotypes, ranging from “Caucasian” to East Asian, with many having an intermediate appearance. Physical differences could be observed between different Ainu subgroups and clans. The numerous large Kabata and Hidaka Ainu clans largely resembled Northeast Asians and Northeastern Siberians, rather than Europeans. The physical differences between Ainu and neighboring Japanese and Koreans, was found to be not as large as early historians suggested. Many Ainu men have abundant wavy hair and often have long beards. There was also a number of mixed Russian-Ainu individuals.” ref

“The book of Ainu Life and Legends by author Kyōsuke Kindaichi (published by the Japanese Tourist Board in 1942) contains a physical description of Ainu: “Many have wavy hair, but some straight black hair. Very few of them have wavy brownish hair. Their skins are generally reported to be light brown. But this is due to the fact that they labor on the sea and in briny winds all day. Old people who have long desisted from their outdoor work are often found to be as white as western men. The Ainu have broad faces, beetling eyebrows, and sometimes large sunken eyes, which are generally horizontal and of the so-called European type. Eyes of the Mongolian type are rare but occasionally found among them.” ref

“A comparative study by Brace et al. (2001) showed a closer morphological relation of the Ainu and their Hokkaido Jōmon ancestors with prehistoric and living European groups. The study concludes that part of their ancestors are descended from of a population (dubbed “Eurasians” by Brace et al.) that moved into northern Eurasia eastwards in the Late Pleistocene, which significantly predates the expansion of the modern core population of East Asia from Mainland Southeast Asia. According to the authors, these morphological similarities suggest distant genetic ties at one time, and provides some basis for the long-time claim that the Ainu have an Indo-European component among their ancestry.” ref

“A study by Kura et al. 2014 based on cranial and genetic characteristics suggests a mostly Northeastern Asian (“Arctic“) origin for Ainu people. Thus, despite Ainu sharing some morphological similarities to Caucasoid populations, the Ainu are essentially of North Asiatic origin. Genetic evidence supports a closer relation with Paleosiberian Arctic populations, such as the Chukchi people. A study by Omoto has shown that the Ainu are closer related to other East Asian groups (previously mentioned as ‘Mongoloid’) than to Western Eurasian groups (formerly termed as “Caucasian”), on the basis of fingerprints and dental morphology.” ref

“A study published in the scientific journal “Nature” by Jinam et al. 2015, using genome-wide SNP data comparison, found that a noteworthy amount of Ainu carry gene alleles associated with facial features which are commonly found among Europeans but absent from Japanese people and other East Asians, but these alleles are not found in all tested Ainu samples. These alleles are the reason for their pseudo-Caucasian appearance and likely arrived from Paleolithic Siberia.” ref

“In 2021, it was confirmed that the Hokkaido Jōmon population formed from “Terminal Upper-Paleolithic people” (TUP) indigenous to Hokkaido and Northern Eurasia and from migrants of Jōmon period Honshu. The Ainu themselves formed from these heterogeneous Hokkaido Jōmon and from a more recent Northeast Asian/Okhotsk population. Traditional Ainu culture was quite different from Japanese culture. According to Tanaka Sakurako from the University of British Columbia, the Ainu culture can be included into a wider “northern circumpacific region”, referring to various indigenous cultures of Northeast Asia and “beyond the Bering Strait” in North America.” ref

“Never shaving after a certain age, the men had full beards and moustaches. Men and women alike cut their hair level with the shoulders at the sides of the head, trimmed semicircularly behind. The women tattooed (anchi-piri) their mouths, and sometimes the forearms. The mouth tattoos were started at a young age with a small spot on the upper lip, gradually increasing with size.” ref

“The soot deposited on a pot hung over a fire of birch bark was used for colour. Their traditional dress was a robe spun from the inner bark of the elm tree, called attusi or attush. Various styles were made, and consisted generally of a simple short robe with straight sleeves, which was folded around the body, and tied with a band about the waist. The sleeves ended at the wrist or forearm and the length generally was to the calves. Women also wore an undergarment of Japanese cloth.” ref

“The Ainu hunted from late autumn to early summer. The reasons for this were, among others, that in late autumn, plant gathering, salmon fishing, and other activities of securing food came to an end, and hunters readily found game in fields and mountains in which plants had withered. A village possessed a hunting ground of its own or several villages used a joint hunting territory (iwor). Heavy penalties were imposed on any outsiders trespassing on such hunting grounds or joint hunting territory.” ref

“The Ainu hunted Ussuri brown bears, Asian black bears, Ezo deer (a subspecies of sika deer), hares, red foxes, Japanese raccoon dogs, and other animals. Ezo deer were a particularly important food resource for the Ainu, as were salmon. They also hunted sea eagles such as white-tailed sea eagles, raven, and other birds. The Ainu hunted eagles to obtain their tail feathers, which they used in trade with the Japanese.” ref

“The Ainu hunted with arrows and spears with poison-coated points. They obtained the poison, called surku, from the roots and stalks of aconites. The recipe for this poison was a household secret that differed from family to family. They enhanced the poison with mixtures of roots and stalks of dog’s bane, boiled juice of Mekuragumo (a type of harvestman), Matsumomushi (Notonecta triguttata, a species of backswimmer), tobacco, and other ingredients. They also used stingray stingers or skin covering stingers.” ref

“They hunted in groups with dogs. Before the Ainu went hunting, particularly for bear and similar animals, they prayed to the god of fire, the house guardian god, to convey their wishes for a large catch, and to the god of mountains for safe hunting.” ref

“The Ainu usually hunted bear during the spring thaw. At that time, bears were weak because they had not fed at all during their long hibernation. Ainu hunters caught hibernating bears or bears that had just left hibernation dens. When they hunted bear in summer, they used a spring trap loaded with an arrow, called an amappo. The Ainu usually used arrows to hunt deer. Also, they drove deer into a river or sea and shot them with arrows. For a large catch, a whole village would drive a herd of deer off a cliff and club them to death.” ref

“Fishing was important for the Ainu. They largely caught trout, primarily in summer, and salmon in autumn, as well as “ito” (Japanese huchen), dace, and other fish. Spears called “marek” were often used. Other methods were “tesh” fishing, “uray” fishing and “rawomap” fishing. Many villages were built near rivers or along the coast. Each village or individual had a definite river fishing territory. Outsiders could not freely fish there and needed to ask the owner.” ref

“Men wore a crown called sapanpe for important ceremonies. Sapanpe was made from wood fibre with bundles of partially shaved wood. This crown had wooden figures of animal gods and other ornaments on its center. Men carried an emush (ceremonial sword) secured by an emush at strap to their shoulders.” ref

“Women wore matanpushi, embroidered headbands, and ninkari, earrings. Ninkari was a metal ring with a ball. Matanpushi and ninkari were originally worn by men. Furthermore, aprons called maidari now are a part of women’s formal clothes. However, some old documents say that men wore maidari. Women sometimes wore a bracelet called tekunkani.” ref

“Women wore a necklace called rektunpe, a long, narrow strip of cloth with metal plaques. They wore a necklace that reached the breast called a tamasay or shitoki, usually made from glass balls. Some glass balls came from trade with the Asian continent. The Ainu also obtained glass balls secretly made by the Matsumae clan.” ref

“The Ainu people had various types of marriage. A child was promised in marriage by arrangement between his or her parents and the parents of his or her betrothed or by a go-between. When the betrothed reached a marriageable age, they were told who their spouse was to be. There were also marriages based on mutual consent of both sexes. In some areas, when a daughter reached a marriageable age, her parents let her live in a small room called tunpu annexed to the southern wall of her house. The parents chose her spouse from men who visited her. The age of marriage was 17 to 18 years of age for men and 15 to 16 years of age for women, who were tattooed. At these ages, both sexes were regarded as adults.” ref

“When a man proposed to a woman, he visited her house, ate half a full bowl of rice handed to him by her, and returned the rest to her. If the woman ate the rest, she accepted his proposal. If she did not and put it beside her, she rejected his proposal. When a man became engaged to a woman or they learned that their engagement had been arranged, they exchanged gifts. He sent her a small engraved knife, a workbox, a spool, and other gifts. She sent him embroidered clothes, coverings for the back of the hand, leggings, and other handmade clothes.” ref

