was a ''

kokugaku was an academic movement, a school of Japanese philology and philosophy originating during the Edo period. scholars worked to refocus Japanese scholarship away from the then-dominant study of Chinese, Confucian, and Buddhist texts in favor of ...

'' scholar,

poet A poet is a person who studies and creates poetry. Poets may describe themselves as such or be described as such by others. A poet may simply be the creator (thought, thinker, songwriter, writer, or author) who creates (composes) poems (oral t ...

and

philologist Philology () is the study of language in oral and written historical sources. It is the intersection of textual criticism, literary criticism, history, and linguistics with strong ties to etymology. Philology is also defined as the study of ...

during mid-

Edo period The , also known as the , is the period between 1600 or 1603 and 1868 in the history of Japan, when the country was under the rule of the Tokugawa shogunate and some 300 regional ''daimyo'', or feudal lords. Emerging from the chaos of the Sengok ...

Japan. Along with

Kada no Azumamaro was a poet and philologist of the early Edo period. His ideas had a germinal impact on the ''kokugaku'' school of nativist studies in Japan. He was commonly known as Hakura Itsuki (羽倉斎宮). His first name was Nobumori (信盛) and late ...

Motoori Norinaga was a Japanese people, Japanese scholar of active during the Edo period. He is conventionally ranked as one of the Four Great Men of Kokugaku (nativist) studies. Life Norinaga was born in what is now Matsusaka, Mie, Matsusaka in Ise Province ...

, and

Hirata Atsutane was a Japanese scholar, conventionally ranked as one of the Four Great Men of Kokugaku (nativist) studies, and one of the most significant 19th century theologians of the Shintō religion. His literary name was , and his primary assumed name ...

, he was regarded as one of the

Four Great Men of Kokugaku The Four Great Men of Kokugaku (國學の四大人, ''Kokugaku no shitaijin'' or ''Kokugaku no shiushi'') are a group of Edo-period Japanese scholars recognized as the most significant figures in the Kokugaku tradition of Japanese philology, relig ...

, and through his research into the spirit of ancient Japan (through his studies of the ''

Man'yōshū The is the oldest extant collection of Japanese (poetry in Classical Japanese), compiled sometime after AD 759 during the Nara period. The anthology is one of the most revered of Japan's poetic compilations. The compiler, or the last in ...

'' and other works of ancient literature) he expounded on the theory of ''

magokoro , (まごころ) also sometimes archaically rendered as without the "impurity" of rendaku, is a principle known in Japanese kokugaku related in particular to the origin of the country, the . It has also been described in Japanese literature. M ...

'', which he held to be fundamental to the history of Japan. Independently of and alongside his contemporary

, Mabuchi is accredited with the initial discovery of Lyman's Law, governing ''

rendaku is a pronunciation change seen in some compound words in Japanese. When rendaku occurs, a voiceless consonant (such as ) is replaced with a voiced consonant (such as ) at the start of the second (or later) part of the compound. For example, t ...

'' in the

Japanese language is the principal language of the Japonic languages, Japonic language family spoken by the Japanese people. It has around 123 million speakers, primarily in Japan, the only country where it is the national language, and within the Japanese dia ...

, though which would later be named after

Benjamin Smith Lyman Benjamin Smith Lyman (11 December 1835 – 30 August 1920) was an American mining engineer, surveyor, and an amateur linguist and anthropologist. He was also a promoter of vegetarianism. Biography Benjamin Smith Lyman was born in Northampton, Ma ...

Biography

Mabuchi was born in 1697 in the village of Iba in

Tōtōmi Province was a Provinces of Japan, province of Japan in the area of Japan that is today western Shizuoka Prefecture.Louis-Frédéric, Nussbaum, Louis-Frédéric. (2005). "''Tōtōmi''" in . Tōtōmi bordered on Mikawa Province, Mikawa, Suruga Province, S ...

(currently part of the city of

Hamamatsu, Shizuoka is a city located in western Shizuoka Prefecture, Japan. In September 2023, the city had an estimated population of 780,128 in 340,591 households, making it the prefecture's largest city, with a population density of over the total urban area o ...

), as the third son of Okabe Masanobu. The Okabe were hereditary ''

kannushi , also called , is the common term for a member of the clergy at a responsible for maintaining the shrine and leading worship of the there.* ''Kannushi'' (in Japanese), Iwanami Japanese dictionary, 6th Edition (2008), DVD version The chara ...

'' of Kamo Shrine in

Kyoto Kyoto ( or ; Japanese language, Japanese: , ''Kyōto'' ), officially , is the capital city of Kyoto Prefecture in the Kansai region of Japan's largest and most populous island of Honshu. , the city had a population of 1.46 million, making it t ...

