Podcasts about sumera

Lepo Sumera (1950–2000) was one of the most important figures in Estonian music following World War Two. He might also be considered one of the most important European symphonists during the last quarter of the 20th century, when he wrote his impressive series of six symphonies that embody imaginative orchestral colour and a skilful sense of structure. Raymond Bisha introduces a new album of Sumera's music performed by the Estonian National Symphony Orchestra under their music director and chief conductor Olari Elts. This first in a series of recordings of all Sumera's symphonies features

This episode we are looking at the early years of the official reign of Naka no Oe, aka Tenji Tenno, including the building of a brand new capital on the shores of Lake Biwa. For more information, see: https://sengokudaimyo.com/podcast/episode-126 Rough Transcript Welcome to Sengoku Daimyo's Chronicles of Japan.  My name is Joshua and this is episode 126:  New Beginnings The local farmers couldn't help but talk.  There was so much construction, but it wasn't entirely clear what was being built.  The land between the mountains and the lake had been neatly groomed fields, but now that the government workmen had moved in, all of those fields were being cleared.  This new construction was much larger than anything that people had seen before.  Rocks were coming in from far flung quarries, and local kilns were being set up to create tiles, while woodcutters were sent into the forests to bring logs to the site. There were various stories about what was going on—a new provincial government office, or perhaps a new temple, but perhaps the most outlandish was that this was going to be some kind of royal palace.  The sovereign himself was taking in interest in this little slice of Afumi, and he was going to abandon the Home Territories of Yamato and bring his entire court to the shores of Lake Biwa. What a far-fetched story!  …Wasn't it? Last episode we recapped a lot of the history of Prince Naka no Oe and how he had come to this point: the Isshi Incident, the Taika reforms, as well as the reigns of his uncle, Prince Karu, aka Koutoku Tennou, and his mother, Takara Hime, aka Saimei Tennou.  With Takara Hime's death, Naka no Oe was now – finally, as he might have thought -- running things officially.  He had prosecuted the war in Baekje, and with that loss, he had turned his focus back to the archipelago.  He now had refugees to settle, and defenses to set up.  And then there were the embassies that would be coming, in an apparent attempt to normalize relations post-conflict.  That could only go so far, however, given that Tang and Silla had simply turned their war efforts against Goguryeo.  So one imagines that any diplomatic discussions were held with the understanding that the international order was still in flux. And so we arrive in the 8th month of 665, as some of the first defensive castles were being erected.  That same month, Tamna—the kingdom on the modern island of Jeju—sent ambassadors to the Yamato court.  The diplomatic ties between Yamato and Tamna were a relatively recent occurrence, but with Baekje gone, one wonders if Yamato wasn't feeling out a new alliance on the continent.  That said, Tamna does not appear to have been a major player on the international stage.    They had been a tributary of Baekje, and may have even been one of the last holdouts of the proto-Japonic language for a long time.  Indeed, a 15th century Joseon history records a foundation myth of Tamna that emphasizes close early ties with the Japanese archipelago. The following month saw another visit by Tang ambassadors, only a year after Guo Wucong had come to the court.  Guo Wucong had been wined and dined, and things seem to have gone well, as this time he returned, but he wasn't the one leading the embassy this time.  That honor went to Liu Degao, sub-prefect of Yizhou, among his many titles.  Yizhou is the same location where the previous missions from Yamato to the Tang court had made landfall.  Presumably, Liu Degao would have had experience with the embassies that passed through Yizhou, so he seems a logical choice to be sent over to the archipelago. This seems like an escalation, with a more titled ambassador leading the party. It is possible that the Tang were trying to not only reset their relationship with Yamato, but also attempt to woo them to their side.  The Tang likely knew that if they defeated Goguryeo, then they would have another problem to work out:  The alliance with Silla.  At the moment both Tang and Silla were in a partnership of convenience, but the Tang empire didn't get where it was by just giving up territory. And Silla was, itself, ambitious.  It would be in the Tang dynasty's best interest to have Yamato on its side in case Silla became a problem.  At the very least, the Tang court could have just been trying to make sure that Yamato would stay out of any continental entanglements, such as by supporting Goguryeo. Within the Yamato court, it is unclear which way, exactly, they were leaning at this point.  The court was clearly building defensive positions—fortresses and more.  At the same time, there were likely those who welcomed any return to stable relations with the Tang.  After all, there were still Wa in Chang'an and elsewhere, and there was still a hunger in the archipelago for the books and other goods that the Silk Road could provide.  On the other hand, they may have felt more at home with Goguryeo, or even Silla.  The bonds with the Korean peninsula were older and likely stronger.  And, as long as the Tang Empire was busy with other states, then perhaps they would be too preoccupied to attack Yamato. Liu Degao and his entourage had arrived at Tsushima on the 28th day of the 7th month.  They would have been put up there for a time, and entertained.  If this embassy followed later conventions, they would have likely pulled into a harbor, like the one near Kofunakoshi.  This is a narrow spot between the two parts of Tsushima, where we know that in the 9th century, ships from the Tang empire would stop, register goods and people, and likely have them transferred to Japanese ships.  All of the checking and cataloging would happen  at nearby Bairinji temple. Even if they didn't have to transport everything to another ship, it is likely that they would held at Tsushima for a while for security purposes.  Tsushima was ideal, both for its distance, halfway between the Korean peninsula and the Japanese archipelago, but also for its shape, with numerous places that ships could sit at anchor in secluded bays away from any weather or rough seas that could otherwise cause problems. We don't know exactly what the Tang embassy's stay was like, but we know that they were at Tsushima for roughly two months, which was probably the time it took to get a message to the Yamato court and back.  We know how long it was because we learn that it is on the 20th day of the 9th month that they finally made landfall at Tsukushi, or Kyushu, and two days later they forwarded a letter-case to the Yamato court. Two months later, we know they were at the court, as there was a banquet held for Liu Degao on the 13th day of the 11th month, and then a month after that, Liu Degao and the rest of the mission were presented gifts, after which they left and returned to the Tang court.  We are also told that Mori no Kimi no Ohoishi, along with Sakahibe no Muraji no Iwashiki and Kimi no Kishi no Harima all went to the Tang court that same month, no doubt traveling with Degao and Wucong. On the first month of the following year, Neungnu of Goguryeo was sent to the Yamato court to offer tribute.  On the same day, the 11th day of the first month, Tamna also sent someone identified as Prince Siyeo to offer presents.  Immediately, I'm wondering about the way that this is presented.  Both of these states – Goguryeo and Tamna - were allies of the former Baekje kingdom.  I have to wonder how the Goguryeo ships made their way—did they come down the western side of the peninsula, through the Bohai sea, and thus past possible Tang patrols between their peninsular and continental territories, or did they head through the East Sea, aka the Japan Sea, where they would have to pass by the coast of Silla, whom they were also not on great terms with?  The fact that both missions are mentioned at the same time suggests that maybe the Goguryeo embassy sailed down to Tamna, on Jeju Island, and then the two groups made their way over to Yamato together from there. Other things about this entry to note is that the Chroniclers use different terms for these visits to the Yamato court.  Goguryeo uses a term that Aston translates as “offering tribute” while Tamna uses a different term indicating that they were “offering presents”.  This may be as simple as the difference in the various relationships between the polities, as viewed by the Chroniclers.  After all, there was a long relationship between Yamato and Goguryeo, which was considered one of the three Han, or Samhan.  Whether true or not, I could certainly see the Chroniclers feeling that Goguryeo was in a subordinate relationship with Yamato.  Tamna, on the other hand, was a more recent addition to the Yamato diplomatic sphere.  As such, it would be understandable, to me if the Chroniclers still saw it as a more independent entity. It also may hint at different messages being communicated.  As far as we can tell, Tamna wasn't under direct threat by the Tang empire—though they may have been feeling a little bit of heat, given the fall of Baekje and the Tang empire's new outpost on the peninsula.  Goguryeo, however, was under more direct threat, and had been in conflict with the Tang for years.  On top of that, based on what we can tell, it seems that Yeong Gaesomun, the despot who had been ruling Goguryeo and helping it defend against the Tang, had just passed away.  It may have been that the Goguryeo court was seeking support against Tang and Silla, as they were in a moment of instability, themselves.  As such, “Tribute” might indicate that they were more formally petitioning Yamato for support. Goguryeo envoy Neungnu left about 5 months later, on the 4th day of the 6th month but then another envoy, this time Minister Eulsyang Oemchu, arrived a little more than four months later.  Much like with the Tang, this feels like Goguryeo was upping the ante, sending higher ranking officials to negotiate with Yamato.  That lends some credence to the theory that there was something of a bidding war going on for Yamato's involvement in international affairs.  For Yamato, however, it would seem that getting involved in continental affairs was hardly something they were itching to do.  Instead, they continued their moves to fortify. In local events, we know that on the 11th day of the 10th month of 665, while the Liu Degao delegation was still in Yamato, there was a great “review”, by which they seem to mean a sutra reading, at Uji.  It is unclear just where this was held, as I haven't found reference to any particular temple.  However, it does indicate that there was activity in the area. Uji is probably most popular, today, for its role as a setting in the Tale of Genji.  There indeed numerous reminders there of the Heian period, including the hall of Ujigami Shrine, and the famous Hou-ou-do, or Phoenix Hall, of the Byoudouin. In 1053, Fujiwara Yorimichi inherited the villa from his father, Fujiwara Michinaga, and he converted it into a Pure Land temple.  Michinaga is thought to have been one of the people on whom Murasaki Shikibu based the character of the Shining Prince, Hikaru Genji.  That's all too late for this moment in the Chronicles, of course., but we do have earlier references to Uji as a place, as well as in various names.  It seems to have been part of the territory of the Hata, who controlled much of the area of modern Kyoto and environs.  There is a temple, Houjouin, also known as Hashidera, which claims to date back to the 7th century, and may have been the site of the above-mentioned sutra reading in 665.  According to the Temple's own legend, it was built around 604, when Hata no Kawakatsu built the famous Uji bridge, or Hashi, on the orders of Prince Umayado, aka Shotoku Taishi.  Other sources give the date as 646.  The temple was rebuilt in the 13th century, and as far as I can tell, nothing remains of the original temple, but it is possible that it was the site of this review. The next non-Diplomatic record of the Chronicles is from the 3rd month in 666.  The Crown Prince went to the house of Saheki no Komaro no Muraji, paying a sympathy call as Saheki appears to have passed away after having been gravely ill.  Saheki no Komaro no Muraji was one of those who had helped Naka no Oe in the Isshi Incident.  He had been introduced to the plot by Nakatomi no Kamatari, and then critical in the literal execution at the court.  He later led forces against Furubito no Oe, assuming that “Sahekibe no Komaro” is the same as “Saheki no Muraji no Komaro”.  There is also a relative, possibly his son, Takunaha, who was one of the Yamato court's overseas envoys.  Thus, one can understand that he had some importance to the Royal family, and we can probably assume that he had been involved in much more.  The Crown Prince, we are told, lamented him on account of his loyal service from the very beginning. One of the confusing things in this part of the Chronicle is the term “Crown Prince”.  It doesn't help that the Chroniclers were pulling from different records, and sometimes using anachronistic titles for individuals.  Naka no Oe had been known as the Crown Prince since the time of Takara Hime, whether he actually was or not.  Now he was in charge of the government, but it isn't clear that he had been formally invested as tennou.  More than that, there is mention of an investiture in either 667 or 668, several years after his quote-unquote “reign” had begun.  This makes some sense.  After all, when Takara Hime passed away, there was a foreign war to prosecute, and that probably took a fair bit of resources.  Plus, Naka no Oe had been running things for a while before that, or so we are told.  It would make sense if things just kept on going as they had been, and they held the actual investiture when they got around to it. We also know that he was busy with building projects: not just for the defense of the archipelago, but even a new capital and a new palace.  We'll talk about it a bit more, later, but suffice it to say that he may have been taking his time and gathering everything together. All of this makes the Chronicles themselves somewhat confusing.  They throw around the terms “Crown Prince” and “Sovereign”—well, “Sumera no Mikoto”—almost interchangeably.  Meanwhile, they've also stated that the Crown Prince was Prince Ohoama, Naka no Oe's younger brother. Based on my read of things, I believe we can distinguish between the two by whether or not it specifically calls them out as just “Crown Prince”, or “Crown Prince, younger brother to the sovereign”.  The latter is clearly Prince Ohoama, and the first is most likely Naka no Oe.  After all, in this instance, why would Prince Ohoama be the one so struck by the death of Saheki no Muraji?  Based on the story the Chronicles have told us, wouldn't it make more sense that it was Naka no Oe lamenting the death of one who had helped put him on the throne, rather than sending his brother? So keep that in mind as we go through the narrative.  I'll try to point out whom I believe they are speaking about, at least until we reach the point where Naka no Oe actually is invested. Getting back to the Chronicles, in the 7th month of the year 666, some four months after the illness and death of Saheki no Komaro no Muraji, another disaster struck—this time a natural disaster.  Great floods were reported—how widespread we aren't told.  This is often a problem in a land with many mountains that often gets large rains.  It is especially problematic when much of your agriculture is based on being just at or below the level of the rivers and streams so that it can be flooded on purpose.  We are told that the government remitted the land-taxes and commuted taxes that year, likely as a form of disaster relief to those affected by the flooding. In 666, we are also told a story that actually links this reign to the previous.  We are told that a monk, named Chiyu, gave the sovereign something called a south-pointing chariot.  I'll talk about what this was in another episode.  What's important here is to note that there was a previous entry in the era attributed to Saimei Tennou, aka Takara Hime, where a monk named Chiyu, or something similar, using different characters, also created a south-pointing chariot.  Likewise, we are later told in this reign how Naka no Oe installed a clepsydra, a water clock.  This is also mentioned in the previous reign.  It is possible that these reference completely different accounts.  