ubasute
{{short description|Mythical practice of senicide in Japan}}
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File:Yoshitoshi - 100 Aspects of the Moon - 97.jpg, by Tsukioka Yoshitoshi]]
{{nihongo3 | "abandoning an old woman" | 姥捨て |Ubasute|also called obasute and sometimes oyasute {{lang |ja|親捨て}} "abandoning a parent"}} is a mythical practice of senicide in Japan, whereby an infirm or elderly relative was carried to a mountain, or some other remote, desolate place, and left there to die.{{cite news|last1= Hoffman |first1= Michael|title=Aging through the ages |url= http://www.japantimes.co.jp/life/2010/09/12/general/aging-through-the-ages |access-date=19 August 2016| work = The Japan Times|date=September 12, 2010}} Kunio Yanagita concluded that the ubasute folklore comes from India's Buddhist mythology.{{cite book | last = Kunio | first = Yanagita | title = Tōno Monogatari (遠野物語) | publisher = Shueisha | volume = 264 | location = Japan | date = 1991 | isbn = 978-4087520194}} According to the Kodansha Illustrated Encyclopedia of Japan, ubasute "is the subject of legend, but…does not seem ever to have been a common custom."{{Citation | title = Japan, An Illustrated Encyclopedia | publisher = Kodansha | place = Tokyo | year = 1993 | page = 1121}}.
Folklore
In one Buddhist allegory, a son carries his mother up a mountain on his back. During the journey, she stretches out her arms, catching the twigs and scattering them in their wake, so that her son will be able to find the way home.
A poem commemorates the story:
{{quote|
In the depths of the mountains,
Whom was it for the aged mother snapped
One twig after another?
Heedless of herself
She did so
For the sake of her son
}}
In popular culture
- The practice of ubasute is explored at length in the Japanese novel The Ballad of Narayama (1956) by Shichirō Fukazawa. The novel was the basis for three films: Keisuke Kinoshita's The Ballad of Narayama (1958), Korean director Kim Ki-young's Goryeojang (1963), and Shohei Imamura's The Ballad of Narayama, which won the Palme d'Or in 1983.
Places
Image:Kamuriki Yama 2012 01 06.JPG
Image:ObasuteYama_20050424.JPG
- {{nihongo|Ubasute-yama|姨捨山|}} is the common name of {{nihongo|Kamuriki-yama|冠着山|}}, a mountain ({{convert|1252|m|disp=or||}}) in Chikuma, Nagano, Japan.[http://www.naganoken.jp/mount/hokushin/sakaki-chikuma/kamurikiyama.htm 冠着山 長野県の山] 信州山学ガイド] {{in lang|ja}}Hoffman
- Obasute Station, Chikuma, Nagano Prefecture, Japan
- According to folklore, the Aokigahara forest at the base of Mount Fuji was once such a site, where its reputation as a suicide site might have originated.{{cite news|url=https://www.economist.com/news/asia/21689651-fewer-japanese-are-killing-themselves-deep-woods|title=Suicide in Japan: Deep in the woods: Fewer Japanese are killing themselves|newspaper=The Economist|date=January 30, 2016|page=45}}
See also
References
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Further reading
- Japan, An Illustrated Encyclopedia, Kodansha Ltd., Tokyo, 1993, p. 1121
External links
- [http://www.eubios.info/TRT3.htm What Japan can Offer to International Bioethics]
- [http://www.geocities.co.jp/HeartLand-Gaien/7211/Japanese/ubasutej.html Folktale] in Japanese, English version: [http://www.geocities.co.jp/HeartLand-Gaien/7211/kudos6/ubasute.html]
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