Reading Notes: Week 2 Anthology

 Romance of Old Japan, Part I: Mythology and Legend by E. W. Champney and F. Champney (1917).

The Divine

I enjoyed this story the most and found it to be the most interesting. I think after reading this was the one that stood to have the most potential for the background to a story.

  • Susa no wo found a chopstick in the river
  • he figured that there must be people up ahead and was interested in what kind of people they were
  • Upon his journey, he finds a maiden crone and a bearded man
  • he is curious if they are gods or humans because he has never seen humans in this area
  • As such, the people introduced themselves one was a diety another the son of a mountain god, and the damsel is their daughter
  • He asks them what's wrong and they tell him that they are mourning the deaths of their 8th daughters
  • Year after year they have been slain by the serpent of Koshi and they believe that their last daughter is next
  • Susa no wo asked what kind of monster it is and they describe it to him
  • He then tells them he will slay the monster for their daughter's hand in marriage
  • They agreed and susa no wo introduced himself as the brother of sun goddess Amaterasu
  • Susa no wo turned the maiden his future wife into a comb and prepared to fight the monster
  • He first set up pointed logs and sake as a trap
  • The monster arrived where he then sees the logs and starts to drink the sake laid out for it
  • After a while, it became drunk where it eventually laid out to sleep
  • Then susa no wo slashed the monster into pieces and the tail of the beast revealed a magical sword called the herb queller
  • Susa no wo delivered the sword to the god of heaven and transformed his maiden and wedded.






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