Or they could be connected in some way. The south-pointing chariot is probably not something that we'll have evidence of, as it would have been mobile and probably deteriorated over time.  However, the water clock would have been a fixed installation with some clear architectural remnants, and indeed we think we know where at least one was built in Asuka.  Both of the water clock entries say that it was the “first” time, so make of that what you will. Also in 666, we see that some 2000 people of Baekje were settled in the East, possibly meaning the Kanto region, though this could be anywhere between modern Nagoya out to the far eastern edge of Honshu.  They were maintained at the government expense for three years, after which they were expected to have built new lives for themselves. In later periods, there is much to be said about “Men of the East”.  There are those that point to this region as being the origin point of many of the warrior traditions that would arise and become the military samurai.  Some of the weapons and fighting styles, especially some of the horse-riding archery seems to point to continental influences that made their way to the Kanto region and beyond.  One has to consider just how much did they bring with them and how did it grow, often beyond the view of the court and the court chronicles.  For now, though, it seems to have largely been a form of a refugee program, since the Baekje no longer had a kingdom to return to. Finally, we have an omen.  In the winter of 666, the rats of the capital, in Asuka, headed north to Afumi.  As with previous entries about rats departing a capital for a direction, this is again meant as an omen.  It probably didn't happen.  But it does foreshadow an account in the following year, when, on the 19th day of the 3rd month, the capital, surprise-surprise, moved to Afumi. And perhaps I shouldn't be flippant.  It was a surprise to have the capital move to Afumi.  There are accounts of legendary sovereigns that had their palace outside of the Nara Basin or Kawachi area, but at this point Yamato had been really building up those areas.  So why would they suddenly relocate to Afumi, of all places? Well, probably because of the same thing that had been driving the rest of their large-scale building projects during this period—from the Water Castle protecting the Dazai to the various Baekje style fortresses from Tsushima down to the Nara Basin.  Afumi was a naturally defensive position.  And in such an uncertain time, having a well-defended capital must have seen like a very good idea.  In fact, though they didn't formally change the capital until the 3rd month of 667, they probably had started work on it as soon as they got back from the loss at Hakusukinoe. As far as locations go, it wasn't necessarily a bad choice.  There were still routes to the port at Naniwa, which could still house various delegations when they arrived.  There were also routes to the east, leading to Owari and the rest of central and eastern Honshu, as well as mountain passes to get to the Japan Sea.  The area where the new palace was located was in the district of Ohotsu.  Ohotsu means something like “Big Port” and I don't know if it was already a major port along the banks of Lake Biwa or if that was a name that came from having the capital there.  Ohotsu was a long-inhabited area, even well before the 660's, and an important site for trade.  In the southern end of modern Ohotsu city is Ishiyama-dera, the stone mountain temple, it which was built in the 8th century, but in front of the temple are the remains of the largest freshwater shellmound in Asia.  As you may recall from some of our earliest episodes talking about the prehistoric period in the Japanese archipelago, shell mounds are typically evidence of ancient settlements, remnants of dump sites where they could throw their detritus.  This probably included a lot more than just shells, but shells, bones, and sometimes things like pottery sherds, would remain.  And while much of the wood and waste of the period would have disintegrated over time, shells do not.    These shell mounds accordingly provide important insight into the lives of people back in that day, and the size can also help us understand things about how large a settlement might have been or how long it was there.  The sheer size of the shellmound at Ishiyama-dera likely indicates that the region had been settled for many centuries prior to the 600's. In addition to the shellmound, and more closely related to the current times we are discussing, is evidence of a rock quarry found at the temple site and showing evidence of techniques familiar to people of the 6th to 8th centuries. You see, Ishiyama is a source of a particular white stone called wollastonite.  The quarry sits below the main hall of the temple, and so it probably would not have been quarried after the hall was built, which was in the 700s, so the site is believed to have been active before that.  From the composition of the stone and the markings on the remnants, we can see similarities to stones in the base of one of the buildings at Kawaradera, in Asuka, which we've talked about before and which was one of the pre-eminent temples of its day.  So this demonstrates a link between the region and the court even before the construction of the new Ohotsu palace. Speaking of the palace, we've known of its exact position since 1974,  when archeologists found evidence of the foundation of a large complex in a residential district in Nishikori.  While some initially suggested it was an old temple, further evidence makes it pretty clear that it was the dairi, or inner sanctum, of a palace.  This is very much in the same mould as the Toyosaki Palace in Naniwa and the various palaces in Asuka from around the same period.  In front of the dairi would have been the actual government buildings, but that area has not been excavated. That brings up another question: was this a full-on capital city, Ohotsu-kyo, or just a palace, the Ohotsu-no-miya?  So far we have only found the palace, But since the area is fairly built up, it may take time to find more, assuming it hasn't been destroyed by previous urban development in the area.  There are some hints that there was more: while there were already at a couple of temples that had been built by the mid-7th century, we see several temples built in ways that not only borrow features from important Asuka temples, like the layout of Kawaradera, but they also match the alignment of the Otsu palace ruins, hinting that they were built at the same time.  For example, there is are the ruins of an abandoned temple in Shiga-Minami – actually once thought to have been the Otsu palace. There was also Soufukuji, a temple in the mountains nearby meant to protect the Northwest from malign influences, likely based on continental geomantic concepts, part of what we might today think of as Feng Shui. This same kind of protective temple building is what we see in later capital cities. Of course, we know that this would not be a permanent capital for the nation of Yamato or of Japan—we aren't that far off from the Nara period, and then, a century later, the capital at Heian-kyo.  But that couldn't have been known at the time.  There was no way to know how long tensions with the continent would last, and it was just as possible that people at the time expected this to be a permanent move.  Its preeminence lasted, too: we do have evidence that even centuries later, the region was still known as an ancient “capital”. No matter what Naka no Oe's intentions were in moving the capital to Afumi, however, it didn't exactly go over well.  It was apparently quite unpopular—so unpopular that the move was mocked in song of the time.  That said, Naka no Oe's mind was made up, and the move took place regardless.     Before moving the capital, however, there was still business to attend to.  Takara Hime and Princess Hashibito were reinterred together in the Misasagi on Wochi Hill.  We are told that men of Goguryeo, Baekje, and Silla all mourned along the processional route.  The Crown Prince—I'm assuming Naka no Oe, this time given his connection to both of these women—apparently had started the work on a stone sarcophagus.  By this was probably meant the actual stone vault of the tomb, rather than just the coffin, which was also likely made of stone.  This was in Kuramaki, in Takatori, in the Takaichi District of the Nara Basin. Three months after the move to the new capital, the district of Kadono, in the west of modern Kyoto, presented to the sovereign a white swallow—an omen of some sort. The following month, on the 11th day of the 7th month, Tamna sent another embassy, led by a Minister known as Cheonma, with presents for Yamato.  This may have been the first envoy to actually visit the new Ohotsu capital, but certainly not the last. Cheonma stuck around for a few months.  In the intercalary 11th month, which is to say the extra 11th month of 667, inserted to keep the lunar and solar calendars at least partially aligned, Cheonma and his companions were presented with brocade and other cloth, as well as axes, sickles, and swords, presumably to take home to Tamna. While Cheonma was at the court, there was apparently another bit of diplomatic ping-pong going on.  Liu Jenyuan, the Tang general in charge of Baekje, sent Szema Facong and others to escort Sakahibe no Iwashiki and those with him to the Dazai in Tsukushi.  They didn't stay long, though—we are told they arrived on the 9th day of the 11th month and left only 4 days later, on the 13th day of the same.  When they left, however, they, themselves, were given escorts of Yuki no Muraji no Hakatoko—the same one whose memoirs we relied on for that previous trip to the Tang court—as well as Kaso no Omi no Moroshi.  So I guess they were escorting the escorts?  At what point does it end?  Hakatoko and others made it back about three months later, on the 23rd day of the first month of 668, and reported on their own escort mission.  That suggests that they didn't escort them that far.  They may have just seen them back to the Korean peninsula and that was it. Hakatoko's escort mission did mean that he missed a rather important event—the Crown Prince assuming the dignity.  That is to say, Naka no Oe finally took the title of sovereign.  A note in the text suggests that there were other sources that said it was the third month of the previous year—the same time that the Otsu capital was built.  Four days later they held a banquet in the palace for all of the court ministers. A little over a month later, his wife, Yamato bime, was appointed queen.  We are then told of his other wives and consorts. To be clear, Naka no Oe had been collecting consorts for ages.  So let's talk about a few of them. To start with there was Yamatobime, the Yamato Princess, daughter of none other than Naka no Oe's half-brother, Prince Furubito no Oe, his former rival to the throne. Then there was Wochi no Iratsume, aka Princess Miyatsuko, the daughter of Soga no Kurayamada no Ishikawa Maro.  She had a son, Prince Takeru, who died in 651 at the age of 8.  That suggests that she and Naka no Oe had been together since at least 643, two years before the Isshi Incident.  Another one of her daughters, Princess Uno, would go on to marry Naka no Oe's younger brother, Prince Ohoama, the new Crown Prince. Wochi no Iratsume seems to have died of grief in 649, after her father and much of her family were destroyed on the orders of her husband, Naka no Oe.  We are told that Naka no Oe also married Wochi no Iratsume's younger sister as well, Mehi no Iratsume.  She had two daughters, Princess Minabe and Princess Abe.  At this point Abe was only about 7 or 8 years old, herself, but she would eventually be married to Prince Kusakabe, the son of Prince Ohoama and Princess Uno, whom we just mentioned. Naka no Oe also had two other consorts.  Tachibana no Iratsume was the daughter of Abe no Kurahashi no Maro no Oho-omi—he was the first Sadaijin, or Minister of the Left, at the start of the Taika reforms, immediately following the Isshi Incident.  And then there was Hitachi no Iratsume, the daughter of Soga no Akaye. Soga no Akaye is an interesting figure.  You may recall the name from Episode 118.  Soga no Akaye was the acting minister in charge in Yamato when Prince Arima tried to start up a revolt against Takara Hime.  It was in his house where Prince Arima laid out his plan, but a broken armrest convinced Soga no Akaye to turn against the conspirators and turn them in.  And so it is interesting to hear that his daughter was married to Naka no Oe. We are also told of four “palace women” that Naka no Oe is said to have had children with.  The implication seems to be that these were women at the palace but they were not formally recognized with the same status as that of the formal consorts and, of course, the queen, his primary wife.  This fits in with at least one theory I've seen that Naka no Oe was something of a ladies' man.  It seems he got around even more than Murasaki Shikibu's fictional “Shining Prince”, Hikaru Genji.  We are told that there were at least 14 children among the nine official wives—and one has to consider that they were unlikely to record many of the women whom he may have slept with that he didn't also have children with.  And there is a theory that one of those not mentioned, may have been his own sister, full blooded sister.  Specifically, his sister Princess Hashibito, who was married to none other than Naka no Oe's uncle, Prince Karu, aka Jomei Tennou. To be clear:  we have no clear evidence that they were anything other than close siblings, but as you may recall how we mentioned back in Episode 114 that there was something that caused a falling out between Prince Karu and Naka no Oe, such that Naka no Oe disobeyed the sovereign's direct order in moving himself and the royal family back to Asuka.  That meant Naka no Oe, his wives, his mother, AND his sister, Princess—now Queen—Hashibito.  So, yeah, he absconded with Prince Karu's wife who was Naka no Oe's full-blooded sister.  And, as we've noted before, ancient Yamato's concept of incest was pretty narrow.  It was only if you had the same mother that you were considered full siblings—even if the father were someone else.  I suspect that this is related to the matrilineal nature of succession as well, which is why it was so important to insist that the ancient sovereigns had a direct lineal connection to the royal line through their mother as much as through their father. So if Naka no Oe and his sister were having any kind of relationship that was considered wrong or scandalous, then that could also help explain why he didn't take the throne sooner, and why it passed over to his mother.  But now, both Takara Hime and Hashibito were quite literally dead and buried, and Naka no Oe had ascended to the throne. Of the so-called “Palace Women” that  are listed as being likewise married to—or at least in a relationship with—Naka no Oe, I'd like to focus on one:  Iga no Uneme no Yakako.  For one, she is specifically mentioned as an uneme—one of the women sent to the court specifically to serve in the palace.  But her parentage isn't further illuminated other than the name “Iga” which is probably a locative, possibly referring to the area of Iga. This is also interesting because we are also told that she gave birth to a son named Prince Iga, also known as Prince Ohotomo.  Despite his mother's apparently unremarkable status, Prince Ohotomo seems to have been quite the apple of his father's eye.  He was born in 648, so in 668 he was about 20 years old, meaning that around this time he was probably just coming into his own at court.  He was married to his cousin, Princess Touchi, daughter of his uncle, Crown Prince Ohoama.  He was also married to Mimotoji, who appears to have been a daughter of Nakatomi no Kamatari, meaning that he was pretty well connected. But we'll get into that in a future episode.  For now, I think we'll leave it here: with the move of the capital to Ohotsu and the formal ascension of Naka no Oe to the throne. We'll talk about what that might mean in the future.  Until then, thank you once again for listening and for all of your support. If you like what we are doing, please tell your friends and feel free to rate us wherever you listen to podcasts.  If you feel the need to do more, and want to help us keep this going, we have information about how you can donate on Patreon or through our KoFi site, ko-fi.com/sengokudaimyo, or find the links over at our main website,  SengokuDaimyo.com/Podcast, where we will have some more discussion on topics from this episode. Also, feel free to reach out to our Sengoku Daimyo Facebook page.  You can also email us at the.sengoku.daimyo@gmail.com.  Thank you, also, to Ellen for their work editing the podcast. And that's all for now.  Thank you again, and I'll see you next episode on Sengoku Daimyo's Chronicles of Japan.

