比々丘女の起源に関する民族学的研究

抄録

Hifukume, a Japanese traditional game corresponding to " fox and geese" in England, is believed to be created by Eshin-sozu who was a Japanese famous Buddist monk of the l0th century. According to a legend in the 15th century, this game at that time had such a queer rule that oni (Buddist ogre of the hell) tried to tag the dead whom zizo (one of the incarnations of Budda) was eager to protect. It is explained that Eshin-sozu began the game in order to propagate Buddism and this legendary view of the origin of the game has been accepted without any criticism ever since. Thus the purpose of this paper is to explain the origin of the game by examining the view stated above. The method used here is ethnological or cross cultural, because this game is recorded mostly in ethnographies, and appears very few in historical literatures. Followings were gained (see Fig. 1 in the text: A distribution chart of hifukume in the Old Continent). 1. Most samples of the game in the Old Continent have a common motif of a wild anima1(kite, hawk, leopard, wolf, fox, etc.) attacking domestic animals (originally hens or chickens).This means that, judging from Qualitatskriterium, the distribution of samples can be explained by diffusion, not by independent originations in each place concerned. 2. The game is played chiefly by grain cultivators, and a few samples of nomades and huntergatherers may be interpreted as introductions from the grain cultivators. This suggests that the origin of the game must be sought in the grain cultivators, especialiy in South Asia and South East Asia where hens were domesticated at the earliest stage of the history. But it is difficult to determine in which Kulturschichten or Kulturkomplexe the game origined in South Asia and South East Asia, for the game is played as a mere children's amusement without having remarkable connections with other cultural elements. Judging from the distribution-situations of the game, however, original players of the game were not shifting cultivators but wet-rice cultivators. 3. In some places the original motif (struggle between a wild animal and domestic animals)was modified as time passed by. One of them was hifukume, which seems to be introduced to Japan by way of Eberhard's Yueh culture of South China after the Yayoi era and buddisticated during the Kamakura era when the popularization of Buddism developed highly.