“The worn-out fabric of old clothing was used for baby clothes because soft cloth was good for the skin of babies and worn-out material protected babies from gods of illness and demons due to these gods’ abhorrence of dirty things. Before a baby was breast-fed, they were given a decoction of the endodermis of alder and the roots of butterburs to discharge impurities. Children were raised almost naked until about the ages of four to five. Even when they wore clothes, they did not wear belts and left the front of their clothes open. Subsequently, they wore bark clothes without patterns, such as attush, until coming of age.” ref

“Newborn babies were named ayay (a baby’s crying), shipo, poyshi (small excrement), and shion (old excrement). Children were called by these “temporary” names until the ages of two to three. They were not given permanent names when they were born. Their tentative names had a portion meaning “excrement” or “old things” to ward off the demon of ill-health. Some children were named based on their behavior or habits. Other children were named after impressive events or after parents’ wishes for the future of the children. When children were named, they were never given the same names as others.” ref

“Men wore loincloths and had their hair dressed properly for the first time at age 15–16. Women were also considered adults at the age of 15–16. They wore underclothes called mour and had their hair dressed properly and wound waistcloths called raunkut and ponkut around their bodies. When women reached age 12–13, the lips, hands, and arms were tattooed. When they reached age 15–16, their tattoos were completed. Thus were they qualified for marriage.” ref

Religion: Ainu creation myth, Ko-Shintō, and Shamanism in Siberia

See also: Category:Ainu mythology

“The Ainu are traditionally animists, believing that everything in nature has a kamuy (spirit or god) on the inside. The most important include Kamuy-huci, goddess of the hearth, Kim-un-kamuy, god of bears and mountains, and Repun Kamuy, god of the sea, fishing, and marine animals. Kotan-kar-kamuy is regarded as the creator of the world in the Ainu religion.” ref

“The Ainu have no priests by profession; instead the village chief performs whatever religious ceremonies are necessary. Ceremonies are confined to making libations of sake, saying prayers, and offering willow sticks with wooden shavings attached to them. These sticks are called inaw (singular) and nusa (plural). They are placed on an altar used to “send back” the spirits of killed animals. Ainu ceremonies for sending back bears are called Iyomante. The Ainu people give thanks to the gods before eating and pray to the deity of fire in time of sickness. They believe that their spirits are immortal, and that their spirits will be rewarded hereafter by ascending to kamuy mosir (Land of the Gods).” ref

“The Ainu are part of a larger collective of indigenous people who practice “arctolatry” or bear worship. The Ainu believe that the bear holds particular importance as Kim-un Kamuy’s chosen method of delivering the gift of the bear’s hide and meat to humans. John Batchelor reported that the Ainu view the world as being a spherical ocean on which float many islands, a view based on the fact that the sun rises in the east and sets in the west. He wrote that they believe the world rests on the back of a large fish, which when it moves causes earthquakes.” ref

“Ainu assimilated into mainstream Japanese society have adopted Buddhism and Shintō, while some northern Ainu were converted as members of the Russian Orthodox Church. Regarding Ainu communities in Shikotanto (色丹) and other areas that fall within the Russian sphere of cultural influence, there have been cases of church construction as well as reports that some Ainu have decided to profess their Christian faith.” ref

“There have also been reports that the Russian Orthodox Church has performed some missionary projects in the Sakhalin Ainu community. However, not many people have converted and there are only reports of several persons who have converted. Converts have been scorned as “Nutsa Ainu” (Russian Ainu) by other members of the Ainu community. Even so, the reports indicate that many Ainu have kept their faith in the deities of ancient times.” ref

Evolution of blond hair?

“Single nucleotide polymorphisms of the KITLG gene are associated with blonde hair color in various human populations. One of these polymorphisms is associated with blond hair. The earliest known individual with this allele is a female south-central Siberian ANE individual from Afontova Gora 3 site, which is dated to 16130-15749 BCE. It is thus argued that at least some ANE individuals were blonde-haired.” ref

Geneticist David Reich said that the KITLG gene for blond hair probably entered continental Europe in a population migration wave from the Eurasian steppe, by a population carrying substantial Ancient North Eurasian ancestry. Hanel and Carlberg (2020) likewise report that populations bearing Ancient North Eurasian ancestry were responsible for contributing gene alleles lightening European hair color.” ref

‘Ancient North Eurasians’ and Comparative mythology

“Since the term ‘Ancient North Eurasian’ refers to a genetic bridge of connected mating networks, scholars of comparative mythology have argued that they probably shared myths and beliefs that could be reconstructed via the comparison of stories attested within cultures that were not in contact for millennia and stretched from the Pontic–Caspian steppe to the American continent.” ref

“For instance, the mytheme of the dog guarding the Otherworld possibly stems from an older Ancient North Eurasian belief, as suggested by similar motifs found in Indo-European, Native American, and Siberian mythology. In Siouan, Algonquian, Iroquoian, and in Central and South American beliefs, a fierce guard dog was located in the Milky Way, perceived as the path of souls in the afterlife, and getting past it was a test. The Siberian Chukchi and Tungus believed in a guardian-of-the-afterlife dog and a spirit dog that would absorb the dead man’s soul and act as a guide in the afterlife. In Indo-European myths, the figure of the dog is embodied by Cerberus, Sarvarā, and Garmr. Anthony and Brown note that it might be one of the oldest mythemes recoverable through comparative mythology.” ref

“A second canid-related series of beliefs, myths, and rituals connected dogs with healing rather than death. For instance, Ancient Near Eastern and Turkic–Kipchaq myths are prone to associate dogs with healing and generally categorized dogs as impure. A similar myth-pattern is assumed for the Eneolithic site of Botai in Kazakhstan, dated to 3500 BCE or 5,522 years ago, which might represent the dog as an absorber of illness and guardian of the household against disease and evil. In Mesopotamia, the goddess Nintinugga, associated with healing, was accompanied or symbolized by dogs. Similar absorbent-puppy healing and sacrifice rituals were practiced in Greece and Italy, among the Hittites, again possibly influenced by Near Eastern traditions.” ref

Ainu people, Sámi people, Native Americans, the Ancient North Eurasians, and Paganistic-Shamanism with Totemism

Damien Marie AtHope’s Art

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“Koryak people of the Russian Far East, who live immediately north of the Kamchatka Peninsula, with cultural borders including Tigilsk in the south and the Anadyr basin in the north. Koryak people are culturally similar to the Chukchi people of extreme northeast Siberia. The Koryak language is linguistically close to the Chukchi language, not to mention, ALL of these languages are members of the Chukotko-Kamchatkan language family. Koryak mythology centers on the supernatural shaman Quikil (Big-Raven), who was created by the Supreme Being as the first man and protector of the Koryak. Big Raven myths are also found in Southeast Alaska in the Tlingit culture, and among the Haida, Tsimshian, and other natives of the Pacific Northwest Coast Amerindians.” ref

Damien Marie AtHope’s Art

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Zen buddhism and god?

Zen master Sokei-an says:[D]harmakaya [is] the equivalent of God … The Buddha also speaks of no time and no space, where if I make a sound there is in that single moment a million years. It is spaceless like radio waves, like electric space – intrinsic. The Buddha said that there is a mirror that reflects consciousness. In this electric space a million miles and a pinpoint – a million years and a moment – are exactly the same. It is pure essence … We call it ‘original consciousness’ – ‘original akasha – perhaps God in the Christian sense. I am afraid of speaking about anything that is not familiar to me. No one can know what IT is (Sokei-an 1993, pp. 142, 146). The same Zen adept, Sokei-an, further comments:The creative power of the universe is not a human being; it is Buddha. The one who sees, and the one who hears, is not this eye or ear, but the one who is this consciousness. This One is Buddha. This One appears in every mind. This One is common to all sentient beings, and is God (Sokei-an 1993, p. 41). Sokei-an (1993). The Zen Eye: A Collection of Zen Talks by Sokei-an. Weatherhill. ISBN 978-0-8348-0272-8. Zen Master Sokei-an – Tricycle: The Buddhist Review

Sokei-an,  Zen Master?