Though it may not seem like it on first glance, across Asuka there are various remnants of a much grander period.  Postholes tell the story of palaces built over and over on the same spots.  In addition, there are the various temples and various carved stone statues and other features.  This episode we'll talk about some of the stonework and palace complexes built during Takara Hime's reign, as well as the deadly politics that were still the currency of the court. For more, check out our blogpost at:  https://sengokudaimyo.com/podcast/episode-118 Rough Transcription Welcome to Sengoku Daimyo's Chronicles of Japan.  My name is Joshua and this is episode 118: Stonework and Treason Before we dive into the episode, a quick shout out to thank Bodil for supporting us on Ko-Fi.com.  For information on how you can also help support the show, we'll have information at the end of the episode or go check out our podcast page at SengokuDaimyo.com. And now, on with the episode:   Soga no Akaye's mansion was busily quiet.  There was plenty of chatter, but it was mostly in hushed tones as servants busied themselves with their work, but wondered what was going on.  They couldn't help but notice the high ranking visitors that had come.  It was to be expected, though.  After all, their master was in charge while the rest of the court was away on a retreat, comforting the sovereign in her grief.  And so why wouldn't people be showing up to meet with him? But nobody was quite sure what all of these visitors were discussing.  They had all gone into an upper story of the building, but the crowd included some powerful figures, including, some said, a royal prince.  Who's who and where people stood in the court were always topics of discussion, but especially now.  After all, what they were dealing with was unprecedented:  who had heard of a sovereign stepping down in the first place, let alone stepping back up because they then outlived their successor?  But she was no spring chicken, either.  Surely it would be her son that would finally ascend the throne next, right?  But that was never guaranteed. Either way, some of the servants grumbled, a change would be nice.  Ever since the royal family had moved back to Asuka, formally making it the capital again, there had been a flurry of activity. Sure, it meant that a certain amount of prestige returned to that region, and houses that had been in disrepair were suddenly occupied again.  But there was so much more.  Just about all of the available labor pool that wasn't working the fields was working on this project or that—there was almost nothing left for anyone else.  How was anyone else supposed to get things done when all of the able-bodied people were already toiling on the sovereign's own vanity projects?  And after building that giant government complex in Naniwa, no less! Such was, I imagine, the hushed rumor-mongering going on in the house when suddenly there came a loud “crack” as of a piece of wood snapping in two.  Later they would learn that an old wooden rest had broken, but that wasn't immediately obvious.  The servants did notice that shortly thereafter, their visitors began to depart, heading back to their own mansions. As for Soga no Akaye, he said nothing, but he seemed drained.  He had a heavy look, as though he was bearing an incredible weight.  Soon thereafter, he requested a brush and some paper, and he began to write out a letter…   So we are talking about the second reign of Takara Hime, who came back to the throne in 655, following the death of her brother, Prince Karu, known as Koutoku Tennou.  For the first time she reigned, the Chroniclers gave her the name “Kougyoku Tennou”, but for her second reign she would be known in the Chronicles as “Saimei Tennou”. We already discussed some of what was recorded as happening in the north during Takara Hime's second reign, with the Emishi and the Mishihase and the expeditions by Abe no Omi no Hirafu.  This episode we are going to focus more on what was going on in the Home Provinces of Yamato—and most specifically the impact that Takara Hime's reign would have on Asuka. I've noted in the past how modern Asuka can seem like your typical rural Japanese town.  Roads weave between rice fields, flanked by densely packed neighborhoods at the foot of the green hills or lining the shores of the Asuka river.  To the north, the valley opens onto the vast Nara basin—a largely flat region that is much more heavily populated but still would be considered “inaka”, or rural country, by anyone from a metropolis like Tokyo or Ohosaka.  To the south, the land rises up into mountain peaks.  Beyond that ridge, the land drops into the Yoshino River Valley, but otherwise the rest of the Kii peninsula, to the south, is covered in a sparsely populated mountain range, where small villages carve out a life in the nooks and crannies between the numerous ridges, finding the rare spot of flat land to build houses and plant their fields.  Looking at it today, Asuka might seem idyllic, rural, and calm.  And yet, back in Takara Hime's day, it was anything but. When Takara Hime moved back to Asuka, she went on a building spree.  In fact, the Chronicles actually complain about all of the building that she was doing, and we'll get to that.  Much of this episode is going to revolve around her building projects, as well as her comings and goings.  While we'll talk about what the Chronicles say, I also want to talk about some of what still remains in Asuka.  Certainly the grand palaces are gone, for the most part leaving little more than post-holes, lying beneath the rice fields.  A bit more obvious are the various kofun, scattered across the landscape, but beyond that there we also see stone works, including numerous carved stones, which range from crude statues, which may have been minimally worked, to elaborate fountains, which would have used natural water pressure to create impressive waterworks.  These latter works demonstrate the sophistication of the masons of the time, and hint at the grandeur of the various palaces, gardens, and mansion complexes that once populated the landscape.  And if you want a little feeling of what it is like, I talked a bit about walking through Asuka in a bonus episode back in March of 2024—if you are interested, look up “Traveling Through the Ancient Nara Basin, Part 2.   So along with what we see in the Chronicles, I want to talk about some of these other features, even if we aren't entirely sure of when, exactly, they were built.  There are a few, though, that we do suspected were built in this period, by Takara Hime, or at least at her order.  So we'll talk about those as we get there. Her reign wasn't all about building things, though.  Politics in the Yamato court remained as cutthroat as ever.  Although Prince Naka no Oe, Takara Hime's son, had been designated as “Crown Prince” he had not taken the throne, despite being of age, and we aren't told why, though the fact that Takara Hime had previously abdicated because of the events of the Isshi Incident, back in 645 (see Episode XX) may have meant that she was still considered the senior eligible member of the royal line.  Then there was the case of Prince Arima.  Prince Arima was the son of Karu, aka Koutoku Tenno, which made him Naka no Oe's cousin.  This wouldn't have meant anything had his father not ascended to the throne.  And under the succession practices of the time, although Naka no Oe was designated as the Crown Prince, that wasn't a guarantee that he would be next in line, so Prince Arima may have been a potential candidate.  However, there is at least one source that says Prince Arima was not yet of age, but still a teenager.  Still, that was no doubt old enough for some in the court to support him—and as we'll see in later centuries, age limits could be negotiable.  So we'll also discuss that, as well. So let's get into it. When the royal family first moved back to Asuka, in 653,  they took up residence in the temporary palace of Kahabe no Miya.  Unfortunately, this name doesn't tell us much about where the palace was located.  There is one theory that the Kawabe no Miya might be at what is known as the Asuka Inabuchi Palace site, up in the Asuka river valley, in the modern Iwaido district, a little south of the famous Ishibutai kofun site.  This is believed to have been a palace—or at least the mansion of some very wealthy family—given its layout, including what appears to be a cobblestone courtyard, and the lack of any roof tiles, which would have been reserved for temples, at that time. The term “temporary” palace comes up a lot in the Chronicles.  In most of the cases where it is used, it suggests that there was already a building in place and the sovereign took up residence there, hence the term “temporary” palace.  Often times we see that a temporary palace is said to have been “built”, at which point I have to wonder if that is truly the case—did they actually build a brand new structure to temporarily house the sovereign and the royal family—or does it just refer to the fact that they may have taken an existing compound and perhaps made some slight changes to accommodate the royal dignity?  Unfortunately, the Chronicles don't really go into much detail. Wherever the Kawabe no Miya happened to be, it does seem to have been temporary, as we later see Takara Hime back at the Itabuki palace, and indeed she reascended the throne there in 655.  The Itabuki palace first shows up in Takara hime's first reign, and seems to be one of at least two royal palaces in Asuka at the time, the other one being the Woharida Palace.  The Woharida palace had been around for a while – it was noted as early as 603, in the reign of Kashikiya Hime, aka Suiko Tenno, and there is the suggestion that it was still around in the time that Karu, aka Kotoku Tenno, was reigning.  We know that Takara Hime took up residence there at some point during her own reign as well.  But in 643 she had the Itabuki palace built, though apparently that didn't mean that the Oharida palace was completely torn down and abandoned – it just was no longer the primary site of court ritual.  Of course, the Itabuki palace wouldn't be the seat of the government for long, either, as the Isshi Incident took place there in 645, and Karu would subsequently move the capital to Naniwa, building the Toyosaki palace. And so the Itabuki palace remained, but was not exactly kept up, so that when the royal family returned to Asuka, it wasn't ready for them to inhabit, and likely required extensive renovation.  Nonetheless, it was being inhabited two years later, when Takara hime again ascended the throne. A quick note here about the name “Itabuki”, because we think that this likely referred to a very specific style of construction that was used.  Up to this point, as far as we can tell, the primary roofing material for all major buildings was a kind of local thatching – we still see this today on some shrines and other buildings.  “Itabuki”, in contrast, refers to a roof made with wooden boards.  Today, we have buildings with rooves where the roof shingles are overlapping boards of wood or bark from the cypress tree: thin layers stacked one on top of the other.  Even today, the modern Imperial Palace in Kyoto uses wood shingles rather than the curved roof tiles that many people think of when they think of Asian architecture. So that's the Itabuki palace, all spruced up and ready for Takara hime to occupy again.  That said, remember the older Woharida palace, the other one in Asuka? Later in 655, a project was started to update that palace as well.  We are told that as of the 13th day of the 10th month there had been a plan to add roof tiles to one of the buildings at the Woharida palace, but unfortunately much of the timber from the mountains and valleys that was designated for the project was found to be too weak from rot, and so they decided to not go forward with that plan.  I would note here that tiled rooves, while they might seen somewhat easier to put together—after all, you only need a layer of interlocking and overlapping tiles—are extremely heavy.  They are known to deform the wooden structures underneath them, and can weigh hundreds of pounds per square foot.  Much of the classic shape of these tiled rooves developed over time to compensate for some of that weight, so this makes me wonder if the wood the palace craftspeople brought in was really that rotten, or if it was just not strong enough for the work that they were trying to do.  After all, were they applying the same techniques as for a temple, or were they simply trying to replace traditional thatching or shingles with clay tiles?  Either way, the project failed, even after all of the work that had gone into it.  This is a small entry in the Chronicles, but it would have meant levying corvee labor that had to go out to the designated regions to source the timber, not to mention setting up the kilns to make the tiles, as well as other preparations that would have been necessary.  In other words, a lot of work, for apparently no payoff. On top of that, we are told that around that time, in the winter of that year—which would have been the 10th, 11th, or 12th month, roughly corresponding from late November to February of the following year—the Itabuki palace caught fire and burned down, and so the sovereign and her retinue decamped to the temporary palace of Kawara – the River Plain or Field. “Kawara” could theoretically refer to just about any flat area by a river. Aston points out that “Kawara” can also mean “rooftile”, which is interesting given what we just talked about, the entry immediately before that deals with attempting to add new rooftiles to a part of the Oharida palace. However, there is some thought that this refers to the Kawara Temple, Kawaradera, and you can find claims that Kawaradera was built on the site of the temporary palace.  There is a reference to Kawaradera in the previous reign, in the year 653, though another source apparently says it was talking about Yamadadera, instead.  There isn't another mention of “Kawaradera” that I can find until 673, so it is entirely possible that the temple started its life off as a mansion or even a temporary royal palace of some kind, and was later turned into a temple. Kawaradera itself is rather interesting.  If you visit the site, today, you can see large stone bases that help to demonstrate the size of the ancient temple.  It was one of the four Great Temples of Asuka, along with Asukadera, Kudara Ohodera, and Yakushiji.  And yet, unlike the other three, we don't have clear indications about its founding in the Chronicles.  When the capital eventually moved to Heijo-kyo, in Nara city, many of the other temples were removed to the new capital, but not, as far as I can see, Kawaradera.  Donald McCallum suggests that this is because it was replaced, instead, by Koufukuji, a temple with deep ties to the descendants of Nakatomi no Kamatari, the Fujiwara clan.  He suggests that mention of the temple in the official records may have even been suppressed by individuals such as Fujiwara no Fubito.  Kawaradera remained in Asuka.  Eventually it fell to ruin, but there is still a small temple on the site, known as Gu-fuku-ji. As for the Kawara Palace, if Kawaradera really was in operation by 653, it is possible that the sovereign took over some of the buildings at Kawaradera, or perhaps the temporary palace was simply somewhere nearby. In any case, they don't seem to have stayed there for too long—they started work on a new palace the following year.  This was the later Okamoto Palace, and from what we can tell it was built on the same site as the Itabuki Palace, south of Asukadera.  This site would see multiple palaces over the years, and even today you can go and see some of the post-holes that they have found, indicating the size of the complex through the years. Based on the layout and size of the Asuka palaces, it seems that these early palaces focused on the “dairi”, the private quarters of the sovereign.  This seems to have ignored the reforms made with the Toyosaki palace design in Naniwa in the early 650s.  That palace, which was built on an incredibly grand scale, consisted of both the private quarters and the public government offices.  But in Asuka the royal family's “palace” appears to have only consisted of the private quarters, for the most part.  So where was the actual bureaucracy happening?  Were there other facilities we don't know about?  Or perhaps, the Toyosaki palace itself was overly ambitious, and there wasn't actually the staff for such a grand complex?  After all, they were just setting up the bureaucracy and perhaps their reach had exceeded their grasp.  Or was it the case that things werestill being run out of the palace complex in Naniwa while the sovereign lived in Asuka?  That seems to have been roughly 10 hours away, by foot, though perhaps only half that by horse. The northern end of the Asuka valley is not as well suited to a large palace complex.  Not only was it already full of temples and the like, but the ground itself rises to the south, and the hills on either side start to come together.  It certainly isn't the kind of place to layout a grand city.  But perhaps that was not the intent—at least not immediately.  It didn't matter much, though, because the Later Okamoto palace, as it came to be known, was not long for this world.  Scarcely had it been built and occupied but that it caught fire and burned down—another expenditure of funds and labor that were once more counted as nothing. In fact, Takara hime was apparently on a tear, and went ahead and initiated quite a few projects that happened in 656.  We are told that nearby Tamu Peak was crowned with a circular enclosure, close to where two “tsuki” trees grew.  A “lofty” building was erected and called both Futatsuki no Miya (the Palace of the Two Tsuki) and Amatsu Miya (the Palace of Heaven).  She also had a new palace erected in Yoshino, possibly as a seasonal retreat.  And with this she was just getting started. She also had laborers dig a canal all the way from the western end of Mt. Kaguyama all the way to Mt. Isonokami.  We are told that 200 barges were then loaded with stone from Mt. Isonokami and hauled to the mountain east of the palace, where the stones were piled up to form a wall.  This last one had people up in arms.  They called the canal the “mad canal” and said that it wasted the labor of over 30,000 people.  On top of that, she used 70,000 men to build the wall.  To top it all off, the timber for the palace rotted away and the top of the mountain where they were building collapsed.  We are told that people cursed it all, crying out: “May the mound built at Iso no Kami break down of itself as fast as it is built.” So, yeah, people weren't too happy.  We, however, just might be – because all of this building work? It leaves traces in the landscape. We aren't always sure about locations in the Chronicles, as it is very easy for names to shift over time or for things to be renamed at a later date. But what we do know is that there are quite a few examples of stone work in the Asuka region.  There is the kame-ishi stone that looks only vaguely carved—it appears to have two carved eyes, but otherwise appears to use the natural shape of the stone to evoke a tortoise—that sits near the site of Kawaradera and Tachibana-dera.  There are the various saruishi—carved figures that are purportedly based on saru, or monkeys, but are likely meant to represent people.  They may have once adorned an elite family's garden or similar, and they were since moved to the tomb of Kibitsu hime.  There are various fountains and waterworks.  And then there are the Sakafune-ishi ruins, sitting along a ridge east of the palace site.  This consists of a large stone up on the hill, with carved channels that appear to be made to channel water poured into the grooves.  At the bottom of the hill there is a turtle shaped stone basin, filled from a boat-shaped water tank.  Across the hill is example of stone work, including possible walls. Given the apparent age of everything, and its location, it is thought that this may all be part of the Futatsuki no Miya complex that Takara hime built.  Unfortunately, it is still not clear how it was meant to operate.  After Asuka was abandoned as the capital, knowledge of the site also disappeared.  There were some stories that arose about the stone that it was used for some kind of sake-brewing, hence the name, but nothing truly concrete has arisen.  There may have been other structures, perhaps made of wood, that are no longer present, and the stone itself appears to have broken and eroded away over the years.  It may have been meant as a ritual site, or perhaps it was just built as some kind of wonder for the people.  It doesn't fit into any clear model of any Buddhist or even ancient Shinto practice, nor is it clearly connected to other continental practices.  We certainly know that they did plenty with water, given the number of waterworks and other carved stones, including a model of Mt. Sumera, we are told was built to the west of Asukadera on the 15th day of the 7th month of the following year—657. Maybe these are remnants of that project Whatever its purpose, the Sakafune-ishi site does seem to compare favorably with what is described in the Nihon Shoki, and perhaps it was considered such a waste of resources just because it didn't fit in with the prevailing ritual culture.  Maybe Takara hime was too artistically avant-garde for her time. “Wasting resources” would, in fact, become a chief complaint against Takara Hime during her time on the throne.  And that takes us from seemingly harmless construction projects into the court politics of the day.  Now as you should recall, Prince Naka no Oe, Takara Hime's son, was the Crown Prince at this point, and quite influential.  He was supported by various courtiers, such as Nakatomi no Kamatari, the Naidaijin, but his eventual ascendancy to the throne was not entirely assured.  We've seen plenty of examples where someone would seem to be in line for the throne and they didn't ever make it.  We know that there were several other royal princes at this time.  One of the youngest was Prince Takeru, a grandson of Takara Hime, who was born around 651.  Then there was Prince Naka no Oe's brother, Prince Ohoama.  He was also one of Takara Hime's sons, and while we haven't heard much of him in the narrative, we will definitely see more of him in the future.  On top of the two of them, there is Prince Arima, whom I talked about at the beginning of the episode.  Prince Arima was mentioned as the son of Karu and Wotarashi Hime, but his mother was not Karu's Queen—that was Hashibito, daughter of Okinaga Tarashi-hi Hironuka, aka Jomei Tennou, and Takara Hime.  Yup, Karu basically married his own niece, though that may have been an attempt to keep the most direct connection possible to the royal line.  Arima's mom Wotarashi Hime, on the other hand, was the daughter of Abe no Kurahashi no Oho-omi—the Minister of the Left, or Sadaijin, during Karu's reign.  Strictly speaking, based on the way that the succession has been depicted so far, Prince Arima wouldn't technically meet the requirements.  That said, we've seen where that has been bypassed in the past, and no doubt people were aware just how easily it would be to rewrite the history, if they had to.  He was young—but not so young that he couldn't be involved in the politics of the court. Other than a note about his parentage at the start of Karu's reign, Prince Arima isn't mentioned again until the ninth month of 657, and right off the bat you can tell where the Chroniclers fall on his personality.  