JAPANESE AND CHINESE HISTORIES give a general idea of how the
Japanese lived before the adoption of the calendar. The following
is a translation of the main content of a description of conditions
in Japan prior to the seventh century, as given in Japanese histories.

"It was only in the twelfth year of the reign of the Empress
Suiko [ 604 A.D.] that Japan adopted the Chinese calendar system,
which was introduced by way of Korea, and that accounts of affairs
in Japan came to be concisely and reliably recorded. However,
even after that date, people living in the suburbs of the capital city,
as well as those living in country districts, still reckoned time by
the old methods of their forefathers. They generally divided the
year into four seasons, taking the heat and the cold as well as the
sprouting of new shoots and the falling of the leaves as bases. Each
season was divided into three parts, the increase and the decrease
of heat and cold, besides the condition of the trees, being taken
into consideration. Each of these three divisions was governed by
the cycle of the moon, the same marking the length of the month.
The cycle of the moon was also divided into three parts, taking
the phases of the moon as reference. The first part was from the
new moon to the egg-shaped moon; the second from the egg-shaped
to the second egg-shaped moon through the full moon; and the
third cycle from the second egg-shaped moon to the new moon.
The first part was called the growing moon, the second part was
called the moon hope, and the third part was called the hiding
moon. Each part was counted by ten, taking the fingers and
thumbs of one's two hands as reference. (The Japanese of those
days could count no higher than ten. Even today, there is no
method of counting higher than ten in the Japanese language, and
in counting higher than ten, the Japanese use Chinese numerals.") ¹⁶

Chinese history also contains the following statement with re-
spect to the way the Japanese calculated their dates in the pre-
calendar period:

"The Japanese do not know how to record the years correctly,
neither can they make right divisions of the four seasons. They

-228-