Abstract
Dai-Nippon Rouju Meiboku-shi is a book on trees in Japan published in 1913, when a trend to protect natural monuments was prevailing. It contains the address, trunk circumference at 1.5 m above ground, height, age, and legends and manners of 1500 famous trees. Chosen Kyoju Rouju Meiboku-shi, published in 1919, is a similar book of 3168 trees in the Korean Peninsula. In this study we tried to understand trees of Japan and the Korean Peninsula botanically and culturally based on these books. The major trees in Dai-Nippon Rouju Meiboku-shi are Pinus spp., Cryptomeria japonica, Cinnamomum camphora, Zelkova serrata, Cerasus spp., and Ginkgo biloba, and those in Chosen Kyoju Rouju Meiboku-shi are Zelkova serrata, Celtis sinensis and Aphananthe aspera, Ginkgo biloba, Pinus densiflora, Fraxinus mandshurica, and Styphnolobium japonicum. Major owners of the trees are shrines and temples in Japan, and regional communities in the Korean Peninsula. Legends of the trees vary depending on the species and seem to have partly originated from their morphological and physiological features. Moreover, comparison of the folklore about the trees brought out the difference in history, religion, and culture between Japan and the Korean Peninsula.
