Tamamo no Mae

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Tamamo-no-Mae (color woodcut by Chikanobu, 1886)

Tamamo no Mae ( Japanese 玉 藻 前 ) is a legendary fox woman in Japanese mythology . The legend is told in different versions, but the common element is that the beautiful, talented Tamamo no Mae becomes the favorite concubine of the ex-emperor Toba and almost drives him to his death until her identity as a magical fox is revealed. As a negative example of a fox in human form, she forms the counterpart to the self-sacrificing fox woman Kuzunoha .

Surname

The name Tamamo no Mae means wtl. "Court lady ( no mae前 is a courtly title in this case) Gemstone ( tama玉) - seaweed ( mo藻)". He will u. a. translated as "Princess Jewel Grass" or "Gem Maiden". Tama玉 can also be interpreted as a hidden reference to Tamamo's true identity as a (fox) spirit ( tama霊).

Legend and lore

Tamamo no Mae arrives at the imperial court, where she becomes the ruler's favorite concubine. Not only is she particularly beautiful, she is also learned and amazes the entire court with her knowledge of Buddhism. In one version she also proves her special abilities when she illuminates the palace with light emanating from her body after a violent gust of wind has extinguished all the lights.

After a while under their influence, the ruler falls ill and calls fortune tellers and astrologers for help. Abe no Yasuchika, a master of Yin Yang Divination, reveals her true identity as a fox and her evil intentions. In the form of a fox (as a white, nine-tailed fox) she flees to the Nasu Plain in northern Japan, where she is hunted until she turns into a large stone. The stone emits poisonous fumes that kill every living being that comes near it - hence its name: "death stone " ( sesshōseki殺生 石). The legend has already been dramatized in the Nō Theater under the title Sesshōseki and ends with a redemption of the Tamamo no Mae by the traveling priest Gennō Zenji (1329-1400), who ends the curse of the death stone.

According to Karen Smyers, the earliest written version of the Tamamo legend dates back to 1444. B. Eisaburo Kusano and S. Akashi. In any case, the story was dramatized early on and eventually made it onto the stage of popular kabuki theater. In any case, the pieces listed in Nō, Kabuki and Kyōgen under the names Sesshōseki and Tamamo-no-Mae are all based on the same material by Lady Tamamo. The Ukiyoe artists of the Edo period also found a worthwhile motif in the demonically beautiful fox woman.

Historical role models

As for the identity of the ruler who falls for Tamamo, the situation is complicated by the fact that it is the ex-emperor Toba (1103-1156, r. 1107-1128), while the ruling Tennō his son, the child emperor Konoe ( 1139-55, r. 1142-55). Since we are in the time of the "ruling ex-emperors" (see Insi system), the power lies with the father, not the son. Western sources, however, sometimes confuse the two figures. The figure of Tamamo is said to go back to the lady-in-waiting Fujiwara no Nariko ( 藤原 得 子 ; 1117–1160), who in turn had a great influence on ex-emperor Toba.

The fox woman Daji in a representation by Hokusai

The most detailed versions of the legend also contain the hint that Tamamo is the incarnation of an ancient fox figure who drove the respective rulers to ruin in India and China. She is primarily identified with the figure of the Baosi (8th century BC), who, according to Chinese legends, was a kind of dragon woman, while the cruel lady-in-waiting Daji (11th century BC) was also adopted in China becomes that she was a fox. However, the influence of women always led to the overthrow of a dynasty.

In Japan, too, the legend takes place at the time when the political leadership passed from the court of the Tennō to the hands of the warrior nobility ( samurai ). It may be that some premodern historians were tempted to ascribe these circumstances to the malevolent influence of court ladies, as Chinese historiography did, and that this was the germ of the Tamamo legend. On the other hand, the Tenno dynasty did not go under completely. In the Tamamo legend there is sometimes a kind of national pride that it was possible to put an end to the mischief of this fox woman in Japan and that the political situation is more stable than China.

literature

  • S. Akashi: Inari. In: Journal for Mission Studies and Religious Studies. St. Ottilien, 43. 1928, pp. 150-151.
  • Alexander Krappe: Far Eastern fox lore. In: California folklore quarterly 3. 1944, 2, pp. 124–147.
  • Eisaburo Kusano: Weird tales of Old Japan. Tokyo 1953, pp. 95-108.
  • Klaus Mailahn: The fox in belief and myth. Münster 2006, ISBN 3-8258-9483-5 , pp. 190-194.
  • Stanca Scholz-Cionca: Fox figures in early Kyôgen. In: The fox in culture, religion and folklore of Central and East Asia 2. Wiesbaden 2002, pp. 137–152.
  • Karen Ann Smyers: The Fox and the Jewel. Shared and Private Meanings in Contemporary Japanese Inari Worship. University of Hawaii Press, Honolulu 1999.
  • Marianus W. De Visser: The fox and the badger in Japanese folklore. In: Transactions of the Asiatic Society of Japan. 1908, pp. 1-159.

Web links

Commons : Tamamo no Mae  - collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b Akashi 1928, pp. 150-151.
  2. ↑ Smyers 1999, p. 232.
  3. ↑ Kusano 1953, pp. 95-108.
  4. ↑ Kitsune motifs ( Religion-in-Japan )
  5. ^ Stanca Scholz-Cionca: Fox figures in early Kyôgen . In: The fox in culture, religion and folklore of Central and East Asia 2 . Wiesbaden 2002, pp. 142-145
  6. ↑ Alexander Krappe: Far Eastern fox lore . In: California folklore quarterly 3 . 1944, 2, p. 129
  7. ↑ Baosi 褒 姒, also: Pao-ssu, Japanese Hōji, the concubine who only laughed when all the princes came to the (senseless) roll call because of her.
  8. ↑ Daji 妲 己, Japanese Dakki, the favorite concubine of the last emperor of the Shang dynasty, known for her fondness for the vivisection of subjects.
  9. ↑ Who and What Was Pao-Ssu? (February 22, 2011).