They describe him as deceitful, and claim that he pretended to be insane—a term that doesn't really show up elsewhere, so it is hard to know what exactly is meant.  Is he the Hamlet of his age?  Arima used this as an excuse to go to Muro Onsen—thought to be modern Shirahama Hot Springs, on the southwestern end of the Kii Peninsula.   When he came back he sang its praises, claiming that “scarce had I seen that region, when my complaint disappeared of itself.”  The Queen wanted to go and see for herself. Overall, this hardly seems to be very “deceitful”, though it is suspected that Arima may have feigned an illness to avoid some of the politics around the start of the new reign.  Given his father Karu's recent death, it would likely have been easy enough to claim that he was greatly depressed.  We aren't told how long he stayed at Muro Onsen, but presumably it was for some time. At the start of the following year, on the 13th day of the first month, Kose no Tokuda no Omi, the Sadaijin, or Minister of the Left, passed away.  This would have no doubt created some ripples, but little more is said—we don't even have the name of who succeeded him in the position, at least not in the Nihon Shoki.  Four months later, which is to say in the fifth month of that same year, 658, Prince Takeru passed away.  He was only 8 years old, but as the grandson of Takara Hime a temporary tomb was constructed in the Imaki valley.  Takara Hime lamented his death greatly, and in the 10th month, she took Arima's advice and went to visit the Ki Onsen.  She had several poems composed and handed them to Hata no Ohokura no Miyatsuko no Mari to record them for posterity. While she was away, Soga no Akaye no Omi was the acting official in charge.  And several weeks in, he addressed Prince Arima.  He noted that there were three problems with Takara Hime's government. First – She builds treasuries on a great scale, collecting the riches of the people. Second – She wastes the public grain revenue in digging long canals. Third – She loads barges with stones and transports them to be piled up into a hill. This may have been popular opinion, but it was also rather treasonous talk.  Prince Arima simply smiled and said: “I have only now come to an age where I am fit to bear arms.” So, yeah, he was basically saying that he was old enough to take up arms—and presumably lead others in a rebellion, if that was the case. Two days later, on the fifth day of the 11th month, Prince Arima met Akaye at his mansion.  They went into one of the upper stories, where they wouldn't be interrupted, and there they conspired together.  Others were also involved, it seems—Mori no Kimi no Oho-ishi, Sakahibe no Muraji no Kusuri, and Shihoya no Muraji no Konoshiro.  There are a few different books that claim to record what the plans were.  One says that Soga no Akaye, Shihoya no Konoshiro, Mori no Oho-ishi, and Sakahibe no Kusuri divined the future of their conspiracy by drawing slips of paper, to see how it would turn out.  Another book states that Arima claimed he would burn down the palace and take 500 men to march down south.  There he would waylay Takara Hime at the harbour of Muro.  They were going to exile her to Awaji island, setting up a fleet of ships to ensure she could never leave. As they were discussing what to do—no doubt talking about how the Prince could take the throne, a leg-rest that they were using broke.  Another book claims it was an arm-rest, instead, but otherwise the details are the same.  They both agreed that was a bad omen, and decided not to proceed any further with their plans.  Prince Arima returned home, but apparently Soga no Akaye had a change of heart.  He apparently figured that his only way out was to turn in the others and admit everything.  And so, that night, Akaye sent Mononobe no Enowi no Muraji no Shibi, who was in charge of the labourers working on the palace.  They surrounded the palace and then Akaye sent a mounted courier to inform Takara Hime. That letter must have laid everything out.  Takara hime had the conspirators arrested and brought to Ki Onsen.  Arima's servant, Nihitabe no Muraji no Yonemaro, followed them.  Prince Naka no Oe himself questioned Arima about why he plotted treason.  Arima's answer is a bit cryptic:  “Heaven and Akaye know.” He responded, “I do not understand at all.” In the end, all of the conspirators were found guilty, and executed.  Tajihi no Wosaha no Muraji no Kuniso was sent to do the task.  Prince Arima was strangled at the Fujishiro acclivity, along with Shihoya no Konoshiro and Nihitabe no Yonemaro.  Before being executed, Konoshiro made a rather macabre request, asking that—presumably after he was dead—they cut off his right hand and make it a national treasure.  The other two conspirators, Mori no Oho-ishi and Sakahibe no Kusuri, were merely banished, presumably having played less of a role. Once again, we must remember that we are only getting one side of the story.  It is definitely convenient for Naka no Oe to have a potential rival out of the way.  At the same time, it is certainly plausible that there was more than a little bit of consternation about how Takara Hime had been spending so much on all of these construction projects.  And yet… were these Takara Hime's projects, alone? Remember, Prince Naka no Oe seems to have had a fair bit of clout.  He orchestrated the original coup, where he killed Soga no Iruka and his father.  And then he declined the throne, but became a major part of the new government.  He was apparently powerful enough that he organized the move back to Asuka against the wishes of Karu no Ohokimi. So would all of these projects have been done without his involvement? This is an area where I have to admit that I probably need to check my bias.  On the one hand, it is rare enough in patriarchal accounts to see women with agency and in positions of power, and so it is easy enough to make an assumption that any agency they are given in the record, they likely had more than is mentioned.  At the same time, in this particular instance, at least, Takara Hime's role in this could just as easily be a cover to preserve the image of Naka no Oe, who is certainly portrayed as a hero figure, bringing much needed change and modernization—such as it was—to Yamato.  His enemies are always shown to be in the wrong, and even if he is accused of something horrible—such as the death of Soga no Ishikawa no Maro—it turns out that it was actually the fault of someone else, such as the person who slandered Maro to him in the first place.  So could it be that these unpopular construction projects were actually his doing, all along?  Was the conspiracy simply to overthrow Takara Hime, or was it focused on both her and Naka no Oe, together? To be honest, I couldn't say for certain.  All we have to go on is what the Chroniclers tell us, and they lay the blame fairly firmly at the feet of Takara Hime.  But do remember that Naka no Oe is not necessarily the Shining Prince that he is often made out to be, and that people rarely come to or stay in power in a society like Yamato's by being nice all the time.  We certainly know what he is capable of from the Isshi Incident, and we shouldn't forget that in the narrative. Now when Takara Hime returned from Ki Onsen after winter ended, in the new year.  We are told that she got back on the third day of the first month of 659.  A couple of months later, on the first day of the third month, she went to Yoshino and held a banquet there—no doubt at the palace she had had constructed.  This may have been at the site of Miyataki Ruins, where excavations have revealed numerous examples of roof tiles and other artifacts that may have come from a building from the Asuka or Nara era. The visit to Yoshino must have been quick, however, as we are told that two days later she visited Hira-ura in Afumi, on the shores of Lake Biwa.  Perhaps this only means she left two days later, since that must have been quite the journey back in the day.  Would she have traveled on horseback, or in a carriage or something similar?  No doubt a full procession would take time, and I doubt that the sovereign would push herself.  We also don't have a reason for her to go, that I can see.  It is an odd entry, to say the least. And I think it may be best to end it there.  I do encourage anyone who can to get down to Asuka and plan to spend a couple of days if you really want to get around.  You may want to rent a bike or even a car to get to everything, though you can walk to most things.  There are several museums and cultural centers set up to expound upon Asuka culture, with a focus on the history and archaeology specifically of that period. The palace site where Takara Hime ruled would continue to be the location of at least two more palaces, which we'll talk about in time.  Before that, though, we'll want to cover a few more things.  Most importantly, we'll want to talk about the relationship with lands outside of the archipelago.  We'll discuss the man from Tukhara—who may have simply been from the Ryukyu islands, or possible from as far aways the Dvaravati Kingdom, in modern day Thailand, or even from the western edge of India and Pakistan, having traveled the Silk Road.  Some have even suggested that he may be a Tocharian, and we'll talk about what that means.  And then, before we finish, we'll have to talk about everything else going on, including the conclusion of the Tang-Baekje war. Until then thank you for listening and for all of your support. If you like what we are doing, please tell your friends and feel free to rate us wherever you listen to podcasts.  If you feel the need to do more, and want to help us keep this going, we have information about how you can donate on Patreon or through our KoFi site, ko-fi.com/sengokudaimyo, or find the links over at our main website,  SengokuDaimyo.com/Podcast, where we will have some more discussion on topics from this episode. Also, feel free to reach out to our Sengoku Daimyo Facebook page.  You can also email us at the.sengoku.daimyo@gmail.com.  Thank you, also, to Ellen for their work editing the podcast. And that's all for now.  Thank you again, and I'll see you next episode on Sengoku Daimyo's Chronicles of Japan.    

Alors que l'année 2024 touche à sa fin et que nous nous préparons à accueillir 2025, Pasteur Ben Luiten t'invite à réfléchir sur ce qui occupe tes pensées et ton cœur. Dans ce message, découvre comment terminer cette année avec reconnaissance et espérance, et poser les bonnes bases pour débuter la nouvelle année. Versets de référence : Psaumes 77:11, 1 Thessaloniciens 5:16-18, Lamentations 3:22, Psaumes 103:2, Psaumes 136:1

1.

This episode we continue looking at the Taika reforms, covering only 3 months, but with edicts about mounded tombs, the labor due to the state vice individuals, and a variety of "offenses", often countering current practices such as forcing people to undergo "harai" in many instances. For more, check out the blog at https://sengokudaimyo.com/podcast/episode-110 Rough Transcript: Welcome to Sengoku Daimyo's Chronicles of Japan.  My name is Joshua and this is episode 110: Manual Labor, Mounded Tombs, and Marital Missteps. Maro sat by the small campfire he had made along the river's edge.  The water nearby was going to be the catalyst for the gruel that he was making with some of the last bit of food that he had.  As he stirred the pot, he looked over at his friend, lying out, his head propped up against the rock. Maro and Sumi had been working on one of the large tombs in Asuka at the commandof their lord, who had built it for his deceased father.  Now they were released and headed back to their village, still two days out.  Unlike their superiors, they didn't get horses to ride across the landscape, so it would be a few days before they returned home.  Unfortunately, Sumi had grown ill, and he was now almost delirious with fever.  Maro couldn't bear to leave his friend, but he also cursed his luck. What if Sumi were to die?  It was one thing to die at home, or even when they were working on the tomb.  But now they were travelers—strangers on the road.  If something happened to Sumi, Maro knew he couldn't just leave him, but neither could he go trudging through the countryside with a dead body.  Even association with death would bring problems for him, and if local villagers were to find out, they could force him to pay for the necessary ritual purification—or worse.  Heck, even something as simple as cooking rice on the side of the road could bring problems for a poor traveler—hence why Maro had found some place off the beaten path and away from prying eyes. Under his breath he prayed to whatever powers were listening to help Sumi recover.  If they could only make it back to their village, then everything would be alright. Once again, we are looking at the second year of Taika, 646.  As we heard in the past couple of episodes, the first year of Taika saw a plethora of edicts that would bring radical change to the way that the sovereign interacted with the land and the people.  These provided the start of  much more direct rule,   and yet also set the stage for a new bureaucratic state, with various new officials up and down the hierarchy. This episode we are continuing to look at what happened in the first several months of 646, largely because there was so much going on that it's worth focusing in on this short time period.   For one thing, we really should talk a little bit more about how this entire Taika era is reflecting the culmination of what appears to have been a major change to Yamato's cultural identity over the preceding century or so—a change in perspective that may not have even been entirely apparent to them, but which allowed Naka no Oe and the sovereign, Karu, aka Koutoku Tennou, to get away with these pronouncements that restructured the basic foundations of the Yamato state.  These changes include the death knell of the kofun period, with new restrictions on how mounded tombs were to be created, including how large they were allowed to be.  We'll also look at a litany of items being called out in the third month of the year—many of which directly affected people at the lowest ends of the economic spectrum and which give us a view of some of the practices that had presumably been going on prior to the edict. As we've already discussed, the early part of the year 646 saw quite a few quote-unquote “normal” things happening.  The sovereign moved into a new detached palace, perhaps while the Toyosaki Palace was being built.  This was the Koshiro Palace of Sayabe, in Naniwa.  Emissaries were sent out to restore—or possibly build—the arsenals; you may recall that the governors were supposed to gather up all of the weapons and armor in a single place so that it could be available, just in case.  Envoys from the Emishi came to do homage, and there was another round of envoys from Goguryeo, Baekje, and Silla.  Apparently, this time, there were no complaints about the tribute.  That was all in the first two months.  By the third, the governors had been called to account for their misdeeds, but also pardoned – we talked about this two episodes ago, when we explored the new system of governors, but this is when their pardons happen – and the sovereign moved out of the Koshiro Palace, presumably to take up residence in the shiny new Toyosaki palace that was just getting blessed and which was the nominal reason for the general amnesty across the land. And with all of that over… well, it was time to get back to figuring out what part of the traditional order they would overthrow next.  And apparently, Karu, our sovereign, had an idea.  He sent a question to the Crown Prince, Naka no Oe, to see what he thought about it, and we are given the Prince's response in a letter back to the crown on the 20th day of the 3rd month of 646.    The question Karu had askedwas roughly: what should be done about a group of families called the Iribe, including the Koshiro no Iribe of the Omi, Muraji, the Tomo no Miyatsuko, and the Kuni no Miyatsuko; and the Mina no Iribe of the Royal Princes.  Karu had also evidently asked what should be done about the Miyake. Now the question reading as “what should be done about these people” sounds a bit ominous, so before we get to Naka no Oe's suggestions, let's explore just who were the “Iribe” mentioned here.  As far as I can find, there doesn't appear to be another use of that word in the Chronicles, but the other terms around it provide clues and we have a general consensus about what this is all about.  “Koshiro”—the Child's Generation—and the “Mina”—the exalted name—suggest that the Iribe were those families set up in the name of a given prince or person.  As we've talked about on the podcast in the past, from the start of the various “Be” families, there was a longstanding tradition of creating specific families to support given individuals: for former queens, princes, and more. These families often took the name of the palace where these individuals  resided.  The output of these families and worker groups would then go to support that individual and their relatives. The language used in Naka no Oe's letter, here, suggests that various other elites had set up similar groups for themselves or their own relatives This is supported by the fact that the Miyake are also mentioned.  The Miyake were the royal granaries, and while they had a political significance in extending the presence of the Yamato throne, they were also supplying income, in the form of rice, to the throne and various members of the royal family. So, Karu's question basically boiled down to: what do we do about all of these groups that exist purely to support elite families?  Naka no Oe's response reflects the new order that he was pushing for in this period.  He notes that there is only one sovereign, and only the sovereign was owed the labor of the populace—suggesting that the labor of the Iribe and those otherwise conscripted into labor should be done according to the new labor laws they had just enacted.  This also suggested that even the Miyake should be abolished. This was another Big Change in the Taika era, and once again, this would have large ramifications, as it suggested, once again, that the traditions of people providing labor to these elite families would go away—although not entirely.  As we will see, elites would still get an income, but it would no longer be based on your hereditary rank and position and provided by groups bound to your service alone, but instead based on your appointed rank and position in the new government.  Those serving in government would continue to receive a stipend based on the labor of agricultural workers on land allotted to such purpose by the state, and in fact we've already seen where stipends were increased for some officers.  This goes along with the idea, at least, of a more merit-based society.  Those who worked hard and proved themselves would find their way to the highest positions and thus the greatest income for themselves and their families.  In reality, these promotions were highly political affairs, and most likely to go to those who came from the families already in power.  How that was envisioned, though, changed in this period, and it really emphasizes the shift that must have occurred within the cultural imaginary of the time. I've mentioned before the concept of the cultural imaginary, and it is something that I think we really need to talk about during this period—during the Great Change.  It is clear that, even if the term “Taika” was applied after the fact, people recognized that there was a sea change going on.  That change is externally represented by the edicts and the change going on in the way the government was operating.  However, this couldn't have happened without at least the tacit approval of the rest of the elites.  If Naka no Oe had just been a lone voice preaching the benefits of a more centralized state, with the sovereign at the top of a bureaucratic system that had never before been seen in the archipelago, then he could easily have been dismissed.  The other members of the court could have effectively revolted, refusing to comply and possibly even forcing a change in government.  And of course, that may have been part of what was behind the attempted revolt around Prince Furubito no Ohoye, which we talked about last episode. However, enough people continued to side with Naka no Oe and Nakatomi no Kamatari and their ideas that any opposition was unable to overcome their momentum.  So why? I would suggest that this was the result and culmination of a new way of envisioning—of imagining, if you will—the Yamato state.  It is an image that would have been familiar to the Chroniclers, and we see it throughout their narrative: the image of an imperial state, with the sovereign—known to the Chroniclers as the Sumera no Mikoto, or Tennou—at the very top.  The Sumera no Mikoto, as the sovereign would eventually be known, held authority not only in the secular realm, but also in the spiritual—in the Buddhist and in matters of the kami.  It envisioned the sovereign as the natural ruler of all of the archipelago, and even beyond. This was an image that is very much in line with the thinking of continental scholars.  It conforms, to a point, with Confucian and Buddhist ideas of what a Good Ruler should be, and, by extension, what the role of the State was and how the people should operate within that realm. Prior to the 6th century, there had been another image of the sovereign—the image of the Oho-kimi.  There are similarities—after all, power is power and humans are going to human.  But there were clearly other prevailing ideas in play back then.  We've talked about the idea of co-rulers, who ruled in tandem.  And we've seen examples of female and male rulers at various levels of society.  Spiritual authority came from the ability to intercede with the kami, and there were no native Buddhist traditions prior to 538—despite attempts by the Chroniclers to paint prior generations with the brush of Buddhist and Confucian morality.  One's place in society wasn't dictated by their own personal accomplishments as much as it was the accomplishments of their extended family, though even some of that may have come about as late as the 5th or 6th centuries.  Perhaps more importantly, prior to the 6th century, the sovereign's direct control only extended so far.  They were the sovereign of Yamato, and though they may have had influence over others in the archipelago, they did not necessarily have direct control over their lands and people.  By all accounts, the people owed their service not to the sovereign in Yamato, but to their local elites, who in turn may have had duties to those above them. But along with books and immigrants from the continent, the people of the archipelago got new ideas of what the government should look like.  These may have been foreign ideas, but over time we had new generations growing up with new and different examples of how things should work.  These new ideas worked their way into their thinking about how elited should behave and act, and colored their image for what a proper State should look like.  Sure, they understood how their own traditions worked, and that is still the mode under which they operated, but they were ready to change. Some of this change started back in the era of Prince Umayado and the sovereign, Kashikiya Hime.  Umayado's purported 17 article constitution, as we noted, didn't exactly lay out specific laws and punishments.  It wasn't a true legal code, though it was accompanied by a few legal changes, including the first attempt at a rank system for individuals.  