A Translation of the “Ko-ji-ki,”
or
“Records of Ancient Matters.”
(古事記)
By Basil Hall Chamberlain.
[Read before the Asiatic Society of Japan April 12th, May 10th, and
June 21st, 1882.]
Introduction.
Of all the mass of Japanese literature, which lies before us as the result of nearly twelve centuries of book-making, the most important monument is the work entitled “Ko-ji-ki”[1] or “Records of Ancient Matters,” which was completed in A. D. 712. It is the most important because it has preserved for us more faithfully than any other book the mythology, the manners, the language, and the traditional history of
- ↑ Should the claim of Accadian to be considered an Altaïc language be substantiated, then Archaic Japanese will have to be content with the second place in the Altaïc family. Taking the word Altaïc in its usual acceptation, viz., as the generic name of all the languages belonging to the Mantchu, Mongolian, Turkish and Finnish groups, not only the Archaic, but the Classical, literature of Japan carries us back several centuries beyond the earliest extant documents of any other Altaïc tongue.—For a discussion of the age of the most ancient Tamil documents see the Introduction to Bishop Caldwell’s “Comparative Grammar of the Dravidian Languages,” p. 91 et seq.