Sokei-an Shigetsu Sasaki (佐々木 指月 (曹渓庵); March 10, 1882 – May 17, 1945), born Yeita Sasaki, was a Japanese Rinzai monk who founded the Buddhist Society of America (now the First Zen Institute of America) in New York City in 1930. Influential in the growth of Zen Buddhism in the United States, Sokei-an was one of the first Japanese masters to live and teach in America. In 1944 he married American Ruth Fuller Everett. He died in May 1945 without leaving behind a Dharma heir. One of his better known students was Alan Watts, who studied under him briefly. Watts stayed for two weeks as a student of Sokei-an [ref] in the late 1930s.Sokei-an was born in Japan in 1882 as Yeita Sasaki. He was raised by his father, a Shinto priest, and his father’s wife, though his birth mother was his father’s concubine. Beginning at age four, his father taught him Chinese and soon had him reading Confucian texts.[ref] 

Following the death of his father when he was fifteen, he became an apprentice sculptor and came to study under Japan‘s renowned Koun Takamura at the Imperial Academy of Art in Tokyo.[ref] While in school he began his study of Rinzai Zen under Sokatsu Shaku, (a Dharma heir of Soyen Shaku), graduating from the academy in 1905.[ref] Following graduation he was drafted by the Japanese Imperial Army and served briefly during the Russo-Japanese War on the border of Manchuria. Sasaki was discharged when the war ended shortly after in 1906, and soon married his first wife, Tomé, a fellow student of Sokatsu.[ref] The newlyweds followed Sokatsu to San Francisco, California that year as part of a delegation of fourteen. The couple soon had their first child, Shintaro. In California with the hope of establishing a Zen community, the group farmed strawberries in Hayward, California with little success. Sasaki then studied painting under Richard Partington[ref] at the California Institute of Art, where he met Nyogen Senzaki.[ref] By 1910 the delegation’s Zen community had proven unsuccessful. All members of the original fourteen, with the exception of Sasaki, made return trips back to Japan.[ref][ref]

Sokei-an then moved to Oregon without Tomé and Shintaro to work for a short while, being rejoined by them in Seattle Washington (where his wife gave birth to their second child, Seiko,[ref] a girl). In Seattle, Sasaki worked as a picture frame maker[ref] and wrote various articles and essays for Japanese publications such as Chuo Koron and Hokubei Shinpo. He traveled the Oregon and Washington countrysides selling subscriptions to Hokubei Shinpo.[ref] His wife, who had become pregnant again, moved back to Japan in 1913 to raise their children. Over the next few years he made a living doing various jobs, when in 1916 he moved to Greenwich Village in Manhattan, New York, where he encountered the poet and magus Aleister Crowley.[ref] 

Sometime during this period he was interviewed by the US Army but not drafted due to lingering allegiances to Japan.[ref] In New York he worked both as a janitor and a translator for Maxwell Bodenheim. He also began to write poetry during his free time.[ref] He returned to Japan in 1920 to continue his koan studies, first under Soyen Shaku and then with Sokatsu.[ref] In 1922 he returned to the United States and in 1924 or 1925 began giving talks on Buddhism at the Orientalia Bookstore on E. 58th Street in New York City, having received lay teaching credentials from Sokatsu.[ref] In 1928 he received inka from Sokatsu in Japan, the “final seal” of approval in the Rinzai school.[ref] Then, on May 11, 1930, Sokei-an and some American students founded the Buddhist Society of America, subsequently incorporated in 1931,[ref] at 63 West 70th Street (originally with just four members).[ref] Here he offered sanzen interviews and gave Dharma talks, also working on various translations of important Buddhist texts.[ref] He made part of his living by sculpting Buddhist images and repairing art for Tiffany’s.[ref]

In 1938 his future wife, Ruth Fuller Everett, began studying under him and received her Buddhist name (Eryu); her daughter, Eleanor, was then the wife of Alan Watts (who also studied under Sokei-an that same year).[ref] 

In 1941 Ruth purchased an apartment at 124 E. 65th Street in New York City, which also served as living quarters for Sokei-an and became the new home for the Buddhist Society of America (opened on December 6). Following the attack on Pearl Harbor, Sokei-an was arrested by the FBI as an “enemy alien“[ref] taken to Ellis Island on June 15 and then interned at a camp in Fort Meade, Maryland on October 2, 1942 (where he suffered from high blood pressure and several strokes).[ref]

He was released from the internment camp on August 17, 1943 following the pleas of his students and returned to the Buddhist Society of America in New York City. In 1944 he divorced his wife in Little Rock, Arkansas, with whom he had been separated for several years. Soon after, on July 10, 1944, Sokei-an married Ruth Fuller Sasaki in Hot Springs, Arkansas. Sokei-an died on May 17, 1945 after years of bad health.[ref] His ashes are interred at Woodlawn Cemetery in Bronx, New York.[ref] The Buddhist Society of America underwent a name change following his death in 1945, becoming the First Zen Institute of America. Dwight Goddard (author of “A Buddhist Bible”) has described Sokei-an as, “being from the autocratic and blunt ‘old school’ of Zen masters.”[ref] According to writer Robert Lopez, “Sokei-an lectured on Zen and Buddhism in English. But he communicated the essence of the Buddha’s teaching and in his daily life by his presence alone, in silence, and in a radiance achieved through, as he once said, ‘nature’s orders.’”[ref] 

Alan Watts has said of Sokei-an, “I felt that he was basically on the same team as I; that he bridged the spiritual and the earthy, and that he was as humorously earthy as he was spiritually awakened.”[ref] In his autobiography, Watts had this to say, “When he began to teach Zen he was still, as I understand, more the artist than the priest, but in the course of time he shaved his head and ‘sobered up.’ Yet not really. For Ruth was often apologizing for him and telling us not to take him too literally or too seriously when, for example, he would say that Zen is to realize that life is simply nonsense, without meaning other than itself or future purpose beyond itself. The trick was to dig the nonsense, for—as Tibetans say—you can tell the true yogi by his laugh.”[ref] Zen master Dae Gak has said, “Sokei-An has a good understanding of Western culture and this, combined with his enlightened perspective, is a trustworthy bridge from Zen in the East to Zen in the West. He finds that place where “East” and “West” no longer exist and articulates this wisdom brilliantly for all beings. A true bodhisattva.”[ref]

The Kanamara Matsuri is centred on a local penis-venerating shrine. The legend being that a sharp-toothed demon (vagina dentata) hid inside the vagina of a young woman and castrated two young men on their wedding nights. As a result, the young woman sought help from a blacksmith, who fashioned an iron phallus to break the demon’s teeth, which led to the enshrinement of penis-venerating. The Kanayama Shrine was popular among prostitutes who wished to pray for protection from sexually transmitted infections. Japan has a patriarchal past still evident in its contemporary society, related in Shinto Japan’s so-called ‘indigenous’ religion, where gender roles are often reinforced through objectification and the targeted use of sight. Male sight, specifically, occupies a privileged position in everything from ancient myths to the modern wedding ritual and continually exerts an oppressive influence on the lives of women, monitoring and impeding their public movements. The twin themes of men dominating women through sight and women building social as well as literal shelters from that sight cut across time and space in ritual practice. It is not quite certain whether in Japan’s early history, the existence of priestesses preceded that of the priests or not. We cannot say whether a golden age of women ever existed or not. 

Aka fujo “Feminine Pollution” involves the idea of “pollution” in Shinto ritual, which has been used in the past to justify discrimination against a variety of groups, including women. Embedded in the idea of pollution, however, is what a society finds threatening and dangerous to its social order; the categorization of women as polluting, therefore, might speak to the fear of women even in a patriarchal society as well as being a remnant of ancient practices where women were revered for their unique spiritual powers. Nevertheless, women have historically been pushed out of the public eye and out of public religious spaces because of their supposed impurity and to this day women are haunted by the belief in their inherent pollution. The actual state of Shinto in its early period has not been sufficiently clarified. A much more important problem is the relationship between men and women in that period where this can be historically substantiated.

In the earliest stages, social structures included both men and women, however, in time this man plus woman system underwent changes. Many of the miko (female shamans) and the ancient chronicles speak of female rulers though as the rights and privileges of the various petty rulers were gradually absorbed by the Imperial male dominated family and a centralized empire formed, politics assumed an increasingly rational character, although it was supposed to be determined ultimately by divine will. Thus began the formal and conceptual rift between politics and religion, as a result, women retired more and more from this form of society. At this stage, the woman was only the emperor’s representative in the religious sphere, and the same process could be observed in the independent provinces.

