Abstract
It has been recognized that, in ancient family registers, contradistinctive naming was used to show seniority among siblings such as ofo vs. wo or je vs. oto. This paper discusses the nature of naming, dealing with how the contradistinctive naming found in the family registers is realized, with some differences, in Kojiki and Nihon-shoki (Ki-Shoki). This paper shows that naka, which is almost never found in the family registers, is found in Ki-Shoki. Naka corresponds to oto in that it shows ordinal seniority. It also reveals that waka in the ofo-(wo-)waka correspondence came to be used to show degree of seniority rather than as an aesthetic element.