More importantly, though, it articulated a set of values on which the government should be founded.  Whether or not these values were actually articulated to Prince Umayado, aka Shotoku Taishi, or even whether they were written down before the Chronicles were put together is debatable, but that whole episode certainly suggests that these kinds of ideas, which were rife with continental thought, were making their way into society. And thus, Naka no Oe was able to suggest his and Karu's reforms based on arguments that no doubt resonated with the people of the time, as many of those in government would have been reading similar texts.  So even while it was seemingly against their immediate interests to give up control of labor or production, they had already been provided an exemplar of how this would work.  They had a new imagination of what their culture should be and look like. And that's why I bring up the idea of a new cultural imaginary taking hold.  A cultural imaginary is the collection of various shared values and concepts that a group envisions for themselves. If we think of modern countries, one can look at American culture, where there are shared values of freedom, individuality, etc.  These are backed by common, shared ideas and stories—stories of the Founding Fathers, separating themselves from Great Britain, but also ideas of the Old West and concepts of the rugged cowboy on his horse.  These stories and images help us to determine our shared values and understanding.  It also tends to define the “us” versus “them”.  Why are *we* the way we are and why are *they* different? To be clear, these stories are not always true, and can change over time.  Early visions of America included some people, but not everyone.  Stories turned George Washington into an almost mythical figure, with an emphasis on his heroic qualities and his honesty.  Our modern version of the Old West is often driven by what we saw in movies, which in turn were influenced by dime novels of the late 19th and early 20th centuries.  The historical Old West tended to be quite different—and much more complex and diverse—than our modern visions of it. We can see similar forces at work in the Nihon Shoki and the Kojiki.  These were written with the cultural values of the 8th century, and deliberately or not, their values are reflected back into the past, which is then what later generations would hold onto, defining their own image of who they were and how things should be. When the cultural imaginary of what your society or culture *should* be conflicts with what people actually see happening, that often creates tension.  That tension can be resolved in a variety of ways, but it often requires something to change.  In this case, the cultural imaginaries of the elite had been flooded with examples of Confucian and Buddhist morals.  The stories and values had been passed along with knowledge of astronomy, mathematics, and more, in the media they were consuming from the continent.  There were also those who had come from the continent—from Baekje, Silla, and beyond—who no doubt also had absorbed some of these stories and values and were passing them on, as well. And so it wouldn't have taken that much for Naka no Oe to point out how the system that they were laboring under differed from what a so-called “good” government should look like.  So in a way, there was already buy-in for a change, at least at the top.  And thus it appears as though Naka no Oe and Karu were able to get many of the elites to give up a measure of their own autonomy under the old system for the benefits of the new system that was being created.  Mind you, it likely didn't hurt that the throne was also ensuring that they gave out lavish gifts of silk, gold ingots, and hefty stipends to many of the more influential members of society as well. There are still questions as to how much actually changed, initially.  Sure, we see the edicts and an intent to change, and the local elites of Yamato seem to have been going along with it, but we don't quite see how quickly these edicts were accepted in places like Izumo or Kibi, and I wouldn't be surprised to learn that, at least initially, many people just paid the edicts lip service, waiting to see whether or not they would actually be enforced.  Still, these are definite changes away from the previous cultural norms. Which leads into the next big edict, which focused on regulating tombs. While the ancient burial mounds which could be called “kofun” continued to be built into the 8th century in one form or another, by most timelines, the Kofun period ended around 538 with the introduction of Buddhism and the start of what is known as the Asuka period.  As we've noted, even the kingly tombs of the royal family from the end of the 6th century stopped relying on the round-keyhole shaped tomb shape.  By the early 7th century the building of temples had become the new memorial for the ultra-wealthy of Yamato—a temple being a memorial that could be built before you passed and carry on your memory to later generations as a place of worship.  This was no doubt helped by the idea that you would also accrue a fair bit of karma, the spiritual capital of the Buddhist worldview. However, a mounded burial was still de rigeur for the elites and certain families, including those who had come over from the continent.  The last keyhole style tombs known to have been built appear to be out in modern Chiba prefecture, in the Kanto region, in the first half of the 7th century.  From then on, we largely see round, square, or octagonal tombs.  Some of the latest tombs that we know of, in the late 7th and early 8th centuries, show clear signs of continental influence.  Kitora kofun and Takamatsuzuka Kofun, both in the Asuka area, are decorated in ways similar to tombs in Goguryeo, including paintings of the four directional animals mentioned in the Liji, the Confucian Book of Rites: Suzaku, the red bird of the south; Byakko, the white tiger of the west; Genbu, the black tortoise of the north; and Seiryuu, the blue dragon of the east.  Takamatsuzuka also contains murals of courtiers dressed in clothing that would be quite at home on the continent and which looks quite different from the clothing seen on haniwa figures from only a century or so earlier. Tombs were also more likely to be clustered together, and often only contained a single burial, rather than evidence of a double burial.  This was likely influenced by the edict of 646.  That edict also gives us ideas on what was considered to be reasonable for that era, and provides some of our best descriptions in the written record to help us better understand tomb construction. I would also note that the court had moved to Naniwa, and near to Naniwa were some of the largest of the kofun, including Daisen-ryo, the largest kofun in Japan and one of the largest mausoleums in the entire world.  So perhaps that was also influencing their thoughts. The edict starts out noting that large, mounded tombs are wasteful.  This shouldn't be a surprise:  large tombs were always about conspicuous consumption as a sign of the wealth and power of the occupant and their family.  As noted earlier, however, a lot of that seems to have shifted to the building of temples, and as such, tombs were no longer seen as something to waste resources on.  However, since it was still tradition, it was still happening, hence the edict. And so it goes on to limit the size of the tombs.  At the largest, it says a tomb should be no more than about nine shaku wide and 5 shaku wide on the inside—one shaku being approximately 1 foot—and no more then 9 hiro to a side and 5 hiro in height.  A “Hiro” was an ancient measure that was generally the length of two outspread arms.  This was about 5 shaku, or 5 feet.    That means that we are still talking about a mound 45 feet on a side, which is nothing to sneeze at.  But this size was reserved for princes and up.  The Daijin—the great ministers of State—could have similar inner dimensions for their sarcophagus, but the outside was limited to only seven hiro to a side and three hiro in height.  Lesser ministers only got 5 hiro to a side and 2.5 hiro in height, while others were allocated no mound at all, and a smaller inner chamber. In addition, the number of laborers and how long they could work on a tomb was also capped.  The largest tombs were allotted 1,000 laborers for 7 days.  The Daijin received 500 laborers over 5 days.  Other ministers received 250 laborers for 3 days, while below that you received 100 laborers for 1 day or 50 laborers for no more than 1 day.  Here we see the state once again asserting itself into the relationship between the various individuals and the laborers—previously, an elite family would have just used as many laborers as they had private access to, but now things were being regulated and it was all based on your rank and position within the civil service of the new government. In addition, how the deceased was delivered to the monument also was regulated.  A carriage was permitted for the highest ranked individuals—the members of the royal family.  Ministers could be placed on a bier and carried by pall-bearers.  No mention is made of people of the lower class, with the assumption that they likely didn't get such a ceremony. White cloth hangings were allowed in many cases—white is practical, in that it isn't dyed and so it wouldn't be as expensive, but it was also considered the color of death in Buddhist and continental tradition, so not surprising.  They also allowed small stones to be used for princes down to the rank of “sho-chi”—that was the lowest official rank.  These stones could refer to several things, and we aren't quite sure.  According to Aston, the compilers of the “shukai” edition of the Nihon Shoki attributed this to memorial stones set up with inscriptions about the deceased, but as he points out, we haven't found anything that really correlates to that.  Aston instead suggests that what is meant are the stones used to build the roof of the main chamber.  If you look at tombs like Ishibutai kofun, you can see the large stones used there, but this may be referring to something similar, possibly using smaller stones that took less effort to haul into place.  There were also stones used on the outside to decorate the kofun back in the day, and I suppose that they could have meant that as well. More than just regulations, there were prohibitions placed on burials.  For one thing, the concept of a temporary interment was discontinued for everyone.  In the past, a body would be buried or even placed in a hut for some time and then the burial would take place at a later date.  There are several reasons this may have been done in the past, from the purely ritual to the more practical.  However, that was no longer considered to be appropriate.  Likewise, commoners were required to be buried within a day of their death.  This goes along with talk about reducing “pollution”, which may have referred to spiritual as much as physical pollution, and so plots of ground were set aside specifically for burials, and people were not allowed to be buried outside of those official locations.  That could certainly help explain why we see more clusters of burials in this later period.  Using the sides of hills and ridges may have also meant that the tombs didn't take up important agricultural lands. There were also prohibitions on sacrifices to the dead.  For one thing, nobody was permitted to sacrifice themselves through strangulation—which apparently had been a thing even though we are told that human sacrifice was prohibited back in the time of Mimaki Iribiko, and the reason that haniwa were invented.  You also weren't allowed to sacrifice someone's horse or bury valuables along with the dead.  These are all things that we see in the early mounded tomb culture, including burials in the Kara, or Gaya, region of the Korean peninsula, and we certainly find plenty of grave goods in the archipelago.  It makes me wonder if this is one of the reasons that painted tombs, like Kitora and Takamatsuzuka, were used, perhaps in place of more lavish grave goods going into the burial.  There was also a prohibition on an apparent custom where people would cut their hair and stab themselves in the thigh prior to pronouncing a eulogy.  Similar traditions are found elsewhere, often to emphasize that people were grieving the dead. And since you can't punish the dead, if there were any problems then it would be the dead person's relatives who would be punished, instead. Speaking of punishments, this starts to get into a part of the Taika reforms that really focuses on the various offenses that people were apparently committing and needed to be stopped.  It is unclear to me how often these offenses occurred, and in some cases I wonder if they were things that were actually happening or if they were carryovers from the continental tradition.  Still, I tend to come down on the idea that these were likely things that were actually happening, and didn't fit in with the social norms and values that Naka no Oe and his cohorts were attempting to put in place.  Some of these will likely resonate with us, today, but others are a bit more difficult to fully grasp. One of the things that is perhaps most difficult for us to grasp today is the concept of “harai”, which Aston translates as “purgation” and is most commonly translated, today, as “purification”.  “Harai” is an important concept in Shinto, and has been something that seems to have been there in some form from the earliest times. In Shinto there is a concept of “pollution” or “tsumi” that can occur, and it may or may not be something that a person has control over.  For example, blood and death are forms of pollution—which also means that, by extension, birth also includes pollution in the form of blood.  “Tsumi” can also be something that occurs because of things that a person does, where they break the social mores or norms.  A number of examples are contained in the stories provided during the Age of the Gods.  In particular, you can see in the tales of Izanagi and Izanami, where Izanagi, coming back from the land of the dead, dips himself into the ocean to wash away any impurities—any pollution.  We talked about that back in episode 14.  In episode 15, we talked about some of the not-so-great actions of Susano'o.  Some of these, like the backwards flaying of the colt and flinging it through the roof of his sister's building is somewhat obvious.  But then there were things like moving the stakes delineating the rice fields, or letting livestock in to trample the young growth.  Those were some other examples of tsumi that were part of the many things that got him kicked out of Takamagahara, the High Plain of Heaven. An important thing here is that tsumi is not necessarily about a person's intentions, motives, nor responsibility.  For all types of tsumi, some form of harai, or purification, is called for.  Today, there are various ceremonies that can be performed by Shinto priests to help remove the effects of tsumi, and that seems to have been the case back in the Kofun and Asuka periods as well, but there was a catch: it wasn't without costs.  And apparently those costs could be significant—significant enough that it was almost like a kind of punishment.  Aston suggests that harai could include various payments, perhaps seen as a kind of sacrifice, but that could be more than some people could afford.  If we look back on the story of Susano'o, he had to have his hair and nails cut as part of his penance—his harai.  There is also some thought that this may have just been a literal payment to the community, like a fine.  I would note that “harai” can mean either purification or payment, depending on the kanji used.  So just keep that in mind when we talk about “harai”. Now here are some of the things that, according to the new edicts, people were to stop doing. First, there were people who saw or heard something—presumably something important—and yet they wouldn't say anything.  That wasn't going to fly anymore.  So I guess this is the pro-snitching rule—if you see something, say something. Then there were enslaved people who apparently would leave poor masters to find someone wealthier to serve, hoping to improve their lot.  Again, this was right out.  We are reminded that Yamato was a slave-holding society, and they weren't going to allow that. On the other hand, the new rules also put a stop to husbands who would dismiss their wives and then, when the wives remarried, try to make a claim on the new husband's property.  Similarly, there were some men who demanded a family's daughter for his wife, but before they consummate the marriage, she marries someone else.  In some of those cases, the men would, again, make demands on the property of the new husband's family as well as the wife's family.  The new edict put that strictly out of bounds. Following on a theme of women and marriage: there was a tradition in some places that widows who, when they married after 10 or 20 years, or even unmarried women got married for the first time, they would be forced by the community to pay for some kind of “harai”.  This, along with the other practice mentioned, was forbidden.  No longer would they have to pay for getting married. Now in some cases, it looks like men who wanted to divorce their wives wouldn't just let them out of the arrangement. Rather, they would sell their wives into slavery—another thing that the new edicts said would no longer be tolerated. And then there was the case of a man who believed his wife was having an affair.  In that case he now had to obtain at least three credible witnesses before bringing it up to the authorities.  One presumes this was to protect women from men simply making a baseless claim with no proof.  Not that a determined man couldn't find—or even bribe—three witnesses to come forward and accuse his wife, but it at least upped the ante a little bit.  Whether this was to provide protection to women or whether it was just to reduce the amount of work on government officials who would have to investigate and come to a decision isn't exactly clear. I would note that while many of these new rules were coming down on the side of protecting women, to some degree, there is still a very heavy patriarchal bias demonstrated throughout. In addition to all the information on marital affairs,  there were a few other, unrelated issues, but all of them were connected to the need to do harai.  And now we come back to our story about poor Maro and Sumi from the beginning of the episode: let's say a man, finishing his forced labor, is returning back when he falls ill on the road and dies in some village.  According to established traditions, the people there could then require his companions or even family members to perform harai—presumably meaning that they would have to pay the village something or at least pay for the ritual cleansing, to compensate for the tsumi that the death caused.  Similarly, if someone were to drown, his companions would be held responsible.  Even if someone were to stop and cook rice by the roadside while traveling, they could be made to perform harai.  And the harai for all of this was so onerous that we are told that even a younger brother might completely ignore the body of his elder brother, just to avoid being associated with him and thus forced to perform harai. In all of these cases, the edict said that this would no longer be acceptable.  You couldn't just put the squeeze on someone to perform harai just because their companion happened to pass away. Being on the road and traveling—especially for official government service—was clearly something that was on their mind.  Moving on from the list of things that were to be discontinued without exception, there were a few other cases that were dealt with in the same edict. First, there was the case where peasants, heading to the capital, would leave their horses with someone in Owari or Mikawa, for example.  They would leave cloth and bundles of hemp as payment for the person to look after their horses, and even procure a spade as a gift when they returned.  However, when they got back, they would find that their horse had died, or else the horse had been sold, but the owner was told it had died.  The last trick, if it was a mare, was to get the mare pregnant and then claim that the pregnancy had polluted their house, therefore the owner would have to do harai, meaning that the horse usually ended up staying with the person who was supposed to be holding onto it. The solution was to use the new bureaucracy.  The owner and the person who agreed to keep the horse would make their statement to the village elder and the owner would hand over the renumeration to the elder as the third party.  This payment would be held by the elder until the owner returned, at which point it was handed over to the person who had kept the horse.  This way the person keeping the horse knew that he would be paid for his troubles, but only if the horse was still around when the owner returned. So they effectively invented the concept of escrow.  I suspect that such a system could be applied to many other such endeavors as well, where there was otherwise no guarantee of payment at the end of a task nor guarantee that the task would completed as agreed if they got the money up front. Besides that, the edict also had a short note about dues payable to Market Commissioners for main roads and to ferrymen—likely various fees.  Instead, these kinds of positions would be granted rice-land which could be cultivated and they could receive a stipend from that. Finally, during the key agricultural months, everybody was to be working on cultivating rice-land.  The edict specifically calls out that they should not eat dainty food nor drink sake, I suspect because dainty food wouldn't give you enough energy and drinking sake would impair your ability in the field.  Each quarter, the Kuni no Miyatsuko were to send messengers to remind the people of this edict—a kind of human public service announcement. So all of that was part of an edict on the 22nd day of the 3rd month of 646.  I am not sure that there is a clear theme to all of it, other than calling out old practices and describing how things would be done from here on out.  There is clearly a concern with harai and how it would affect people's willingness to do the right thing. The next set of pronouncements would come almost five months later, and a lot of that had to do with names, as well as further work on the creation of the government bureaucracy, but that is going to take a lot more time, and so I think that for now we'll end this here:  The link between the state and laborers has been changed, the tomb-building has been strictly regulated, and a series of rather specific pronouncements and prohibitions has been issued. And so, until next time, thank you for listening and for all of your support. If you like what we are doing, please tell your friends and feel free to rate us wherever you listen to podcasts.  If you feel the need to do more, and want to help us keep this going, we have information about how you can donate on Patreon or through our KoFi site, ko-fi.com/sengokudaimyo, or find the links over at our main website, SengokuDaimyo.com/Podcast, where we will have some more discussion on topics from this episode. Also, feel free to reach out to our Sengoku Daimyo Facebook page.  You can also email us at the.sengoku.daimyo@gmail.com.  Thank you, also, to Ellen for their work editing the podcast. And that's all for now.  Thank you again, and I'll see you next episode on Sengoku Daimyo's Chronicles of Japan.