The second period of Shinto history began with the Taika Reform 645-1867 which brought about a change from the old form of government to a centralized absolute monarchy. In order to achieve political unity in the state, the power of the earlier provincial lords fell to the emperor. This meant that the individual cults of the local gods of the clans (ujigami) had to be organized into one central system. In State Shinto, fulfilling the rite correctly meant that the gods could only appear at a certain time and in a certain place. Each new step in the modernization of the cultural, political or economic fields ousted women further from significant positions in the priesthood. For this reason, the rites had to be performed by official priests and these official priests were ruling men, after this time, priestesses were very rare but in many old shrines, the tradition of having a priestess persisted until the tenth century CE.

Three factors are responsible for the decline in the number of priestesses at most shrines:

1. Since the descent of the divinity could now be calculated “mechanically”, as it were, women were no longer really necessary in the priesthood.

2. The Chinese legal system, recently introduced to Japan and on which the priesthood was based, was strictly male-oriented.

3. Buddhism strengthened the notion of the uncleanness of woman, due to her biological and psychological make-up.

The third period of Shintoism, beginning with the Meiji Restoration from 1868 to the present day, also considerably affected the position of women. The newly restored Imperial dynasty, with its new national awareness, strove to establish pure Shinto as the national religion and abolished such mystical elements of Shinto as the concept of inherited charism and the practice of magical rites. Women could no longer be a member of the official priesthood.

Since the Second World War, women have once again been accepted into the priesthood though; women are generally seen as substitutes for male priests. Thus, women have achieved a new position in the Shinto religion by renouncing their specific femininity.

Furthermore, there remain two sexist problems the role of the women in contemporary Shinto:

1. The participation of women is limited at the higher ranking shrines, such as Ise and Atsuta, which had prerogatives during the period of National Shinto.

2. Shinto is still sensitive to contamination by “impure blood,” so that priestesses have to take precautions so as not to defile the cult during menstruation. Their menstrual periods are controlled and regulated through the use of medications.

Many of the roles carved out for women in Shinto emphasize their passivity or subordination to men. Such as the form of spiritual practice specific to women is that of the itako, a type of shaman which has a unique relationship to sight because they are always blind or visually impaired. Their initiation ceremony echoes many of the same themes as those found in the Kojiki and their pairing with a male spirit speaks to the presence of patriarchal influences even within a female-exclusive religious practice.

References 1, 2, 3

If you are a religious believer, may I remind you that faith in the acquisition of knowledge is not a valid method worth believing in. Because, what proof is “faith”, of anything religion claims by faith, as many people have different faith even in the same religion?

Damien Marie AtHope’s Art

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“Several linguists and geneticists suggest that the Uralic languages are related to various Siberian languages and possibly also some languages of northern Native Americans. A proposed family is named Uralo-Siberian, it includes Uralic, Yukaghir, Eskimo–Aleut (Inuit), possibly Nivkh, and Chukotko-Kamchatkan. Haplogroup Q is found in nearly all Native Americans and nearly all of the Yeniseian Ket people (90%).” ref, ref

You can find some form of Shamanism, among Uralic, Transeurasian, Dené–Yeniseian, Chukotko-Kamchatkan, and Eskaleut languages.

My speculations of shamanism are its dispersals, after 24,000 to 4,000 years ago, seem to center on Lake Baikal and related areas. To me, the hotspot of Shamanism goes from west of Lake Baikal in the “Altai Mountains” also encompassing “Lake Baikal” and includes the “Amur Region/Watershed” east of Lake Baikal as the main location Shamanism seems to have radiated out from. 

Shamanism Among the Peoples of the North: Uralic, Transeurasian, Dené–Yeniseian, Chukotko-Kamchatkan, and Eskaleut languages

SHAMANISM IN JAPAN

“Shamanism is part of the indigenous Ainu religion and the Japanese religion of Shinto. Since the early middle-ages Shinto has been influenced by and syncretized with Buddhism and other elements of continental East Eurasian culture. The book “Occult Japan: Shinto, Shamanism and the Way of the Gods” by Percival Lowell delves further into researching Japanese shamanism or Shintoism. The book Japan Through the Looking Glass: Shaman to Shinto uncovers the extraordinary aspects of Japanese beliefs.” ref

“There are still shamans in Japan but they are not as big as they are in Korea. Shamans are people who have visions and perform various deeds while in a trance and are believed to have the power to control spirits in the body leave everyday existence and travel or fly to other worlds. The word Shaman means “agitated or frenzied person” in the language of the Manchu-Tungus nomads of Siberia. Shaman are viewed as bridges between their communities and the spiritual world. During their trances, which are usually induced in some kind of ritual, shamans seek the help of spirits to do things like cure illnesses, bring about good weather, predict the future, or communicate with deceased ancestors.” ref

“Shamans are generally poor and come from the lower social classes. Sometimes their spiritual power is seen as so great that they need to be separated from society. In the past, it is believed, almost all villages had a shaman and they were members of a caste that passed their traditions down from generation to generation. Some shaman are afraid to reveal their secrets because they believe that after they pass on their secrets they will die. Shamans can be both men and women. Many are women. Traditionally, they have not chosen to become shamans but rather had shamanism thrust upon them. The process of becoming a shaman usually follows five steps: 1) a break with life as usual; 2) a journey to an “other world;” 3) dying and being reborn: 4) gaining a new vision: 5) and emerging with a deep sense of connectedness and purpose.” ref

Itako Shamans

“Itako” are shamans or mediums who have traditionally been blind or sight-impaired old women who were called upon by bereaved family members to communicate with the dead. They embrace folk religion and animist traditions but also call upon Buddhist and Shinto gods for help. Each itako has her own gods that she calls upon. Some use aids such as beads and stringed bows to call the gods. Itako have traditionally been looked down upon as little more than beggars. They were persecuted in the Meiji period and they sought refuge in remote places. They often dress in ragged clothes. When other people saw them they threw horse dung at them.” ref

“Itako were once common throughout Japan. According to one researcher, there may have been 1 million of them roaming the countryside, working as mediums and healers, 150 years ago. They usually traveled with “yamabushi” (See Buddhism). Only about 20 or so itako remain, they are mostly in Aomori. “Onmyoji” are traditional shamans trained in Taoist, Buddhist, and Shinto magic. They are sometimes called on to perform exorcisms, which are done by convincing the spirits they should leave rather than forcing them out.” ref

Itako Shamans in Aomori

Entsuji, a Buddhist temple near a crater lake in Osorezan, a composite volcano in the middle of Shimokita Peninsula in Aomori Prefecture in northern Japan, hosts a four-day festival in late July that features itako who communicate with the dead. During the festival, the women sit in blue tents and people who want to communicate with dead loved ones form lines to meet with the old women, who charge ¥3,000 per spirit per 30-minute session. Some work at shrines and others work at their homes outside the festival times. Some moonlight as fortunetellers.” ref

Itako Seances

“During a seance with an itako known as “Kuchiyose”, the itako receives the death date of a deceased person and it relation to the customer. She then rattles prayer beads, goes into a trance, and sings to call the spirit to possess her. The spirit usually thanks the petitioner, wishes good fortune and life, and discusses personal matters. Itako usually claim they don’t know what is said while they are in a trance. They say that while they are in a trance it feels like they have been grabbed by a powerful force and moved to someplace where they can watch themselves.” ref

“The seances last about 10 minutes. Through the medium, the spirit usually says something like, “I am very sorry for having died before my parents, but I am glad that you have come here. I am OK, and hope you are too.” Describing Japan’s only male itako, Miki Fuji wrote in the Daily Yomiuri, “I ask Narumi to contact my grandmother. He closes his eyes and begins to chant Buddhist scriptures while rubbing black beads in his hands, until his speech suddenly becomes addressed to me…”I rest peacefully on a lotus with grandfather. Your mother may become ill in December and this may develop into pneumonia if she doesn’t take care. But it won’t be serious if she takes precautions early enough.” ref

“Doctors are studying subjects who have participated in Kuchiyose to see if they have had a healing effect from the ritual. In survey of 670 people with chronic diseases in the Aomori area, 35 percent of them said they had taken part in a Kuchiyose ritual. Of those 80 percent said the experience was beneficial. Thirty percent said they felt mentally healed and 27 percent said they felt calm after speaking to the shamans. One doctor involved in the research told the Yomiuri Shimbun, “Kuchiyose has an effect of giving people a sense of comfort and encouragement to live thinking about the future.” ref

