10th East Asia Culture Research Meeting of 2010

Speaker: Wang Weikun (Professor, Northwest University, China)

Date: 13th January 2011, 18:30-20:35

Venue: Hosei University Ichigaya Campus, ’58 Building 2F Research Center for International Japanese Studies Seminar Room

Chair: WANG Min (Professor, Hosei University Research Center for International Japanese Studies)

Summary of Meeting

We welcomed Prof. Dr. Wang Weikun, Northwest University (China), and conducted the meeting on the theme of “History of Japan-China Cultural Exchange: The Case of Japanese Characters in “Wado Kaiho coin””.

In this report, Prof. Wang discussed usage of characters and Japanese characters in “Wado Kaiho coin”, the oldest coin in Japan, and examined the cultural exchange between China and Japan in the late 7th century and the early 8th century.

Then Prof. Wang maintained about the case of “Chinese characters of Empress Wu” introduced by Empress Wu Zetian, focusing on the character “圀”. Prof. Wang noted that Shimotsumichi no Kunikatsu, father of Kibi no Makibi, and his younger brother Shimotsumichi no Kuniyori already used the character “圀” in the year 708. By this fact, Prof. Wang pointed out that they used the character “圀” in a few years after Empress Wu Zetian created it and cleared factually that Japan or Japanese wisdoms were eager to learn and accept Chinese cultural elements by the missions to Tang China.

Reported by SUZUMURA Yusuke (Visiting Academic Researcher, Research Center for International Japanese Studies, Hosei University)