glaze. The quality of this pottery was not very outstanding, and there is little evidence of any new or original developments.
If the pottery was inferior, textiles seem to have flourished. Some beautiful fragments of Asuka textiles have been preserved at Hōryū-ji which show considerable variety both in design and technique. The most remarkable is the banner which, according to literary accounts, Princess Tachibana and her court lathes embroidered in 622 in memory of Shōtoku Taishi. The subject portrayed is the rebirth of the Prince in paradise, and it was hoped that his chances for eternal bliss might be furthered by this act. Only parts of the banner remain, but the quality of the silk and the needlework is very fine. Temples, human beings, lotus flowers, phoenixes, a tortoise, and the moon with the hare in it are represented. The style is similar to that of other works of this period, showing the same kind of abstraction.
The Asuka period, which was the first great creative period of Buddhist art in Japan, was a most remarkable one, for even though relatively few monuments have survived, those that have are of the highest artistic quality. Although the inspiration for the art came from China by way of Korea, the Japanese must be given credit for the way in which they responded to this new culture. In spite of the relatively primitive art which they had previously produced, in little more than a generation they were able not only to master the foreign art but to equal it in quality and variety, an accomplishment which certainly shows their artistic genius. It might also be said that since many of these art forms, although originating in China, have not been preserved in China itself, the Japanese examples are unique not only for the study of Japanese art but for that of China and Korea as well. This is especially true of the temple buildings and the wood carvings, of which no equivalents have been found in China. The fact that so much has been preserved by the Japanese is in itself indicative of the artistic culture of Japan, where, throughout the ages, works of art have been held in the highest esteem.
3
The Art of the Nara Period
THE Nara period, especially the eighth century, was the golden age of Japanese Buddhist art. This epoch, which extends from the middle of the seventh to the end of the eighth century, is usually divided into two parts, the Early Nara period, from 646 to 710, which is also called Hakuho after the reign of the Emperor Temmu, and the Nara period proper which lasted from 710, when the capital was established at Nara, to 794, when it was moved to Heian-Kyo, as the present-day Kyoto was called. (This latter part is also referred to as the Tempyō period after the reign of the Emperor Shomu, 729 to 748, which was the most important of the entire period.)
To the Japanese of the time, the city of Nara must have seemed unbelievably splendid. It was modelled after the T'ang capital of Ch'ang-an, and like the Chinese city it abounded in temples and palaces and broad streets which were laid out in a grid pattern. The Nara age was completely dominated by Chinese thought and Chinese culture, and the Japanese, no longer content with visiting Korea, went to the Middle Kingdom itself, which, under the powerful T'ang dynasty (618-907), was experiencing one of the great epochs in its political as well as cultural history. Just as the Japanese of the Meiji period went abroad to study the West, so the Nara Japanese travelled to the Middle Kingdom to learn from China. Contemporary records tell of scholars, priests, artists, writers, statesmen, political philosophers, businessmen, and technicians who went to study in China. Many stayed for years and others never returned, so great was the lure of this ancient civilization. It must be said that T'ang China was magnificent not only by the standards of the less sophisticated Japanese but by any other standards, for the Chinese at that time were perhaps the most civilized people in the world.
Far-reaching political and social reforms were undertaken in imitation of the Tang society, reforms which have had a profound effect upon Japanese culture. For a study of the arts, however, the influence of Chinese thought and especially of Chinese art is far more important. Confucianism, with its ancestor worship and its emphasis upon obedience to the emperor, was very influential, and Buddhism, which practically became the official religion, almost completely absorbed Shintoism. The result was a form of Shinto known as Ryōbu-Shinto, according to which the national gods were nothing but manifestations of the Buddha, a doctrine proclaimed by the monk Gyōgi (670-749), who taught that the Buddha and the Sun Goddess were really the same.
In Buddhism itself a greater diversification took place. Among the numerous sects of the period, the most important were the so-called six sects of Nara. The oldest of these was the Hossō sect which had its center at Hōryū-ji (where it still continues today) and at Kōfuku-ji. It was first introduced to China from India by the famous pilgrim Hsiian Tsang, and its central doctrine was the belief that the only true reality was consciousness. The Ritsu sect stressed ritual rather than doctrine, and its most famous exponent was the Chinese monk Ganjin, who, after six attempts, had finally reached Japan in 753, and whose teachings were very successful. Another branch, in some ways the most influential of all, was the Kegon sect, which had its center at Tōdai-ji, also called the great Kegon temple. It was based on the Avatamsaka sutra which taught that the historical Buddha Shaka is only one manifestation of the cosmic and omnipresent Buddha Roshana, or Vairocana, as he is called in Sanskrit. In the teachings of this school, the supreme Buddha Roshana is said to dwell upon a giant lotus with a thousand petals, each representing a universe and each of these in turn having myriad worlds. This doctrine appealed greatly to the people of the Nara period, and it was especially popular at the court, where the emperor was seen as the earthly counterpart of the Buddha Roshana. How important these sects had become is best seen by the fact that at the end of the seventh century the number of temples had increased to over five hundred.
The growth of interest in Buddhist thought naturally led to an increase in the study of Chinese writing and literature. In fact one might say that the ability to read Chinese, which was, of course, absolutely essential for the study of Buddhist texts as well as the Confucian classics, became the mark of a cultured man. Various copies of the sacred writings were made, many of them beautifully written and illuminated. This was done not only for utilitarian purposes, but also because it was hoped that such pious acts would accumulate merit in heaven both for the copyist and for the person who commissioned him. A secular literature developed along with the sacred one, although its progress was less rapid. The first history of Japan, the Kojiki, or Record of Ancient Matters, was compiled in 712 following the Chinese custom of writing dynastic histories. Even more important was the first great book of poetry, the Manyoshu, or Collection of a Myriad Leaves, containing more than four thousand poems, almost all of which were written during the Nara period. To this day the collection, which is regarded as the finest in the Japanese language, is read widely by all classes of people. The writing used in it is a mixture of Chinese characters read in the Japanese way and an early form of kana, or Japanese writing, called manyogana. Although influenced by Chinese poems, particularly the Book of Poetry, these lyrics show a marked Japanese quality both in their spirit and form.
As for the visual arts, the contact with T'ang China could not have been more fortunate, for this period was one of the most splendid in the history of Chinese art. The Emperor Shomu, himself an ardent patron both of Buddhism and Buddhist art, gave further stimulus to the development. In 741 he issued an edict commanding that a temple and a seven-story pagoda be erected in each province as an indication that Buddhism was the dominant religion not only at the capital but in all parts of the realm. For each of these temples he had ten copies of the Lotus sutra, or Hokke-kyo, made, and we are told that the Emperor himself copied some of the texts in golden letters for enshrinement in the pagodas. The single most spectacular event of his reign was the construction of the temple of Tōdai-ji at Nara with the image of the Great Buddha Vairocana. Unfortunately neither has survived in its original form and the reconstructions which stand today are quite inferior. The hall was the largest wooden building in the world and the giant Buddha, or Daibutsu, was fifty-three feet high and contained over a million pounds of metal. The whole enterprise, which took several decades to complete, was the most ambitious the Japanese had undertaken. The temple complex was laid out on a grand scale, comprising, in addition to the huge Buddha hall, two large seven-story pagodas, splendid gates, halls of worship and study,
