英译本《中国上古审美文化对日本绳文时代的影响》（一）

Influenceof Ancient Chinese Aesthetic Cultures on

JapaneseJomon Aesthetic Culture  

ZhiguangKong

(School of Literatureand Journalism, Shandong University, Jinan, Shandong 250100)

Abstract

Based on the Chinese and Japanesearchaeological cultural relics, ancient documents and the legends of theancient history, it can be concluded that the ancient Chinese aestheticcultures had great influences on the Japanese Jomon aesthetic culture. Suchinfluences can be divided into three stages: early, middle and late. Theinfluence in the early stage was represented by the radiation of the Chineseaesthetic culture in the Taihao Era, typically the Houli Culture in Shandong, to theJapanese aesthetic culture in the Incipient and Initial Jomon Periods. Theinfluence in the middle stage was represented by the penetration of the Chineseaesthetic culture in the Shaohao Era, typically the Dawenkou Culture, into theJapanese aesthetic culture in the Early and Middle Jomon Periods. The influencein the late stage was represented by the condensation of the Chinese aestheticcultures in the Period of the Shang-Zhou Dynasties, mainly the Bronze Cultureand the Jade Sculpture Culture, in the Japanese aesthetic culture in the Lateand Final Jomon Periods. Due to the influences from the ancient Chineseaesthetic cultures, the Japanese Jomon aesthetic culture changed accordinglyboth in the deep-level cultural concepts, such as sun worship, fire worship,phoenix worship and cock worship, and in the aesthetic forms, such as theoverall shape, pottery ornamentation, abstract cord pattern, etc.. That is whythe style of the Jomon aesthetic culture was firstly mysterious, primitive andunskillful, then miraculous and gorgeous, and finally dignified and elegant.

Keywords: Jomon Culture, TaihaoCulture, Shaohao Culture, Shang-Zhou Culture, Aesthetic Culture Exchange

In 2001, the author visited Tokyo NationalMuseum, TohohuHistory Museum, and Sendai MunicipalMuseum to inspect the exhibitedcultural artifacts and the artistic works, read books and pictures about theJapanese primitive society and the Jomon culture and art in the libraries of Tohohu Universityand Sendai Municipal International Culture Exchange Center as well as SendaiMunicipal Library. After returning to China, I examined the relevantancient documents, ancient history and legends as well as archaeological data.Through careful studies, I recognized that the ancient Chinese aestheticculture in the legendary the Taihao Era, the Shaohao Era as well as the Periodof the Shang-Zhou Dynasties had influenced the Japanese Jomon aesthetic culturesignificantly. Due to such influences, the Japanese Jomon aesthetic culturechanged correspondingly both in deep-level cultural concepts and in aestheticforms to finally lead to the transitions from the mysterious, primitiveand unskillful style in the early stage to themiraculous and gorgeous style in the middle stage and then to the dignified andelegant style in the late stage.

I

The potteries of theIncipient Jomon Period firstly discovered by the Japanese archaeologists wereunearthed from the Fukui caveof Yoshii-town, Nagasaki,as well as the other sites of the ancient cultural remains in Kagoshimaprefecture, Aomoriprefecture and Iwatek prefecture. These pottery assemblages were mainlycharacteristics of embossed fine cord patterns (called Linear Applique inJapan), and accompanied with projectile point pattern, meandered and twistedlines, fingernail impression pattern and piercing point pattern, etc. Later thepotteries with bean applique of an earlier age were found under the layer ofRyusenmon at Sempukuji caveof Sasebo-city Nagasaki.These potteries could be dated to over 12,000 years ago, which caused asensation throughout the world. It was also a great astonishment to the worldthat a coverage in the People’s Daily reported the following on Aug. 14, 2001:“There are important discoveries from the second excavation lasting for 3months in the Zengpiyan Cave in Guilin Guangxi, and the plain sand-temperedpotteries dated back to 12,000 years ago were unearthed and has become thefocus of the attention of the archaeologists worldwide. It is the earliestpottery ever unearthed in China.” (1) Whether in China or in Japan, the earliest potteries found both appearedabout 12,000 years ago, with plain sand-tempered potteryin China and potteries decorated with bean applique in Japan. As theexisting information does not show any connections between them, we shallregard them as potteries from two different pottery culture systems separatedby the ocean. These two pottery culture systems developed in parallelinitially. Until 9,000 years ago when the Incipient Jomon Period was replacedwith the Initial Jomon Period, remarkable changes took place.