Itako, Feminism and Trances

“Kohkan Sasaki, professor emeritus of Komazawa University is a researcher of religious anthropology who has studied shamanism in Asia., told the Daily Yomiuri: “While male shamans are common in China and Southeast Asia, female shamans are more prevalent in India, North and South Korea, and Japan, where societies are based on patriarchal values. I think shamans tend to be female in societies where women are suppressed or discriminated against as an inferior gender. By associating themselves with the gods, women are able to balance their power with men in such societies. Japanese used to believe that the gods offered mercy to those in misery, especially Kannon, the Buddhist goddess of mercy. She is one of the most commonly believed-in gods among itako. I have seen noseless yuta shamans in Okinawa Prefecture. Such physical defects used to be interpreted as symbolic of supernatural stigmata. The oldest reference to female shamans in Japan appears in the Wei Zhi, a Chinese chronicle of the third century.” ref

“A woman called Himiko, who is described as a shaman, ruled an early Japanese political federation known as Yamatai using a divine power to converse with the gods.The first reference to female shamans in Japanese writing dates back to the 11th century. [Source: Miki Fujii, Daily Yomiuri] On the religious beliefs of itako, Sasaki said: “Shamanism is based on animistic folk religions. In the case of itako, they believe in a number of gods from various different beliefs, such as animism, Buddhism and Shinto. Rather than simply mixing these beliefs, they superimpose later religions on top of existing ones, enabling long-running beliefs and gods to maintain strong identities. During an initiation ceremony, each itako will come into contact with the gods that will possess them. They will also learn which god is most powerful in a variety of different circumstances.” ref

“On the itako initiation ceremony Sasaki said: “In training for initiation, itako dress in a white kimono 100 days before the ceremony. They pour cold water over themselves from a well, river or pond–usually this takes place in midwinter–and practice chanting. Three weeks before the ceremony they stop taking grain, salt, and avoid artificial heat. This helps to create an extreme state of mind to facilitate their entering a trance. During the ceremony itself, the itako trainee is dressed as a bride to indicate that she will marry a god. Repetitive drum and bell sounds are produced to help raise concentration levels and prepare the mind while older itako sit around to assist the chanting. The session can continue for days and days until the itako finally enters a trance. That is when the master itako determines which god has possessed the trainee itako. During this tough ritual trainees are not allowed to sleep and their consumption of food is kept to a minimum. Because many itako suffer from some kind of visual impairment, trainees must learn by heart various scriptures. In this way, some itako know the scriptures better than some of the less-motivated priests.” ref

“On why itako have not garnered the same respect as priests, Sasaki said: The difference between priests and shamans lies in the fact that shamans go into a trance while priests simply ask the gods for mercy. Priests often come from privileged backgrounds while shamans are generally lower-class people or social outcasts. Before Buddhism and Confucianism entered Japan, various emperors made use of the services of shamans. But as doctrinal religions were introduced, animism became vilified as the superstition and heresy of primitive culture. A similar trend can be seen in most civilizations around the world, in which folk religions are eliminated by institutional religions such as Buddhism, Christianity or Islam. Eventually, the religious rituals once performed by female shamans in Japan in ancient times were taken over by men of later, more sophisticated religions.” ref

“On How can you verify that an itako has really entered a trance, Sasaki said: “Although this is a crucial point for researchers, you can never be sure that a trance is entirely authentic. I think the important point is that the client believes in the power of the itako and that society accepts the tradition. This is one aspect common in all religions. On How shamanism can help make up for weaknesses of modern culture, Sasaki said it can provide relief for people in extreme suffering and pain, making fuller use of people’s daily lives and keeping society and culture intact. Shamanism fills some of the spaces left open by modern rationalism and science.” ref

Small Town Shaman Fire Ceremony for a Mountain God

“Describing s small town shaman fire ceremony in the Kiso area between Nagoya and Nagano, Thomas Swick wrote in Smithsonian magazine, “Mr. Ando, the man in the brown cardigan, invited us to a goma (fire) ceremony that evening at his shrine…Mr. Ando was a shaman in a religion that worships the god of Mount Ontake. That evening “about a dozen similarly garbed celebrants sat cross-legged on pillows before a platform with an open pit in the middle. Behind the pit stood a large wooden statue of Fudo Myo-o, the fanged Wisdom King, who holds a rope in his left hand (for tying up your emotions) and a sword in his right (for cutting through your ignorance). He appeared here as a manifestation of the god of Mount Ontake.” ref

“A priest led everyone in a long series of chants to bring the spirit of the god down from the mountain. Then an assistant placed blocks of wood in the pit and set them ablaze. The people seated around the fire continued chanting as the flames grew, raising their voices in a seemingly agitated state and cutting the air with their hands in motions that seemed mostly arbitrary to me. But Bill told me later that these mudras, as the gestures are called, actually correspond to certain mantras.” ref

“Each of us was handed a cedar stick to touch to aching body parts, in the belief that the pain would transfer to the wood. One by one, people came up, knelt before the fire, and fed it their sticks. The priest took his wand — which, with its bouquet of folded paper, resembled a white feather duster — and touched it to the flames. Then he tapped each supplicant several times with the paper, front and back. Flying sparks accompanied each cleansing. Bill, a Buddhist, went up for a hit.” ref

Miko

“A miko (巫女), or shrine maiden, is a young priestess who works at a Shinto shrine. Miko were once likely seen as shamans, but are understood in modern Japanese culture to be an institutionalized role in daily life, trained to perform tasks, ranging from sacred cleansing to performing the sacred Kagura dance. Miko traditions date back to the prehistoric Jōmon period of Japan, when female shamans would go into “trances and convey the words of the gods” (the kami), an act comparable with “the pythia or sibyl in Ancient Greece.” ref

“Traditional miko tools include the Azusa Yumi (梓弓, “catalpa bow”), the tamagushi (玉串) (offertory sakaki-tree branches), and the gehōbako (外法箱, a “supernatural box that contains dolls, animal and human skulls … [and] Shinto prayer beads”). Miko also use bells, drums, candles, gohei, and bowls of rice in ceremonies. The Japanese words miko and fujo (“female shaman” and “shrine maiden” respectively) are usually written 巫女 as a compound of the kanji 巫 (“shaman”), and 女 (“woman”). Miko was archaically written 神子 (“kami” + “child”) and 巫子 (“shaman child”).” ref

“The term is not to be confused with miko meaning “prince”, “princess” or “duke”, and which is otherwise variously spelt 御子 (“august child”), 皇子 (“imperial child”), 皇女 (“imperial daughter”, also pronounced himemiko), 親王 (“prince”) or 王 (“king”, “prince” or “duke”). These spellings of miko were commonly used in the titles of ancient Japanese nobles, such as Prince Kusakabe (草壁皇子, Kusakabe no Miko or Kusakabe no Ōji). The word can also mean “shrine virgin.” ref

“Miko once performed spirit possession and takusen (whereby the possessed person serves as a “medium” (yorimashi) to communicate the divine will or message of that kami or spirit; also included in the category of takusen is “dream revelation” (mukoku), in which a kami appears in a dream to communicate its will) as vocational functions in their service to shrines. As time passed, they left the shrines and began working independently in secular society.” ref

“In addition to a medium or a miko (or a geki, a male shaman), the site of a takusen may occasionally also be attended by a sayaniwa who interprets the words of the possessed person to make them comprehensible to other people present. Kamigakari and takusen may be passive, when a person speaks after suddenly becoming involuntarily possessed or has a dream revelation; they can also be active, when spirit possession is induced in a specific person to ascertain the divine will or gain a divine revelation.” ref

“Miko are known by many names; Fairchild lists 26 terms for “shrine-attached Miko“ and 43 for “non-shrine-attached Miko“. Other names are ichiko (巫子, “shaman child”), or “market/town child” (巫子) (both likely ateji meaning “female medium; fortuneteller”), and reibai (霊媒, meaning “spirit go-between, medium”). In English, the word is often translated as “shrine maiden”, though freer renderings often simply use the phrase “female shaman” (shamanka) or, as Lafcadio Hearn translated it, “Divineress”. Some scholars prefer the transliteration miko, contrasting the Japanese Mikoism with other Asian terms for female shamans.” ref

“As Fairchild explains:

Women played an important role in a region stretching from Manchuria, China, Korea and Japan to the [Ryukyu Islands]. In Japan these women were priestesses, soothsayers, magicians, prophets and shamans in the folk religion, and they were the chief performers in organized Shinto. These women were called Miko, and the author calls the complex “Mikoism” for lack of a suitable English word.” ref

