The ''Kokushi Daijiten'' (国史大辞典 literally "Great Dictionary of National History") all no.: REF DS 833 .K64, (Vol. 1)is a large, general history

dictionary A dictionary is a listing of lexemes from the lexicon of one or more specific languages, often arranged Alphabetical order, alphabetically (or by Semitic root, consonantal root for Semitic languages or radical-and-stroke sorting, radical an ...

Japan Japan is an island country in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean off the northeast coast of the Asia, Asian mainland, it is bordered on the west by the Sea of Japan and extends from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea ...

published by the

Tokyo Tokyo, officially the Tokyo Metropolis, is the capital of Japan, capital and List of cities in Japan, most populous city in Japan. With a population of over 14 million in the city proper in 2023, it is List of largest cities, one of the most ...

-based company

Yoshikawa Kobunkan is a city located in Saitama Prefecture, Japan. , the city had an estimated population of 73,262 in 31,031 households and a population density of 2300 persons per km2. The total area of the city is . Geography Located in far southeastern Saitam ...

. The original edition consisted of six volumes and was published in 1927. The current edition was written and released over a period of 18 years, beginning in 1979 and ending in 1997.

General

The ''Kokushi Daijiten'' consists of a total of 14 volumes of entries in addition to three index volumes (numbered as vol. 15 upper, middle, and lower). A remarkable feature of the

is the inclusion of large, high-quality glossy

color Color (or colour in English in the Commonwealth of Nations, Commonwealth English; American and British English spelling differences#-our, -or, see spelling differences) is the visual perception based on the electromagnetic spectrum. Though co ...

plates and

map A map is a symbolic depiction of interrelationships, commonly spatial, between things within a space. A map may be annotated with text and graphics. Like any graphic, a map may be fixed to paper or other durable media, or may be displayed on ...

s in addition to

black Black is a color that results from the absence or complete absorption of visible light. It is an achromatic color, without chroma, like white and grey. It is often used symbolically or figuratively to represent darkness.Eva Heller, ''P ...

and

white White is the lightest color and is achromatic (having no chroma). It is the color of objects such as snow, chalk, and milk, and is the opposite of black. White objects fully (or almost fully) reflect and scatter all the visible wa ...

illustrations that accompany entries in the text.

Organization

The

is organized following the Japanese phonetic syllabary beginning with "a", as opposed to the

iroha The is a Japanese poem. Originally the poem was attributed to Kūkai, the founder of Shingon Buddhism, but more modern research has found the date of composition to be later in the Heian period (794–1179). The first record of its existence ...

order. Entries are titled in

hiragana is a Japanese language, Japanese syllabary, part of the Japanese writing system, along with ''katakana'' as well as ''kanji''. It is a phonetic lettering system. The word ''hiragana'' means "common" or "plain" kana (originally also "easy", ...

katakana is a Japanese syllabary, one component of the Japanese writing system along with hiragana, kanji and in some cases the Latin script (known as rōmaji). The word ''katakana'' means "fragmentary kana", as the katakana characters are derived fr ...

as appropriate, then followed by

kanji are logographic Chinese characters, adapted from Chinese family of scripts, Chinese script, used in the writing of Japanese language, Japanese. They were made a major part of the Japanese writing system during the time of Old Japanese and are ...

or Western letters when applicable. Each entry is signed by its author, usually an academic expert in a related field.

Index

The three-volume index is separated by type of entry. The first ("upper") volume contains a supplement containing entries not included in the writing of the original volumes, as well as indexes for historical events (''shiryô'') and place names (''chimei''). The second volume is an index of people's names (''jinmei''), and volume three is an index for "topics" (''jikô''). Each index entry (which are listed in kanji) contains the volume number, page, and line on which the term appears, as well as the title of the entry under which it appears.

Reception

One criticism often leveled against the ''Kokushi Daijiten'' is that since it was written over the course of nearly twenty years and released volume by volume in

syllabary In the Linguistics, linguistic study of Written language, written languages, a syllabary is a set of grapheme, written symbols that represent the syllables or (more frequently) mora (linguistics), morae which make up words. A symbol in a syllaba ...

order, some information from the early volumes has already become outdated. It is generally considered on the slightly

conservative Conservatism is a cultural, social, and political philosophy and ideology that seeks to promote and preserve traditional institutions, customs, and values. The central tenets of conservatism may vary in relation to the culture and civiliza ...

side, which makes it less imaginative than its competitors, such as the Heibonsha ''Nihonshi Daijiten'', but by the same token, factually reliable.

References

*''Kokushi daijiten''. 15 vols. Tokyo: Yoshikawa Kobunkan, 1979-1997. *http://www.columbia.edu/~hds2/BIB95/ch18.htm {{Dictionaries of Japanese Japanese dictionaries 1927 in Japan 1927 non-fiction books