The Initial Jomon Period(about 7,000 B.C. to 4,000 B.C.) was the period when the ancient Chineseaesthetic culture began to influence the Jomon aesthetic culture. Acharacteristic pottery assemblage represented by the tube kettle (Fu) (called“deep-bowl earthenware” in Japan)and composed of kettles, pots, jars, earthen bowl, etc. was discovered in theUenohara Site in Kagoshima andNakano A Site in Hokkaido. These tube kettles are mostly bronzing andyellowish-brown with fine cord pattern, incised pattern, fold line pattern andpiercing point pattern around the mouth rim and the neck. Some tube kettles ofa later period mostly had undulate piled-up applique pattern on the mouth rims.Other tube kettles were either with bird-head buttons on the mouth rims or withseveral circles of appended piled-up applique on the necks, or with semi-circleears or comb buttons outside the mouth rims and in the middle parts. Comparedwith the Incipient Jomon potteries, these potteries had been enhanced aestheticallywith obviously increasing decorative meanings and cultural contents. Theygenerally looked mysterious, primitively simple, and unskillful. But it isworth noticing that these initial Jomon potteries shared similar features withthe pottery assemblage represented by tube kettles uncovered from the ruins ofthe Houli Culture in Taiyi Mountains, the ruins of the Xinglongwa Culture inwestern Liaoning and southeast Inner Mongolia, the sites of the XiaoshankouCulture around Su County in north Anhui and Suixi as well as the ruins of theMajiabin Culture around Taihu Lake.

Around 7,000-6,500 B.C.,the Houli Culture in Taiyi Mountains was nearly parallel to the PeiligangCulture in Henan, and somewhat earlier thananother Neolithic Culture, the Cishan Culture in Hebei. Houli potteries were distinctive.“The majority of the potteries had plain surfaces with few potteries decoratedwith few lines. The mouth rims of the larger potteries were usually foldedreversely to form double layers called folding lips, or reinforced with acircle of clay pressed into saw teeth or undulated patterns, or fine cordpattern, or inscribed, prodded short lines. The integration of reinforcementand decoration became a distinguished characteristic of the Houli potteries. Inaddition, below the mouth rims, cone patterns and fingernail impressionpatterns were decorated. The potteries were also decorated with one to twocircles of appended piled-up applique at themiddle part, inscribed patterns below the neck and several comb piled-upapplique appended at the outside mouth rim. ” Kettlewere “the most typical pottery in the Houli Culture. The large number ofkettles accounted for two thirds of the total potteries in the Houli Culture.They were nearly tubular with long middle parts and round bottom ….. Somekettles were decorated with several plain surfaces or comb ears at the outsideof the mouth rims.”  (2) There are also a large number of tube kettles andpots in the Xianglongwa Culture and the Xiaoshankou Culture, which were nearlyparallel to the Houli Civilization Period. The Xiaoshankou potteries included astraight-wall kettle decorated with a circle of appended piled-up appliquealong the outside, and fingernail impression pattern at the protruding partlike folding lips. A large number of tube kettles with many appended piled-upapplique, fingernail impression patterns, inscribed patterns or comb ears wereunearthed from the Shizishan ruins of the Xiaoshankou Culture. They were verydistinctive. The Xinglongwa Culture was featured with open cylindrical potswith flat bottoms decorated with several circles of hollow patterns along theoutside mouth rims. The pottery assemblage of the Majiabin Culture includedmany tube kettles with the same shape as the kettles of the same types in theearly remains in the Houli Culture and the Xiaoshankou Culture. The surfaces ofthese potteries were generally decorated with cord pattern and inscribedpattern, and appended with piled-up applique along the outside mouth rim orcomb ears. Overall, they represented a mysterious, primitively unskillful anddignified style both in shape and in patterns.