Damien Marie AtHope’s Art

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Postglacial genomes from foragers across Northern Eurasia reveal prehistoric

mobility associated with the spread of the Uralic and Yeniseian languages

Abstract

“The North Eurasian forest and forest-steppe zones have sustained millennia of sociocultural connections among northern peoples. We present genome-wide ancient DNA data for 181 individuals from this region spanning the Mesolithic, Neolithic, and Bronze Age. We find that Early to Mid-Holocene hunter-gatherer populations from across the southern forest and forest-steppes of Northern Eurasia can be characterized by a continuous gradient of ancestry that remained stable for millennia, ranging from fully West Eurasian in the Baltic region to fully East Asian in the Transbaikal region. In contrast, cotemporaneous groups in far Northeast Siberia were genetically distinct, retaining high levels of continuity from a population that was the primary source of ancestry for Native Americans. By the mid-Holocene, admixture between this early Northeastern Siberian population and groups from Inland East Asia and the Amur River Basin produced two distinctive populations in eastern Siberia that played an important role in the genetic formation of later people. Ancestry from the first population, Cis-Baikal Late Neolithic-Bronze Age (Cisbaikal_LNBA), is found substantially only among Yeniseian-speaking groups and those known to have admixed with them. Ancestry from the second, Yakutian Late Neolithic-Bronze Age (Yakutia_LNBA), is strongly associated with present-day Uralic speakers. We show how Yakutia_LNBA ancestry spread from an east Siberian origin ~4.5kya, along with subclades of Y-chromosome haplogroup N occurring at high frequencies among present-day Uralic speakers, into Western and Central Siberia in communities associated with Seima-Turbino metallurgy: a suite of advanced bronze casting techniques that spread explosively across an enormous region of Northern Eurasia ~4.0kya. However, the ancestry of the 16 Seima-Turbino-period individuals–the first reported from sites with this metallurgy–was otherwise extraordinarily diverse, with partial descent from Indo-Iranian-speaking pastoralists and multiple hunter-gatherer populations from widely separated regions of Eurasia. Our results provide support for theories suggesting that early Uralic speakers at the beginning of their westward dispersal where involved in the expansion of Seima-Turbino metallurgical traditions, and suggests that both cultural transmission and migration were important in the spread of Seima-Turbino material culture.” ref

Haplogroup N from China to Fennoscandia: Migrations and Relationship of Language (Dene-Yeniseian and Uralic), DNA, and Cultures

Damien Marie AtHope’s Art

People don’t commonly teach religious history, even that of their own claimed religion. No, rather they teach a limited “pro their religion” history of their religion from a religious perspective favorable to the religion of choice. 

Damien Marie AtHope’s Art

Do you truly think “Religious Belief” is only a matter of some personal choice?

Do you not see how coercive one’s world of choice is limited to the obvious hereditary belief, in most religious choices available to the child of religious parents or caregivers? Religion is more commonly like a family, culture, society, etc. available belief that limits the belief choices of the child and that is when “Religious Belief” is not only a matter of some personal choice and when it becomes hereditary faith, not because of the quality of its alleged facts or proposed truths but because everyone else important to the child believes similarly so they do as well simply mimicking authority beliefs handed to them. Because children are raised in religion rather than being presented all possible choices but rather one limited dogmatic brand of “Religious Belief” where children only have a choice of following the belief as instructed, and then personally claim the faith hereditary belief seen in the confirming to the belief they have held themselves all their lives. This is obvious in statements asked and answered by children claiming a faith they barely understand but they do understand that their family believes “this or that” faith, so they feel obligated to believe it too. While I do agree that “Religious Belief” should only be a matter of some personal choice, it rarely is… End Hereditary Religion!

Opposition to Imposed Hereditary Religion

Damien Marie AtHope’s Art

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Animism: Respecting the Living World by Graham Harvey 

“How have human cultures engaged with and thought about animals, plants, rocks, clouds, and other elements in their natural surroundings? Do animals and other natural objects have a spirit or soul? What is their relationship to humans? In this new study, Graham Harvey explores current and past animistic beliefs and practices of Native Americans, Maori, Aboriginal Australians, and eco-pagans. He considers the varieties of animism found in these cultures as well as their shared desire to live respectfully within larger natural communities. Drawing on his extensive casework, Harvey also considers the linguistic, performative, ecological, and activist implications of these different animisms.” ref

Damien Marie AtHope’s Art

We are like believing machines we vacuum up ideas, like Velcro sticks to almost everything. We accumulate beliefs that we allow to negatively influence our lives, often without realizing it. Our willingness must be to alter skewed beliefs that impend our balance or reason, which allows us to achieve new positive thinking and accurate outcomes.

Damien Marie AtHope’s Art

Damien Marie AtHope’s Art

Damien Marie AtHope’s Art

Damien Marie AtHope’s Art

Damien Marie AtHope’s Art

Damien Marie AtHope’s Art

Damien Marie AtHope’s Art

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Low Gods “Earth” or Tutelary deity and High Gods “Sky” or Supreme deity

“An Earth goddess is a deification of the Earth. Earth goddesses are often associated with the “chthonic” deities of the underworld. Ki and Ninhursag are Mesopotamian earth goddesses. In Greek mythology, the Earth is personified as Gaia, corresponding to Roman Terra, Indic Prithvi/Bhūmi, etc. traced to an “Earth Mother” complementary to the “Sky Father” in Proto-Indo-European religion. Egyptian mythology exceptionally has a sky goddess and an Earth god.” ref

“A mother goddess is a goddess who represents or is a personification of nature, motherhood, fertility, creation, destruction or who embodies the bounty of the Earth. When equated with the Earth or the natural world, such goddesses are sometimes referred to as Mother Earth or as the Earth Mother. In some religious traditions or movements, Heavenly Mother (also referred to as Mother in Heaven or Sky Mother) is the wife or feminine counterpart of the Sky father or God the Father.” ref

“Any masculine sky god is often also king of the gods, taking the position of patriarch within a pantheon. Such king gods are collectively categorized as “sky father” deities, with a polarity between sky and earth often being expressed by pairing a “sky father” god with an “earth mother” goddess (pairings of a sky mother with an earth father are less frequent). A main sky goddess is often the queen of the gods and may be an air/sky goddess in her own right, though she usually has other functions as well with “sky” not being her main. In antiquity, several sky goddesses in ancient Egypt, Mesopotamia, and the Near East were called Queen of Heaven. Neopagans often apply it with impunity to sky goddesses from other regions who were never associated with the term historically. The sky often has important religious significance. Many religions, both polytheistic and monotheistic, have deities associated with the sky.” ref

“In comparative mythology, sky father is a term for a recurring concept in polytheistic religions of a sky god who is addressed as a “father”, often the father of a pantheon and is often either a reigning or former King of the Gods. The concept of “sky father” may also be taken to include Sun gods with similar characteristics, such as Ra. The concept is complementary to an “earth mother“. “Sky Father” is a direct translation of the Vedic Dyaus Pita, etymologically descended from the same Proto-Indo-European deity name as the Greek Zeûs Pater and Roman Jupiter and Germanic Týr, Tir or Tiwaz, all of which are reflexes of the same Proto-Indo-European deity’s name, *Dyēus Ph₂tḗr. While there are numerous parallels adduced from outside of Indo-European mythology, there are exceptions (e.g. In Egyptian mythology, Nut is the sky mother and Geb is the earth father).” ref

Tutelary deity

“A tutelary (also tutelar) is a deity or spirit who is a guardian, patron, or protector of a particular place, geographic feature, person, lineage, nation, culture, or occupation. The etymology of “tutelary” expresses the concept of safety and thus of guardianship. In late Greek and Roman religion, one type of tutelary deity, the genius, functions as the personal deity or daimon of an individual from birth to death. Another form of personal tutelary spirit is the familiar spirit of European folklore.” ref