Pianist Käbi Laretei sooloplaat "Exil: Home - Elsewhere" on ilmunud aastal 1995. Kavas Pärt, Chopin, Bartok, Rahmaninov, Hindemith, Field, Martinu, Almqvist ja Sumera.

This episode, we look at the rise of the Sui Dynasty and the famous interactions between Yamato and the Sui Dynasty, recorded in the histories of each state. For more, check out the podcast webpage:  https://sengokudaimyo.com/podcast/episode-96 Rough Transcript Welcome to Sengoku Daimyo's Chronicles of Japan.  My name is Joshua and this is Episode 96: From the Land Where the Sun Rises. Once again, we are still talking about the reign of Kashikiya Hime,   from the late 6th to early 7th century.  This time, though, we are going to take a quick diversion from Yamato and first look at what was going on over on the continent, in the  area of the Yellow and Yangzi River Basins—the area of the so-called “middle country”.  This is, after all, where a lot of the philosophy and other things that the archipelago was importing came from, so what was going on over there? Back in Episode 73, ee talked about the various northern and southern dynasties in the Yellow and Yangzi River Basins.  To sum up, during that period, the eastern area of modern China was split between a variety of dynasties, many of them short-lived, and many of them—especially in the north—were dynasties from outside of the main Han ethnic group. Up through the early 580's, the dynasty in charge of the Yellow River region was the Northern Zhou, one of the many dynasties in the north descended from the nomadic Xianbei ethnic groups.  Though their aristocracy was a mix of multiple ethnicities that had intermarried over the years, the Northern Zhou celebrated their Xianbei roots, often to the detriment of ethnic Han groups.  They had inherited the territory of the Western Wei, including much of the central Yangzi region down to Sichuan.  They then defeated the Northern Qi in 577 and claimed dominion over all of the Yellow River region in the north of modern China.  Their only rival was the Chen dynasty, along the eastern reaches of the Yangzi river, but the Chen themselves were relatively weak, and it was only the power struggles within the Northern Zhou court that kept them from wiping out the Chen completely. In 581, the Northern Zhou suffered a coup d'etat. Yang Jian was a Northern Zhou general, and his family, the Yang clan, had Han origins but had intermarried with the Xianbei as well, creating a truly mixed lineage. Jian also held some sway at court, and was known as the Duke of Sui—his daughter was the Empress Dowager, and her stepson was the young Emperor Jing.  In 581 Yang Jian usurped power from his step-grandson, the child emperor Jing, and placed himself on the throne, taking the name Emperor Wen of Sui, using his previous title as the name of the new dynasty. He killed off fifty-nine princes of the previous Northern Zhou, and began to consolidate his power.  By 587, he had strengthened his position, and by 588 invasion of the Chen territories began under Prince Yang Guang.  By 589, the Chen were defeated and any attempts at rebellion were put down, giving the Sui dynasty full control of northern and southern regions—from the Yellow and Yangzi Rivers down to the Sichuan basin.  Although, as I noted, the Yang family had intermarried with the Xianbei families of the Northern Zhou, they still retained some connection with their Han roots, and Emperor Wen won over the Han Confucian scholars with reforms to the rank system and at least a nod towards getting rid of nepotism and corruption that had taken hold in the Northern Zhou and previous dynasties.  He reinstituted Han dynasty titles and restored the nine rank system.  He also reinstituted a system of impartial judges to seek out talent and moved towards the idea of an examination system—something that would really take hold in later centuries. Furthermore, while he set himself up in the northern capital of Daxingcheng, aka Chang'an, he helped rebuild the southern capital, naming it Dayang.  He also supported Buddhism and Daoism.  He became a patron of southern Buddhist monasteries, and recognized major temples as state-sponsored institutions—a far cry from the suppression attempts in the north in 574 and 578. Emperor Wen also worked on repairing canals along the Yellow River.  These canals, which allowed easy transport of goods, regularly silted up without maintenance, and the dikes on either side could break, flooding the land on either side. They had been neglected during many of the short-lived reigns up to this point, with perhaps a few exceptions when things got really bad.  However, Emperor Wen began work to fix these old canals and thus improve the flow of goods and services. Given all of this - his patronage of Buddhism and Daoism, as well as his attempt to resurrect the Han dynasty and the Confucian principles that underlay its government, as well as the public works that he instituted, Yang Jian, aka Emperor Wen of Sui, is remembered as the Cultured Emperor—despite that fact the had started out as a blood-soaked general who had secured his usurpation with a not inconsiderable amount of murder.  Sima Guang, writing from the Song dynasty, centuries later, praised Emperor Wen for all he did to grow the Sui, uniting north and south, supporting the people, and helping the country to prosper as it rarely has before.  And yet, Sima Guang also says that in his personal life he was mean and stingy and paranoid—afraid that everyone was out to get him.  Given the life he'd lived, that would make some sense.  Still, he seems to have been good for his people, in the long run. But this wasn't to last.  In 604, Emperor Wen fell ill and died.  Or at least that is the official story.  Another says that he had grown angry over some event and was about to disinherit the crown prince, Yang Guang, who sent someone to kill his father.  That is a very abbreviated version of the story, and, as I said, it is not without controversy. However he died, his son, Yang Guang, succeeded him to the throne and became known as Emperor Yang.  Emperor Yang continued to expand the empire, and under his dynasty the Sui would attain their greatest extent yet.  He rebuilt parts of the Great Wall, and expanded the borders south, into modern Vietnam, as well as up to the borders with Goguryeo.  He also continued the work his father had begun on canals, eventually undertaking the creation of the Grand Canal, which would connect the Yellow and Yangzi Rivers.  No longer would the two be separate, forced to send goods out to sea or over treacherous land routes to get from one river basin to another.  Now they could sail ships straight from one river to the other—an impressive feat that you can still see today in parts of modern China.  The project would forever change the landscape of China, both literally and figuratively.  It connected the north and south, leading to greater political, economic, and cultural unity between the two regions.  It would connect the culture and economic resources of the south with the military institutions of the north.   Unfortunately, for all that this expansion may have been good for commerce, it came at a price.  The wars in Champa, in Southern Vietnam, saw thousands of Sui soldiers die from malaria.  And then, in the north, though they continuously pushed against Goguryeo, they were never quite able to overthrow them.  Finally, there was the Grand Canal.  Although it would truly be a wonder of the world, and become a part of the lifeblood of dynasties for centuries to come, it was built at a huge price both monetarily and in human lives.  We can assume a large number of people died as conscript labor working on the canals or on refurbishing the Great Wall, but also we are told that the monetary price largely bankrupted the empire, and for which later historians castigated the Sui dynasty But that was still to happen.  For our purposes, we should rewind a bit, to the very beginning of the 7th century.  As we touched on last episode, Yamato was just adopting their own twelve rank system and a seventeen article constitution shortly after Emperor Wen passed away and Yang Guang took the throne.  Now these 17 articles were almost all based on Confucian or Buddhist philosophy; clearly the Court was looking to the continent more and more for inspiration on how to govern, especially as it further expanded and solidified its grasp across the archipelago.  Up to this point, much of that innovation had come through the Korean peninsula, by way of Silla, Goguryeo, and, most prominently, their ally Baekje.  But no doubt they knew that much of what was influencing those kingdoms had, itself, come from even farther away.  And so, this reign, the Chronicles record that Yamato once again sent envoys beyond their peninsular neighbors all the way to the Middle Country itself.  This is significant as they were making direct contact with the mighty empire, the source of so many of the philosophical and scientific innovations that Yamato was trying to adopt.  This wasn't the first time this had happened, of course—we know of the cases of state of Na contacting the Han court, and then Himiko of the Wa during the Wei period, as well as several missions immediately after Himiko's death.  We also know of the five kings of Wa who reached out to the Liu Song court, though the Chronicles themselves are often silent on actual embassies, making it hard to tell exactly which reigns that occurred in, though it is generally agreed that one of those “Five Kings” was none other than Wakatakiru himself, Yuuryaku Tennou. There may have been other missions.  There seems to be some discussion amongst the Liang dynasty records that may indicate greater contact with Japan, but again, we don't necessarily see that in the records themselves.  Furthermore, with the fractured nature of the various dynasties since the Han period, and the various conflicts on the peninsula and in the archipelago, it would be understandable if there hadn't been much direct diplomatic contact since about the time of Wakatakiru. And so it is a pretty big thing that we not only have an envoy around the year 608, but that there appears to be agreement for it in the Sui history—though there is one glaring mistake: in the Nihon Shoki they clearly say that they sent envoys to the “Great Tang”, and not the Sui.  However, this is fairly easily explained.  By the 8th century, as the records were being compiled, the Tang dynasty was, indeed, in control of the Chinese court.  In fact, the Tang dynasty was so admired by the Japanese of the day that even now the term “Karafu”, or “Chinese style”, uses the character for the Tang dynasty, rather than the Han.  On the one hand it seems as though the scholars of the 8th century would surely have known of the Sui dynasty coming before the Tang, but it is also understandable that anyone would have just thought of the successive courts as a single continuity.  Either way, I'll talk about the Sui dynasty, and it is in the Sui dynasty records that we find the corresponding description of this embassy. It starts on the 3rd day of the 7th month of 607.  The Chronicles tell us that Wono no Omi no Imoko was sent to the Sui court, taking along Kuratsukuri no Fukuri as an interpreter.  You may recall that the Kuratsukuri, or saddle-makers, claimed a descent from Shiba Tattou, himself from the continent.  It would make sense to take someone on this diplomatic exhibition who could actually speak the language or, failing that, read and write it - a peculiar function of the Chinese language, since the various dialects, though often mutually unintelligible, still use the same characters. Imoko, by the way, may have also had important connections, but in this case it was to the Soga.  We are told in the Nihon Shoki that Imoko was known in the Sui Court as “So Imko”, and the “So” character is the same as the first character in the name “Soga”.  It is possible that Imoko was, indeed, a Soga family member, and the name Wono no Omi may have come later.   Or it is possible that he was forgotten for some reason. On the Sui side, we are told that in the year 607 there was an envoy sent with tribute from King Tarashihoko, which may have been another name for Kashikiya Hime, or perhaps it was simply an error caused by the problems with attempting to record foreign names in Sinitic characters. The arrival of the embassy must have been something else, especially as they came upon the capital city.  Wen's capital city, that of Daxingcheng, was a new city, built just southeast of the ancient city of Chang'an, which was in a sad state of decay, despite hosting so many rulers over the centuries, including the Northern Zhou themselves.  Wen had laid out a new plan of a permanent, rectangular city, with the royal palace taking up the northern central district.  Buddhist and Daoist temples were scattered throughout the city.  The city itself was five to six miles a side, and so it would take time to truly build it out.  However, first the walls were set up, and then the palace area, so that Wen effectively moved into an empty city when he arrived in 583.  Many people were forcibly resettled, and members of the new royal family were encouraged to set up their own palaces, but it would take time to truly fill up—by the end of the Sui dynasty, and the beginning of the Tang, the city was still being built, and it wouldn't see its ultimate heyday as a vibrant urban capital until the Tang dynasty. And so when the Yamato delegation arrived in 608, they would have seen the impressive walls and the immense palace, but in all likelihood, much of the city was still being built, and there was likely construction on every block.  Nonetheless, the sheer size would have to have made an impression on them—nothing like this existed in the archipelago in the slightest. On the other hand, the Sui had their own curiosities about Yamato.  The history of the Sui, written only twenty to thirty years afterwards, starts out its account with a description of the Land of Wa.  Some of it is taken directly from the Wei histories, recounting what was previously known about these islands across the eastern sea—we talked about that back in episodes 11 to 13.  The Sui history summarizes these previous historical accounts, including mention of envoys that came over during the Qi and Liang dynasties—between 479 and 556—though little more is said. Then the Sui history mentions an envoy that is said to have arrived in the early part of the Sui—the Kaihuang era, between 581-600.  We are told that this was for a “King” whose family name was Ame and his personal name was Tarashihiko, with the title of Ohokimi—at least, assuming we are transliterating correctly, as the characters used have slightly different pronunciations.  That could easily be attributed to just mistranslations.  Even the family and personal name are familiar, but not exactly attributed in the Chronicles—though we have seen the elements elsewhere in the royal family, and it may be that they were also titles, of a sort.  Also, they mention a King, but that could also just be due to the fact that the Ohokimi was not a gendered title, and as such the Sui simply assumed a male ruler.  There is no evidence of this in the Chronicles for this, however it is said that at that time they looked into the ways of the Wa and they were told that “The King of Wa deems heaven to be his elder brother and the sun, his younger.  Before break of dawn he attends the Court, and, sitting cross-legged, listens to appeals.  Just as soon as the sun rises, he ceases these duties, saying that he hands them over to his brother.” This is likely a misunderstanding, once again, but it rings with some truth.  Even if we discard some of the legends about Amaterasu as later additions, there is plenty of linguistic and cultural evidence that the sun held a special place in Wa culture.  There is also the article in the new constitution about starting early to work that might just be referenced here. We aren't sure when, exactly, the Sui collected this information—though given that it was written within living memory of many of the events, a lot of the information is considered to at least be plausible, if perhaps a bit misunderstood at times. The Sui history specifically mentions the twelve court ranks—in fact, it is possible that the Chronicles, compiled in the 8th century, were actually referencingthis earlier history about the ranks, though we know that ranks continued in one way or another.  