The ancient Chineseaesthetic culture featured the above-mentioned large number of tube kettles,along with the style combining folding lips with decorations, thecharacteristic piled-up clay applique, the semi-circle or comb ears decoratedalong the outside mouth rim or at neck or middle part. Why did these Chinesepotteries share the basic features with the initial Jomon potteries in Japan in respectof both shape and decorative patterns? An objective explanation shall onlyattribute this to the influence of the ancient Chinese aesthetic culture on theinitial Jomon potteries. Regarding this, Mr. Fengshi Luan, a Chinesearchaeologist pointed out the following: “ I deducted that the Dadiwan Culture(also called the Laoguantai Culture) had expanded as it developed. Theinhabitants of the Dadiwan Culture certainly chose the vast land in the eastwith infinite development prosperity due to the special geographic position ofGuangzhong, which was neighboring to Qinling Mountain stretching longand unbroken from west to east in the south, the dry Huangtu Plateau in thenorth, and the undulated hilly areas in the west. Under the pressure of theexpansion of the Dadiwan Culture, the inhabitants of the Peiligang Culture wereforced to migrate southward, eastward, etc. The stage I Yangshao ruins inXiawanggang Xichuan was the ruins left by the inhabitants of the PeiligangCulture after they migrated to the south. Most of the inhabitants moved acrossthe Huanghuai Plain into the Haidai area (East Shandong),which resulted in the enormous changes in the east. ”  “We also assumedthat some of the Houli inhabitants in the north and northeast of Haidai areacrossed the sea to settle down at the middle and western part of the KoreanPeninsula and merged into the indigenous inhabitants, but they still maintainedthe inherent culture tradition of tube kettles with round bottoms. Some ofthese Houli immigrants moved further southward to Kyushuand influenced the culture there.” (3) So did the people of that age werecapable of sailing eastward? The paddles and the skeletons of the ocean fishesthe archaeologists unearthed from the ruins of the Hemudu Culture around 7,000years ago proved not only the ancient people’s ability to “make a canoe out ofa tree trunk and chop the woods to make paddles ” but also their incrediblenavigation abilities.

In the legendary ancientChinese history, the “Fuxishi Era of Taihao Tribe” shall correspond to theInitial Jomon Period. In the “Taihao Era”, the concept of sun worship wasprevailing, and the cultural concepts of sun worship, fire worship, phoenixworship, cock worship, etc. profoundly influenced the culture circles in East Asiaand even the Pan Pacific Region. The surname of both Fu Xi and Nv Wa is“Feng”(in high and level tone), which can also be interpreted as “Feng”(infalling tone),namely, phoenix, which means that Fu Xi andNv Wa were the descendants of the tribe with the phoenix as the totem. The Haoin Taihao meant light, or the morning sun. The Xi in Fu Xi, Nv Xi , Xi He andChang Xi also means morning or morning sun. Fire is the essence of the sun, andfire worship also signifies sun worship. Phoenixis a sunbird created by the primitive progenitors through their imaginationbased on prototype of the pheasant family and birds, such as peacocks andgolden pheasants. So phoenix is also a new totem of a higher level after a highcondensation of the tribe badges of different tribes during the long meltingprocess. As a sunbird and a form to express sun worship, phoenix is mysteriousand lofty, and can’t been seen in daily life. Out of the ardent love andreverence toward the sunbird phoenix, they sought for something similar tophoenix. So they found the cock, which was good at heralding the break of theday and welcoming the sunrise.  

Cock belongs to thepheasant family and became one of the poultry after tamed and raised by theprogenitors at the early Neolithic Age. Therefore there is a close “kinship”between phoenix and cock. As it was difficult to find the phoenix but easy tosee a cock, people focused all their worship, ardent love and reverence towardthe phoenix on the cocks and treated cocks in their daily life as the legendaryphoenix. That is why meandered and twisted linepatterns appended with piled-up applique and especially the comb ears werewidely applied to the tube kettles in the Houli Culture, the XianglongwaCulture, the Xiaoshankou Culture and the Majiabin Culture. In essence, itreflected a special feeling of the people towards the cock. It was also amedium of the cultural concept of sun worship and phoenix worship popular inthat age. The witch culture and aesthetic culture of the Taihao Era radiated tothe Japanese Archipelago through immigration. The comb ears combiningdecoration with practical functions were found on the tube kettles in theInitial Jomon period. They also functioned as themedium of sun worship, phoenix worship and cock worship. From the overalldevelopment of the human culture, the cultural concept of sun worship existedin the ancient times worldwide, but different witch culture forms were adoptedto express this concept. To use cock worship as a means to express sun worship shallbe a unique characteristic of the ancient Chinese aesthetic culture.

           （本文曾在由中华全国美学学会、中国社会科学院、北京第二外国语学院举办的国际美学大会上宣读，中文本载《文史哲》2002年第4期。）