“A tutelary (also tutelar) in Korean shamanism, jangseung and sotdae were placed at the edge of villages to frighten off demons. They were also worshiped as deities. Seonangshin is the patron deity of the village in Korean tradition and was believed to embody the Seonangdang. In Philippine animism, Diwata or Lambana are deities or spirits that inhabit sacred places like mountains and mounds and serve as guardians. Such as: Maria Makiling is the deity who guards Mt. Makiling and Maria Cacao and Maria Sinukuan. In Shinto, the spirits, or kami, which give life to human bodies come from nature and return to it after death. Ancestors are therefore themselves tutelaries to be worshiped. And similarly, Native American beliefs such as Tonás, tutelary animal spirit among the Zapotec and Totems, familial or clan spirits among the Ojibwe, can be animals.” ref

“A tutelary (also tutelar) in Austronesian beliefs such as: Atua (gods and spirits of the Polynesian peoples such as the Māori or the Hawaiians), Hanitu (Bunun of Taiwan‘s term for spirit), Hyang (Kawi, Sundanese, Javanese, and Balinese Supreme Being, in ancient Java and Bali mythology and this spiritual entity, can be either divine or ancestral), Kaitiaki (New Zealand Māori term used for the concept of guardianship, for the sky, the sea, and the land), Kawas (mythology) (divided into 6 groups: gods, ancestors, souls of the living, spirits of living things, spirits of lifeless objects, and ghosts), Tiki (Māori mythology, Tiki is the first man created by either Tūmatauenga or Tāne and represents deified ancestors found in most Polynesian cultures). ” ref, ref, ref, ref, ref, ref, ref

Mesopotamian Tutelary Deities can be seen as ones related to City-States 

“Historical city-states included Sumerian cities such as Uruk and Ur; Ancient Egyptian city-states, such as Thebes and Memphis; the Phoenician cities (such as Tyre and Sidon); the five Philistine city-states; the Berber city-states of the Garamantes; the city-states of ancient Greece (the poleis such as Athens, Sparta, Thebes, and Corinth); the Roman Republic (which grew from a city-state into a vast empire); the Italian city-states from the Middle Ages to the early modern period, such as Florence, Siena, Ferrara, Milan (which as they grew in power began to dominate neighboring cities) and Genoa and Venice, which became powerful thalassocracies; the Mayan and other cultures of pre-Columbian Mesoamerica (including cities such as Chichen Itza, Tikal, Copán and Monte Albán); the central Asian cities along the Silk Road; the city-states of the Swahili coast; Ragusa; states of the medieval Russian lands such as Novgorod and Pskov; and many others.” ref

“The Uruk period (ca. 4000 to 3100 BCE; also known as Protoliterate period) of Mesopotamia, named after the Sumerian city of Uruk, this period saw the emergence of urban life in Mesopotamia and the Sumerian civilization. City-States like Uruk and others had a patron tutelary City Deity along with a Priest-King.” ref

“Chinese folk religion, both past, and present, includes myriad tutelary deities. Exceptional individuals, highly cultivated sages, and prominent ancestors can be deified and honored after death. Lord Guan is the patron of military personnel and police, while Mazu is the patron of fishermen and sailors. Such as Tu Di Gong (Earth Deity) is the tutelary deity of a locality, and each individual locality has its own Earth Deity and Cheng Huang Gong (City God) is the guardian deity of an individual city, worshipped by local officials and locals since imperial times.” ref

“A tutelary (also tutelar) in Hinduism, personal tutelary deities are known as ishta-devata, while family tutelary deities are known as Kuladevata. Gramadevata are guardian deities of villages. Devas can also be seen as tutelary. Shiva is the patron of yogis and renunciants. City goddesses include: Mumbadevi (Mumbai), Sachchika (Osian); Kuladevis include: Ambika (Porwad), and Mahalakshmi. In NorthEast India Meitei mythology and religion (Sanamahism) of Manipur, there are various types of tutelary deities, among which Lam Lais are the most predominant ones. Tibetan Buddhism has Yidam as a tutelary deity. Dakini is the patron of those who seek knowledge.” ref

“A tutelary (also tutelar) The Greeks also thought deities guarded specific places: for instance, Athena was the patron goddess of the city of Athens. Socrates spoke of hearing the voice of his personal spirit or daimonion:

You have often heard me speak of an oracle or sign which comes to me … . This sign I have had ever since I was a child. The sign is a voice which comes to me and always forbids me to do something which I am going to do, but never commands me to do anything, and this is what stands in the way of my being a politician.” ref

“Tutelary deities who guard and preserve a place or a person are fundamental to ancient Roman religion. The tutelary deity of a man was his Genius, that of a woman her Juno. In the Imperial era, the Genius of the Emperor was a focus of Imperial cult. An emperor might also adopt a major deity as his personal patron or tutelary, as Augustus did Apollo. Precedents for claiming the personal protection of a deity were established in the Republican era, when for instance the Roman dictator Sulla advertised the goddess Victory as his tutelary by holding public games (ludi) in her honor.” ref

“Each town or city had one or more tutelary deities, whose protection was considered particularly vital in time of war and siege. Rome itself was protected by a goddess whose name was to be kept ritually secret on pain of death (for a supposed case, see Quintus Valerius Soranus). The Capitoline Triad of Juno, Jupiter, and Minerva were also tutelaries of Rome. The Italic towns had their own tutelary deities. Juno often had this function, as at the Latin town of Lanuvium and the Etruscan city of Veii, and was often housed in an especially grand temple on the arx (citadel) or other prominent or central location. The tutelary deity of Praeneste was Fortuna, whose oracle was renowned.” ref

“The Roman ritual of evocatio was premised on the belief that a town could be made vulnerable to military defeat if the power of its tutelary deity were diverted outside the city, perhaps by the offer of superior cult at Rome. The depiction of some goddesses such as the Magna Mater (Great Mother, or Cybele) as “tower-crowned” represents their capacity to preserve the city. A town in the provinces might adopt a deity from within the Roman religious sphere to serve as its guardian, or syncretize its own tutelary with such; for instance, a community within the civitas of the Remi in Gaul adopted Apollo as its tutelary, and at the capital of the Remi (present-day Rheims), the tutelary was Mars Camulus.” ref 

Household deity (a kind of or related to a Tutelary deity)

“A household deity is a deity or spirit that protects the home, looking after the entire household or certain key members. It has been a common belief in paganism as well as in folklore across many parts of the world. Household deities fit into two types; firstly, a specific deity – typically a goddess – often referred to as a hearth goddess or domestic goddess who is associated with the home and hearth, such as the ancient Greek Hestia.” ref

“The second type of household deities are those that are not one singular deity, but a type, or species of animistic deity, who usually have lesser powers than major deities. This type was common in the religions of antiquity, such as the Lares of ancient Roman religion, the Gashin of Korean shamanism, and Cofgodas of Anglo-Saxon paganism. These survived Christianisation as fairy-like creatures existing in folklore, such as the Anglo-Scottish Brownie and Slavic Domovoy.” ref

“Household deities were usually worshipped not in temples but in the home, where they would be represented by small idols (such as the teraphim of the Bible, often translated as “household gods” in Genesis 31:19 for example), amulets, paintings, or reliefs. They could also be found on domestic objects, such as cosmetic articles in the case of Tawaret. The more prosperous houses might have a small shrine to the household god(s); the lararium served this purpose in the case of the Romans. The gods would be treated as members of the family and invited to join in meals, or be given offerings of food and drink.” ref

“In many religions, both ancient and modern, a god would preside over the home. Certain species, or types, of household deities, existed. An example of this was the Roman Lares. Many European cultures retained house spirits into the modern period. Some examples of these include:

• Brownie (Scotland and England) or Hob (England) / Kobold (Germany) / Goblin / Hobgoblin
• Domovoy (Slavic)
• Nisse (Norwegian or Danish) / Tomte (Swedish) / Tonttu (Finnish)
• Húsvættir (Norse)” ref

“Although the cosmic status of household deities was not as lofty as that of the Twelve Olympians or the Aesir, they were also jealous of their dignity and also had to be appeased with shrines and offerings, however humble. Because of their immediacy they had arguably more influence on the day-to-day affairs of men than the remote gods did. Vestiges of their worship persisted long after Christianity and other major religions extirpated nearly every trace of the major pagan pantheons. Elements of the practice can be seen even today, with Christian accretions, where statues to various saints (such as St. Francis) protect gardens and grottos. Even the gargoyles found on older churches, could be viewed as guardians partitioning a sacred space.” ref