, but his father was from a

cadet A cadet is a student or trainee within various organisations, primarily in military contexts where individuals undergo training to become commissioned officers. However, several civilian organisations, including civil aviation groups, maritime ...

branch of the clan and was a farmer. In 1707, he began training under Sugiura Kuniakira, a ''kokugaku'' scholar with a private academy in Hamamatsu and a disciple of

. Mabuchi married in 1723, but his wife died the following year. At the age of 37, Mabuchi moved to Kyoto to study directly under Kada no Azumamaro. Following the master's death in 1736, Mabuchi moved to

Edo Edo (), also romanized as Jedo, Yedo or Yeddo, is the former name of Tokyo. Edo, formerly a (castle town) centered on Edo Castle located in Musashi Province, became the '' de facto'' capital of Japan from 1603 as the seat of the Tokugawa shogu ...

in 1738 where he taught ''kokugaku''. In 1746, he was hired by

Tokugawa Munetake was a Japanese samurai of the mid-Edo period, also known as Tayasu Munetake (田安宗武). The first head of the Tayasu branch of the Tokugawa clan, he held daimyō-level income, but was not a daimyō himself, instead having his residence insi ...

, the head of the Tayasu branch of the

Tokugawa clan The is a Japanese dynasty which produced the Tokugawa shoguns who ruled Japan from 1603 to 1868 during the Edo period. It was formerly a powerful ''daimyō'' family. They nominally descended from Emperor Seiwa (850–880) and were a branch of ...

. Mabuchi's works include commentaries on the ''Man'yōshū'', ''

norito are liturgical texts or ritual incantations in Shinto, usually addressed to a given ''kami''. History The first written documentation of ''norito'' dates to 712 CE in the ''Kojiki'' and 720 CE in the ''Nihongi''. The Engishiki, a compilation ...

'' (Shinto prayers), ''

kagura is a type of Shinto ritual ceremonial dance. The term is a contraction of the phrase , indicating the presence of gods () in the practice. One major function of is , involving a procession-trance process. Usually a female shaman will perfor ...

'' (Shinto dances), the ''

Tale of Genji Tale may refer to: * Narrative A narrative, story, or tale is any account of a series of related events or experiences, whether non-fictional (memoir, biography, news report, documentary, travel literature, travelogue, etc.) or fictional (fa ...

'', the meaning of poems, and other ancient works and their themes. His disciples included

, Arakida Hisaoyu, Kato Chikage, Murata Harumi,

Katori Nahiko Katori can refer to: Places *Katori Sea, was an inland sea in Japan *Katori, Chiba, a city in Japan *Katori District, Chiba *Katori Shrine *Katori Station, junction passenger railway station People *Katori Masaru, author *Hidetoshi Katori, physic ...

, Hanawa Hokiichi, Uchiyama Matatsu, and Kurita Hijimaro, and also included several women. In 1763, while Mabuchi was on his way to

Ise Shrine The , located in Ise, Mie Prefecture of Japan, is a Shinto shrine dedicated to the solar goddess Amaterasu Ōmikami and the grain goddess Toyouke-hime (Toyouke Omikami). Also known simply as , Ise Shrine is a shrine complex composed of many Shi ...

, Motoori Norinaga sought him out and became a disciple. This single night of discussions, later known as "the night in Matsuzaka", was the only occasion on which Norinaga directly received teaching from Mabuchi, although the two men later corresponded. Mabuchi died in 1769 in Edo, at the age of 73. His grave can be found in the Tōkai-ji cemetery in

Shinagawa is a special ward in the Tokyo Metropolis in Japan. The Ward refers to itself as Shinagawa City in English. The Ward is home to ten embassies. , the Ward had an estimated population of 380,293 and a population density of 16,510 persons per ...

and was designed a National Historic Site in 1926. An explanatory marker stands at the site of Mabuchi's residence in Edo ( Hisamatsu-cho,

Nihonbashi is a business district of Chūō, Tokyo, Japan, which sprung up around the bridge of the same name that has linked two sides of the Nihonbashi River at this site since the 17th century. The first wooden bridge was completed in 1603. The curre ...

Chūō, Tokyo is a special ward in the Tokyo Metropolis in Japan. The ward refers to itself in English as Chūō City. It was formed in 1947 as a merger of Kyōbashi and Nihonbashi wards following Tokyo City's transformation into Tokyo Metropolis. C ...

), and a memorial museum was built beside the house where he was born in Hamamatsu.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Mabuchi, Kamo no 1697 births 1769 deaths 18th-century philologists 18th-century Japanese philosophers 18th-century Japanese poets Kokugaku scholars People from Hamamatsu Writers of the Edo period Kamo clan Japanese philologists

Biography

See also

References