there perchance any one who could join with me in governing the world?' Upon this a Divine radiance illuminated the sea, and of a sudden there was something which floated towards him and said:—'Were I not here, how couldst thou subdue this Land? It is because I am here that thou hast been enabled to accomplish this mighty undertaking.' Then Oho-na-mochi no Kami inquired, saying:—'Then who art thou?' It replied and (I. 61.) said:—'I am thy guardian spirit, the wondrous spirit.' Then said Oho-na-mochi no Kami:—'True, I know therefore that thou art my guardian spirit, the wondrous spirit. Where dost thou now wish to dwell?' The spirit answered and said:—'I wish to dwell on Mount Mimoro, in the province of Yamato.' Accordingly he built a shrine in that place and made the spirit to go and dwell there. This is the God of Oho-miwa.
The children of this Deity were the Kimi of Kamo (I. 62.) and of Oho-miwa,[1] and also Hime-tatara[2] I-suzu-hime no Mikoto.
Another version is that Koto-shiro-nushi no Kami, having become transformed into an eight-fathom bear-sea-monster,[3]
- ↑ Descendants are here meant. Kimi is simply Lord.
- ↑ Tatara is said to be the name of a plant. Isuzu (fifty bells) is the name of the site of the Inner Shrine at Ise.
- ↑ Sea-monster is in Japanese wani. It is written with a Chinese character which means, properly, crocodile, but that meaning is inadmissible in these old legends, as the Japanese who originated them can have known nothing of this animal. The wani, too, inhabits the sea and not rivers, and is plainly a mythical creature.
Satow and Anderson have noted that the wani is usually represented in art as a dragon, and Toyo-tama-hime (see Index), who in one version of the legend changes into a wani, as her true form, at the moment of child-birth, according to another changes into a dragon. Now Toyo-tama-hime was the daughter of the God of the Sea. This suggests that the latter is one of the Dragon-Kings familiar to Chinese (see Mayers' Manual, p. 142) and Corean fable who inhabit splendid palaces at the bottom of the sea. It is unnecessary here to follow the Dragon-Kings into Indian myth, where they appear under the form of the Nâga Râdja or Cobra-Kings. The reader who wishes to do so should consult Anderson's British Museum Catalogue, p. 50. Chamberlain has remarked that "the whole story of the Sea-God's palace has a Chinese ring about it, and the