“For centuries, Christianity fought a mop-up war against these lingering minor pagan deities, but they proved tenacious. For example, Martin Luther‘s Tischreden have numerous – quite serious – references to dealing with kobolds. Eventually, rationalism and the Industrial Revolution threatened to erase most of these minor deities, until the advent of romantic nationalism rehabilitated them and embellished them into objects of literary curiosity in the 19th century. Since the 20th century this literature has been mined for characters for role-playing games, video games, and other fantasy personae, not infrequently invested with invented traits and hierarchies somewhat different from their mythological and folkloric roots.” ref

“In contradistinction to both Herbert Spencer and Edward Burnett Tylor, who defended theories of animistic origins of ancestor worship, Émile Durkheim saw its origin in totemism. In reality, this distinction is somewhat academic, since totemism may be regarded as a particularized manifestation of animism, and something of a synthesis of the two positions was attempted by Sigmund Freud. In Freud’s Totem and Taboo, both totem and taboo are outward expressions or manifestations of the same psychological tendency, a concept which is complementary to, or which rather reconciles, the apparent conflict. Freud preferred to emphasize the psychoanalytic implications of the reification of metaphysical forces, but with particular emphasis on its familial nature. This emphasis underscores, rather than weakens, the ancestral component.” ref

“William Edward Hearn, a noted classicist, and jurist, traced the origin of domestic deities from the earliest stages as an expression of animism, a belief system thought to have existed also in the neolithic, and the forerunner of Indo-European religion. In his analysis of the Indo-European household, in Chapter II “The House Spirit”, Section 1, he states:

The belief which guided the conduct of our forefathers was … the spirit rule of dead ancestors.” ref

“In Section 2 he proceeds to elaborate:

It is thus certain that the worship of deceased ancestors is a vera causa, and not a mere hypothesis. …

In the other European nations, the Slavs, the Teutons, and the Kelts, the House Spirit appears with no less distinctness. … [T]he existence of that worship does not admit of doubt. … The House Spirits had a multitude of other names which it is needless here to enumerate, but all of which are more or less expressive of their friendly relations with man. … In [England] … [h]e is the Brownie. … In Scotland this same Brownie is well known. He is usually described as attached to particular families, with whom he has been known to reside for centuries, threshing the corn, cleaning the house, and performing similar household tasks. His favorite gratification was milk and honey.” ref

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ref, ref

Hinduism around 3,700 to 3,500 years old. ref

 Judaism around 3,450 or 3,250 years old. (The first writing in the bible was “Paleo-Hebrew” dated to around 3,000 years ago Khirbet Qeiyafa is the site of an ancient fortress city overlooking the Elah Valley. And many believe the religious Jewish texts were completed around 2,500) ref, ref

Judaism is around 3,450 or 3,250 years old. (“Paleo-Hebrew” 3,000 years ago and Torah 2,500 years ago)

“Judaism is an Abrahamic, its roots as an organized religion in the Middle East during the Bronze Age. Some scholars argue that modern Judaism evolved from Yahwism, the religion of ancient Israel and Judah, by the late 6th century BCE, and is thus considered to be one of the oldest monotheistic religions.” ref

“Yahwism is the name given by modern scholars to the religion of ancient Israel, essentially polytheistic, with a plethora of gods and goddesses. Heading the pantheon was Yahweh, the national god of the Israelite kingdoms of Israel and Judah, with his consort, the goddess Asherah; below them were second-tier gods and goddesses such as Baal, Shamash, Yarikh, Mot, and Astarte, all of whom had their own priests and prophets and numbered royalty among their devotees, and a third and fourth tier of minor divine beings, including the mal’ak, the messengers of the higher gods, who in later times became the angels of Judaism, Christianity and Islam. Yahweh, however, was not the ‘original’ god of Israel “Isra-El”; it is El, the head of the Canaanite pantheon, whose name forms the basis of the name “Israel”, and none of the Old Testament patriarchs, the tribes of Israel, the Judges, or the earliest monarchs, have a Yahwistic theophoric name (i.e., one incorporating the name of Yahweh).” ref

“El is a Northwest Semitic word meaning “god” or “deity“, or referring (as a proper name) to any one of multiple major ancient Near Eastern deities. A rarer form, ‘ila, represents the predicate form in Old Akkadian and in Amorite. The word is derived from the Proto-Semitic *ʔil-, meaning “god”. Specific deities known as ‘El or ‘Il include the supreme god of the ancient Canaanite religion and the supreme god of East Semitic speakers in Mesopotamia’s Early Dynastic Period. ʼĒl is listed at the head of many pantheons. In some Canaanite and Ugaritic sources, ʼĒl played a role as father of the gods, of creation, or both. For example, in the Ugaritic texts, ʾil mlk is understood to mean “ʼĒl the King” but ʾil hd as “the god Hadad“. The Semitic root ʾlh (Arabic ʾilāh, Aramaic ʾAlāh, ʾElāh, Hebrew ʾelōah) may be ʾl with a parasitic h, and ʾl may be an abbreviated form of ʾlh. In Ugaritic the plural form meaning “gods” is ʾilhm, equivalent to Hebrew ʾelōhîm “powers”. In the Hebrew texts this word is interpreted as being semantically singular for “god” by biblical commentators. However the documentary hypothesis for the Old Testament (corresponds to the Jewish Torah) developed originally in the 1870s, identifies these that different authors – the Jahwist, Elohist, Deuteronomist, and the Priestly source – were responsible for editing stories from a polytheistic religion into those of a monotheistic religion. Inconsistencies that arise between monotheism and polytheism in the texts are reflective of this hypothesis.” ref

Jainism around 2,599 – 2,527 years old. ref

Confucianism around 2,600 – 2,551 years old. ref

Buddhism around 2,563/2,480 – 2,483/2,400 years old. ref

Christianity around 2,o00 years old. ref

Shinto around 1,305 years old. ref

Islam around 1407–1385 years old. ref

Sikhism around 548–478 years old. ref

Bahá’í around 200–125 years old. ref

Damien Marie AtHope’s Art

Expressions of Atheistic Thinking:

• Around 2,600 years ago, Ajita Kesakambali, ancient Indian philosopher, who is the first known proponent of Indian materialism. ref
• Around 2,535 to 2,475 years ago, Heraclitus, Greek pre-Socratic philosopher, a native of the Greek city Ephesus, Ionia, on the coast of Anatolia, also known as Asia Minor or modern Turkey. ref
• Around 2,500 to 2,400 years ago, according to The Story of Civilization book series certain African pygmy tribes have no identifiable gods, spirits, or religious beliefs or rituals, and even what burials accrue are without ceremony. ref
• Around 2,490 to 2,430 years ago, Empedocles, Greek pre-Socratic philosopher and a citizen of Agrigentum, a Greek city in Sicily. ref
• Around 2,460 to 2,370 years ago, Democritus, Greek pre-Socratic philosopher considered to be the “father of modern science” possibly had some disbelief amounting to atheism. ref
• Around 2,399 years ago or so, Socrates, a famous Greek philosopher was tried for sinfulness by teaching doubt of state gods. ref
• Around 2,341 to 2,270 years ago, Epicurus, a Greek philosopher known for composing atheistic critics and famously stated, “Is God willing to prevent evil, but not able? Then he is not omnipotent. Is he able, but not willing? Then he is malevolent. Is he both able and willing? Then whence cometh evil? Is he neither able nor willing? Then why call him god?” ref

This last expression by Epicurus, seems to be an expression of Axiological Atheism. To understand and utilize value or actually possess “Value Conscious/Consciousness” to both give a strong moral “axiological” argument (the problem of evil) as well as use it to fortify humanism and positive ethical persuasion of human helping and care responsibilities. Because value-blindness gives rise to sociopathic/psychopathic evil.

Damien Marie AtHope’s Art

Damien Marie AtHope’s Art

Damien Marie AtHope (Said as “At” “Hope”)/(Autodidact Polymath but not good at math):

Axiological Atheist, Anti-theist, Anti-religionist, Secular Humanist, Rationalist, Writer, Artist, Jeweler, Poet, “autodidact” Philosopher, schooled in Psychology, and “autodidact” Armchair Archaeology/Anthropology/Pre-Historian (Knowledgeable in the range of: 1 million to 5,000/4,000 years ago). I am an anarchist socialist politically. Reasons for or Types of Atheism

My Website, My Blog, & Short-writing or Quotes, My YouTube, Twitter: @AthopeMarie, and My Email: damien.marie.athope@gmail.com