It also makes the comment that there were no regulated number of officials in each rank—that would certainly be the case later, and makes sense when the ranks also dictated how much of a salary that one could expect from the court.  Then, outside of the court they mention the “kuni”—the kuni no miyatsuko—and then claimed that each kuni no miyatsuko oversaw about 10 inaki, officials in charge of the royal granaries, who each oversaw 80 families.  It is doubtful that these numbers were that precise, but it gives an interesting concept of scale. The Sui history also tells us about other things that the Chronicles tend to leave out.  We are told that the men wore both outer and inner garments, with small (likely meaning narrow) sleeves.  Their footgear was like sandals, painted with lacquer, which sounds not unlike geta, which we do have evidence for going back into the Yayoi, at least, though this was only for the upper crust—most people just went barefoot, wearing a wide piece of cloth tied on without sewing. We do get a hint at the headgear that was instituted along with the court rank system, by the way, but only a glimpse.  We are told that it was made of brocade and colored silk and decorated with gold and silver inlaid flowers, which does correspond to some of what we know from the Chronicles. As for the women of Yamato, we are told that they arrange their hair on the back of the head, and they wear outer garments and scarves with patterns.  They have decorative combs of bamboo as well.  They also wore tattoos, as did the men.  Much of this, including the tattoos, accords with what we have evidence of in the Haniwa from the 6th century and later. For sleeping arrangements we are told that they weave grass into mattresses—possibly the origin of the later tatami that would originally just be woven mats but eventually turned into a type of permanent flooring.  For covers we are told they used skins lined with colored leather—a curious blanket, and one wonders if this was for everyone or just the upper crust. We are given some discussion of their weapons and armor, including their use of lacquered leather and the fact that they made arrowheads out of bone.  We also know they used metal, but bone was likely the more prevalent material, as losing a metal arrowhead was much more costly than losing a bone one. Interestingly we are told that, though there is a standing army, wars are infrequent—which may have been accurate in relation to what the Sui themselves had gone through and seen, since it seems like they were almost constantly fighting somewhere along their borders.  But Yamato was far from peaceful, and it is telling that the court was accompanied by music and displays of military might. As for the justice system, we talked about this a little bit in previous episodes, based on various punishments we've seen in the archipelago, though the Sui history gives us a slightly more direct description.  It claims that there were some high crimes punished by death.  Others were punished with fines, often meant to make restitution to the aggrieved.  If you couldn't pay you would be enslaved to pay for it instead.  They also mention banishment and flogging.  All of this is in line with some of what we've seen in the Chronicles, though it also seems like some of this may have also depended on other factors, including the accused's social status.  After all, not everyone had rice land that they could just turn over to wipe out their misdeeds. Then there were the various judicial ordeals.  We've mentioned this idea , with the idea that somehow the righteous would be protected from injury.  These included things like pulling pebbles out of boiling water, or reaching into a pot to grab a snake and hoping he doesn't bite you.  There are also various tortures designed to get one to confess. In discussing literacy, the Sui histories mention that the Wa have no written characters—and at this point, the writing would have been some form of Sinic characters, assuming one could read and write at all.  Instead, the Sui anthropologists said that the Wa used notched sticks and knotted ropes as a means of conveying messages.  How exactly that work, I'm not sure, but there are certainly cultures that we know used things like knotted rope for various math and conveying numbers, etc. In regards to religion, the Sui noticed that Buddhism had taken hold, but it had not gotten rid of other practices.  Thus we know they practiced forms of divination and had faith in both male and female shamans. In their free time, people would enjoy themselves.  On New Year's day, they would have archery tournaments, play games, and drink—the Sui said that it was very much like how they themselves celebrated. Coromorant fishing and abalone diving—well, diving for fish—are both noted already.  Again, these are activities that continue into the modern day. At dinner we are told that the people do not eat off of dishes or plates, but instead use oak leaves.  We've seen mention of this kind of practice, and that may have just been a particular ritual or ceremony that made its way back. Finally, there are the rituals for the dead.  We are told people wear white—white is often considered the color of death in Japan, even today.  They would have singing and dancing near the corpse, and a nobleman might lay in state—in a mogari shelter or temporary interment—for three years.  Certainly, we've sometimes seen it take a while, especially if the kofun isn't ready to receive the body, yet.  Commoners apparently would place the body in a boat which was pulled along from the shore or placed in a small palanquin—though what happens after that is somewhat of a mystery. The Sui envoys writing about this also apparently experienced an active period of Mt. Aso—or another mountain so-named—as they said it was belching forth fire from the rocks.  As we've mentioned, the archipelago is particularly active, volcanically speaking, so I'm not surprised that an envoy might have had a chance to get to know a little more about that first hand. Having described the country thus, the Sui Chronicles go on to describe the embassy that came over in the year 607.  According to the history as translated by Tsunoda Ryusaku and L. Carrington Goodrich, the envoy from Yamato explained the situation as such: “The King has heard that to the west of the ocean a Boddhisattva of the Sovereign reveres and promotes Buddhism.  Accompanying the embassy are several tens of monks who have come to study Buddhism.” This is great as we see some of the things that the Japanese scholars left out—that there were Buddhists on this mission.  For many, getting to the monasteries and temples of the Middle Kingdom was almost as good as making the trip all the way to India. Over all, the embassy appears to have been largely successful in their mission.  The ambassador, Imoko, came back with an envoy from the Sui, Pei Shiqing, along with twelve other individuals.  It is thought that this may have been the same embassy that then reported back to the court all of the various details that the later Sui history  captured. According to the Sui dynasty history, the embassy first headed to Baekje, reaching the island of Chiku, and then, after seeing Tara in the south, they passed Tsushima and sailed out in to the deep ocean, eventually landing on the island of Iki.  From there they made it to Tsukushi, and on to Suwo.  They then passed through some ten countries until they came to the shore.  Now, Naniwa no Kishi no Wonari had been sent to bring them to court and they had a new official residence erected for them in Naniwa—modern Ohosaka.  When they arrived, on the 15th day of the 6th month of the year 608, Yamato sent out thirty heavily decorated boats to meet them—and no doubt to make an impression as well.  They met them at Yeguchi, the mouth of the river and they were ensconced in the newly built official residence. Official entertainers were appointed for the ambassadors—Nakatomi no Miyatoko no Muraji no Torimaro, Ohohoshi no Kawachi no Atahe no Nukade, and Fume no Fumibito no Oohei.  Meanwhile, Imoko continued on to the court proper to report on his mission. Unfortunately, for all of the goodness that came from the whole thing, the trip had not been completely flawless.  The Sui court had entrusted Imoko with a letter to pass on to the Yamato court, but the return trip through Baekje proved… problematic, to say the least.  We are told that men of Baekje stopped the party, searched them, and confiscated the letter.  It is unclear whether these were Baekje officials or just some bandits, but the important thing was that Imoko had lost the message, which was a grave offense.  The ministers suggested that, despite all of his success, Imoko should be banished for losing the letter.  After all, it was the duty of an envoy to protect the messages between the courts at all costs. In the end, it was agreed that, yes, Imoko should be punished, but that it would be a bad look in front of their guests.  After all, he had just represented them to the Sui Court, and so Kashikiya Hime pardoned Imoko of any wrongdoing. A couple months later, on the 3rd day of the 8th month, the preparations had been made and  the envoys formally approached the palace.  There were met on the Tsubaki no Ichi road by 75 well-dressed horses—the Sui history says two hundred—and there Nukada no Muraji no Hirafu welcomed them all with a speech. After finally reaching the location of the palace, it was nine more days before the Sui envoys were formally summoned to present themselves and state their reason for coming.  Abe no Tori no Omi and Mononobe no Yosami no no Muraji no Idaku acted as “introducers” for the guests, announcing who they were to the court.  Then Pei Shiqing had the various diplomatic gifts arranged in the courtyard, and then presented his credentials to the court.  Then, bowing twice, he gave his own account of why he had been sent—he announced greetings from the Sui emperor, recognized the work of Imoko, and then provided an excuse that the emperor himself could not make it due to his poor health.  That last bit I suspect was a polite fiction, or perhaps an erroneous addition by the Chroniclers.  After all, it isn't like the Sui emperors were in the habit of just gallivanting off to an unknown foreign land—especially one across the sea. After delivering some polite niceties, Shiqing also provided a detailed list of all of the diplomatic gifts that they had brought. The dance that happened next is telling.  In order to convey Pei Shiqing's letter to the sovereign, it wasn't like they could just hand it.  There were levels of protocol and procedure that had to be observed, and so Abe no Omi took the letter up and handed it to Ohotomo no Kurafu no Muraji, who in turn placed it on a table in front of the Great gate where Kashikiya Hime could then get it.  This setup is similar to the later court, where only certain individuals of rank were actually allowed up into the buildings of the palace, whereas others were restricted to the ground. After that formal introduction, there was a month or more of parties for the envoys, until finally they had to return to the Sui court.  When they departed, they were sent with eight students and Imoko, who was bringing another letter back to the Sui Court.  The students were all scheduled to study various disciplines and bring the knowledge back to the Yamato court. But that wasn't quite so special, or at least we aren't given much more on the specifics of what the students brought back..  What really stands out in the Sui histories is the contents of the formal letter that Imoko was carrying, as it had a phrase that will be familiar to many students of this period of history, and which really connects across the Japanese and Sui histories, despite other inconsistencies.  It read: “The Son of Heaven in the land where the sun rises addresses a letter to the Son of Heaven in the land where the sun sets.  We hope you are in good health.” Or at least, that is how the Sui histories record it.  In the Nihon Shoki they say something similar, “The Emperor of the East respectfully addresses the Emperor of the West.”  Here, rather than using “Child of Heaven”, the author made use of the term “Tennou” when referring to the Yamato sovereign, and then different characters were used for the Sui emperor.  At the same time, that is one of the reasons that I give more credence to the Sui history. Of course, however you slice and dice this thing, there are some major airs being taken by the Yamato sovereign.  Thus it is no wonder that, when the Sui emperor heard this, he was displeased, to say the least, and he told his minister that the letter was discourteous and should never again be brought to his attention.  So that's a whole mood. The reason for this offense may be obvious, as the letter paints the sovereign of Japan as equal to the emperor of the Sui dynasty.  That was indeed a bold claim. As we mentioned towards the top of the episode, the Sui were just about at their zenith.  They had defeated their enemies, taken control of both the northern and southern regions, expanded to their south and north, and they were using their vast reserves on massive public works.  They were a large, established and still growing empire.  Comparatively Yamato had, what, 100,000 households?  No writing system.  They were eating off of oak leaves.  And yet they were taking on airs and claiming that they were equal to the Sui.  That had to garner more than a few eyerolls, and I really wonder at the temerity of the officer who presented it up the chain, especially as they would have seen what the Sui was really like—a reality that most of envoys to the Sui court would have seen firsthand. There is also the fact that they claim to be the land where the sun rises while the Sui are the land where the sun sets, which may have just been referencing east and west in a poetic fashion, but on another level it is almost as if they were talking about the rise of Yamato and the fall, or setting, of the Sui. I would note that we still don't see the term “Land of the Rising Sun”, or “Nihon”, used for the name of the country yet—one of the reasons I continue to refer to Yamato and not just “Japan”.  However, all of this is in keeping with the traditions of the Wa people as we know them—the sun was given a special place in their worldview, as demonstrated linguistically, and not just through the legends curated in the 8th century. By the way, this  exchange is mentioned in both the Sui History and the Nihon Shoki, but they place it in slightly different contexts.  According to the Sui History, this was one of the first things that envoys said, whereas the version in the Nihon Shoki it was actually sent with the second mission.  In either case, however, the content is relatively the same.  Certainly, as Japan continued to take on more and more trappings of the continental courts, they would eventually even take on the term Tennou—also read in Japanese as Sumera no Mikoto—to refer to the sovereign.  This is basically saying that the sovereign is, indeed, a Heavenly Son, and which they would come to translate as “emperor”, in English.  There would be other terminology and trappings that would reinforce this concept, which placed the sovereign of Japan in a position that at least locally seemed to be much more prestigious. Imoko came back from this last diplomatic mission and was well beloved—some later sources even suggest that he may have been promoted for his diplomatic efforts.  Oddly, however, we don't really hear more, if anything, about Imoko, and he fades back into the past. And so that covers much of the story of what Yamato was borrowing from the Sui and others during this period.  Next episode—well, I'm honestly not sure what we'll be covering next, as there is just so much going on during Kashikiya-hime's reign.  But stick around. Until next time, then, thank you for listening and for all of your support.  If you like what we are doing, tell your friends and feel free to rate us wherever you listen to podcasts.  If you feel the need to do more, and want to help us keep this going, we have information about how you can donate on Patreon or through our KoFi site, ko-fi.com/sengokudaimyo, or find the links over at our main website, SengokuDaimyo.com/Podcast, where we will have some more discussion on topics from this episode. Also, feel free to Tweet at us at @SengokuPodcast, or reach out to our Sengoku Daimyo Facebook page.  You can also email us at the.sengoku.daimyo@gmail.com.  And that's all for now.  Thank you again, and I'll see you next episode on Sengoku Daimyo's Chronicles of Japan.   

For more see: https://www.sengokudaimyo.com/podcast/episode-95 Rough Transcript Welcome to Sengoku Daimyo's Chronicles of Japan.  My name is Joshua and this is Episode 96: From the Land Where the Sun Rises. We are still talking about the reign of Kashikiya Hime, aka Suiko Tenno, from the late 6th to the early 7th century.  We've been covering discussions of the continental influences on the archipelago, especially as they adopted more and more continental practices—both religion and government.  This episode we are going to continue the discussion regarding Yamato's interactions, specifically a notably famous trip to the continent and Yamato's apparent assumption of equality between their ruler, the Ohokimi, and the Emperor of the Sui dynasty—the Son of Heaven.  We'll also touch on the changes Japan was adopting in their own government as a result of greater adoption of continental philosophy.  These are largely seen as a Sinification—a trend towards a more “Chinese” style system—but I want to emphasize that a lot of this was filtered through the lens of the states on the Korean peninsula: Baekje, Goguryeo, and Silla.  This is one of the reasons I hesitate to just call it “Chinese”, as Yamato was really blending aspects of several cultural influences, as well as adding their own spice to the sauce.   Hence, last episode we talked about Yamato's contact with the continent—specifically the Korean Peninsula—and the various diplomatic gifts, often put in terms of “tribute”, that came over.  Besides a small menagerie of exotic animals and Buddhist statues, there were learned monks and various books conveying continental teachings.  At the same time that Yamato was starting to experiment with a new, foreign religion—Buddhism—they began to experiment with other foreign concepts as well.  They had members of the court studying specific disciplines, and presumably passing those on to others.  I want to go more in depth into just what Yamato did and how they trans (Touch on the Rank System and the 17 Article Constitution once again) Now these 17 articles were almost all based on Confucian or Buddhist philosophy; clearly the Court was looking to the continent more and more for inspiration on how to govern, especially as it further expanded and solidified its grasp across the archipelago.  Up to this point, much of that innovation had come through the Korean peninsula, by way of Silla, Goguryeo, and, most prominently, their ally Baekje.  But no doubt they recognized that much of what was influencing those kingdoms had, itself, come from even farther away.  And so, this reign, the Chronicles record that Yamato once again sent envoys beyond their peninsular neighbors all the way to the Middle Country itself.  This is significant as they were making direct contact with the mighty empire, the source of so many of the philosophical and scientific innovations that Yamato was trying to adopt.  This wasn't the first time this had happened, of course—we know of the cases of state of Na contacting the Han court, and then Himiko of the Wa during the Wei period, as well as several missions immediately after Himiko's death.  We also know of the five kings of Wa who reached out to the Liu Song court, though the Chronicles themselves are often silent on actual embassies, making it hard to tell exactly which reigns that occurred in, though it is generally agreed that one of those “Five Kings” was none other than Wakatakiru himself, Yuuryaku Tennou. There may have been other missions.  There seems to be some discussion amongst the Liang dynasty records that may indicate greater contact with Japan, but again, we don't necessarily see that in the records themselves.  Furthermore, with the fractured nature of the various dynasties since the Han period, and the various conflicts on the peninsula and in the archipelago, it would be understandable if there hadn't been much direct diplomatic contact since about the time of Wakatakiru. And so it is a pretty big thing that we not only have an envoy around the year 608, but that there appears to be agreement for it in the Sui history—though there is one glaring mistake: in the Nihon Shoki they clearly say that they sent envoys to the “Great Tang”, and not the Sui.  However, this is fairly easily explained.  By the 8th century, as the records were being compiled, the Tang dynasty was, indeed, in control of the Chinese court.  In fact, the Tang dynasty was so admired by the Japanese of the day that even now the term “Karafu”, or “Chinese style”, uses the character for the Tang dynasty, rather than the Han.  On the one hand it seems as though the scholars of the 8th century would surely have known of the Sui dynasty coming before the Tang, but it is also understandable that anyone would have just thought of the successive courts as a single continuity.  Either way, I'll talk about the Sui dynasty, and it is in the Sui dynasty records that we find the corresponding description of this embassy. It starts on the 3rd day of the 7th month of 607.  The Chronicles tell us that Wono no Omi no Imoko was sent to the Sui court, taking along Kuratsukuri no Fukuri as an interpreter.  As you may recall, the Kuratsukuri, or saddle-makers, claimed a descent from Shiba Tattou, himself from the continent.  It would make sense to take someone who could actually speak the language or, failing that, read and write it.  This was a peculiar function of the Chinese language, since the various dialects, though often mutually unintelligible, still use the same characters. Imoko, by the way, may have also had connections, but in this case it was to the Soga.  We are told in the Nihon Shoki that Imoko was known in the Sui Court as “So Imko”, and the “So” character is the same as the first character in the name “Soga”.  It is possible that Imoko was, indeed, a Soga family member, and the name Wono no Omi may have come later.   Or it is possible that he was forgotten for some reason. In the Sui history, we are told that in the year 607 there was an envoy sent with tribute from King Tarashihoko, which may have been another name for Kashikiya Hime, or perhaps it was simply an error caused by the problems with attempting to record foreign names in Sinitic characters. According to the history as translated by Tsunoda Ryusaku and L. Carrington Goodrich, the envoy from Yamato explained the situation as such: “The King has heard that to the west of the ocean a Boddhisattva of the Sovereign reveres and promotes Buddhism.  Accompanying the embassy are several tens of monks who have come to study Buddhism.” This is great as we see some of the things that the Japanese scholars left out—that there were Buddhists on this mission.  For many, getting to the monasteries and temples of the Middle Kingdom was almost as good as making the trip all the way to India. Over all, the embassy appears to have been largely successful in their mission.  The ambassador, Imoko, came back with an envoy from the Sui, Pei Shiqing, along with twelve other individuals. According to the Sui dynasty history, they first headed to Baekje, reaching the island of Chiku, and then, after seeing Tara in the south, they passed Tsushima and sailed out in to the deep ocean, eventually landing on the island of Iki.  From there they made it to Tsukushi, and on to Suwo.  They then passed through some ten countries until they came to the shore.  Now, Naniwa no Kishi no Wonari had been sent to bring them to court and they had a new official residence erected for them in Naniwa—modern Ohosaka.  When they arrived, on the 15th day of the 6th month of the year 608, Yamato sent out thirty heavily decorated boats to meet them—and no doubt to make an impression as well.  They met them at Yeguchi, the mouth of the river and they were ensconced in the newly built official residence. Official entertainers were appointed for the ambassadors—Nakatomi no Miyatoko no Muraji no Torimaro, Ohohoshi no Kawachi no Atahe no Nukade, and Fume no Fumibito no Oohei.  Meanwhile, Imoko continued on to the court proper to report on his mission. Unfortunately, for all of the goodness that came from the whole thing, the trip had not been completely flawless.  The Sui court had entrusted Imoko with a letter to pass on to the Yamato court, but the return trip through Baekje proved… problematic, to say the least.  We are told that men of Baekje stopped the party, searched them, and confiscated the letter.  It is unclear whether these were Baekje officials or just some bandits, but the important thing was that Imoko had lost the message, which was a grave offense.  The ministers suggested that, despite all of his success, Imoko should be banished for losing the letter.  After all, it was the duty of an envoy to protect the messages between the courts at all costs. In the end, it was agreed that, yes, Imoko should be punished, but that it would be a bad look in front of their guests.  After all, he had just represented them to the Sui Court, and so Kashikiya Hime pardoned Imoko of any wrongdoing. A couple months later, on the 3rd day of the 8th month, the preparations had been made and  the envoys formally approached the palace.  There were met on the Tsubaki no Ichi road by 75 well-dress horses—the Sui history says two hundred—and there Nukada no Muraji no Hirafu welcomed them all with a speech. After finally reaching the location of the palace, it was nine more days before they were formally summoned to present themselves and state their reason for coming.  Abe no Tori no Omi and Mononobe no Yosami no no Muraji no Idaku acted as “introducers” for the guests, announcing who they were to the court.  Then Pei Shiqing had the various diplomatic gifts arranged in the courtyard, and then presented his credentials to the court.  Then, bowing twice, he gave his own account of why he had been sent—he announced greetings from the Sui emperor, recognized the work of Imoko, and then provided an excuse that the emperor himself could not make it due to his poor health.  That last bit I suspect was a polite fiction, or perhaps an erroneous addition by the Chroniclers.  After all, it isn't like the Sui emperors were in the habit of just flouncing off to an unknown foreign land—especially one across the sea. After delivering some polite niceties, Shiqing also provided a detailed list of all of the diplomatic gifts that they had brought. The dance that happened next is telling.  In order to convey Pei Shiqing's letter to the sovereign, it wasn't like they could just hand it.  There were levels of protocol and procedure that had to be observed, and so Abe no Omi took the letter up and handed it to Ohotomo no Kurafu no Muraji, who in turn placed it on a table in front of the Great gate where Kashikiya Hime could then get it.  This setup is similar to the later court, where only certain individuals of rank were actually allowed up into the buildings of the palace, whereas others were restricted to the ground. After that formal introduction, there was a month or more of parties for the envoys, until finally they had to return to the Sui court.  When they departed, they were sent with eight students and Imoko, who was bringing another letter to the Sui Court.  The students were all scheduled to study various disciplines and bring the knowledge back to the Yamato court. But that wasn't quite so special, or at least we aren't given much more on the specifics of what the students brought back..  What really stands out in the Sui histories is the contents of the formal letter that Imoko was carrying, as it had a phrase that will be familiar to many students of this period of history, and which really connects across the Japanese and Sui histories, despite other inconsistencies.  It read: “The Son of Heaven in the land where the sun rises addresses a letter to the Son of Heaven in the land where the sun sets.  We hope you are in good health.” Or at least, that is how the Sui histories record it.  In the Nihon Shoki they say something similar, “The Emperor of the East respectfully addresses the Emperor of the West.”  Here, rather than using “Child of Heaven”, the author made use of the term “Tennou” when referring to the Yamato sovereign, and then different characters were used for the Sui emperor.  At the same time, that is one of the reasons that I give more credence to the Sui history..  Of course, however you slice and dice this thing, there are some major airs being taken by the sovereign.  Thus it is no wonder that, when the Sui emperor heard this, he was displeased, to say the least, and he told his minister that the letter was discourteous and should never again be brought to his attention.  So that's a whole mood. The reason for this may be obvious, as the letter paints the sovereign of Japan as equal to the emperor of the Sui dynasty.  That was indeed a bold claim.  There is also the fact that they claim to be the land where the sun rises while the Sui are the land where the sun sets, which may have just been referencing east and west in a poetic fashion, but on another level it is almost as if they were talking about the rise of Yamato and the fall, or setting, of the Sui. I would note that we still don't see the term “Land of the Rising Sun”, or “Nihon”, used for the name of the country yet—one of the reasons I continue to refer to Yamato and not just “Japan”.  However, all of this is in keeping with the traditions of the Wa people as we know them—the sun was given a special place in their worldview, as demonstrated linguistically, and not just through the legends curated in the 8th century.  The Nihon Shoki mentions this letter, but not for this first Certainly, as Japan continued to take on more and more trappings of the continental courts, they would eventually even take on the term Tennou—also read in Japanese as Sumera no Mikoto—to refer to the sovereign.  This is basically saying that the sovereign is, indeed, a Heavenly Son, and which they would come to translate as “emperor”, in English.  There would be other terminology and trappings that would reinforce this concept, which placed the sovereign of Japan in a position that at least locally seemed to be much more prestigious. Imoko came back from this last diplomatic mission and was well beloved—some later sources even suggest that he may have been promoted for his diplomatic efforts.  Oddly, however, we don't really hear more, if anything, about Imoko, and he fades back into the past. And so that covers much of the story of what Yamato was borrowing form the Sui and others during this period.  Next episode—well, I'm honestly not sure what we'll be covering next, as there is just so much.  But stick around. Until next time, then, thank you for listening and for all of your support.  If you like what we are doing, tell your friends and feel free to rate us wherever you listen to podcasts.  If you feel the need to do more, and want to help us keep this going, we have information about how you can donate on Patreon or through our KoFi site, ko-fi.com/sengokudaimyo, or find the links over at our main website, SengokuDaimyo.com/Podcast, where we will have some more discussion on topics from this episode. Also, feel free to Tweet at us at @SengokuPodcast, or reach out to our Sengoku Daimyo Facebook page.  You can also email us at the.sengoku.daimyo@gmail.com.  And that's all for now.  Thank you again, and I'll see you next episode on Sengoku Daimyo's Chronicles of Japan.

The world cannot stop saying Cliterally, and Dominick Cliterally can't stop gushing about the Succession Finale! Sumera Syed joins Dom and Chris to tackle the infamously unfixable Lindsay Lohan. After two solid pitches, the team comes up with an idea that would shake the foundations of Netflix, Society, and even Judy Dench.You can find Sumera at @sumerathebaker.You can find Dom at dommentary.com.You can find Chris at @thechrisderosa.Write a review and let us know who you want us to fix! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In today's season 9 opening episode (100) of the EAT, CAPTURE, SHARE podcast, I'm celebrating 100 episodes of the podcast by answering YOUR food photography business, Instagram and food blogging questions! Questions include how to attract long-term clients, how to grow an Instagram audience in 2022 and LOTS more! Honestly, if you love the idea of growing your food photo and blogging business then this is an episode I know you won't wanna miss! Here's what else you can expect from today's episode...   I share how to start a blog and how to decide what content to post. I give my top tips for how to land more long-term food photography and food styling clients. I answer the question about how much to charge as a new or experienced content creator, whether you're in the US or Europe. I share my insights on how the current economic downturn might affect the rates that food photographers, food stylists and bloggers are able to charge. I give my best advice for how to stand out and attract clients, even if brands are using interns to create content instead of freelance photographers and influencers. I talk openly and honestly about being a woman of colour and racism in the food photography and food styling industries. I chat about how you can grow your Instagram following in 2022. I give my best advice for how to start your own Instagram Challenge.   LINKS MENTIONED: My book, Creative Food Photography is available HERE! It's for food photographers who want to find their own unique style and up level their photography. Find out more about my Fearless Focus Mastermind and Mentoring program for food photographers and food bloggers HERE Find out more about my online Foundation Food Photography and Food Styling course HERE My creative business challenge for food photographers and food content creators My free #eatcaptureshare Instagram food photography challenge Pricing your food photography work. Read more about it in this blog post HERE How to start a food business with Delish Vegan Doughnuts, Eat Capture Share Podcast episode number 2 How to make it as a food photographer, with Christall Lowe - Eat Capture Share Podcast episode number 36 Inspiration is everywhere, with Betty Binon - Eat Capture Share Podcast episode number 49 Sumera's Instagram Delish Vegan Doughnuts on Instagram Joy the Baker Two Red Bowls Find my Instagram HERE Find the full show notes HERE

In this week's episode of the Red Pill Revolution Podcast, we GO DEEP. We touch on everything from King Charles appointing Prince Andrew; An El Paso Teacher fired for promoting the term MAP, UFOs being sited and tracked over Ukraine, a nursing home apologies for bringing in a stripper, and even the ancient Sumerian Race and their unbelievable technological advances. Subscribe and leave a 5-star review! ----more---- Our website https://redpillrevolution.co/    Protect your family and support the Red Pill Revolution Podcast with Affordable Life Insurance. This is attached to my license and not a third-party ad!   Go to https://agents.ethoslife.com/invite/3504a now!   Currently available in AZ, MI, MO, LA, NC, OH, IN, TN, WV Email austin@redpillrevolution.co if you would like to sign up in a different state   Leave a donation, sign up for our weekly podcast companion newsletter, and follow along with all things Red Pill Revolution by going to our website: https://redpillrevolution.co    ----more----   Full Transcription      Welcome to the revolution. Hello and welcome to red pill revolution. My name is Austin Adams and thank you so much for listening today. I appreciate it so so much. We have some very fun and interesting things to talk about today. Some things about the Royal family on the backs of queen Elizabeth's death last week, some things about. I don't know, strippers at old folks homes. And then we will also talk about a little bit about UFOs, a little bit of everything today. So you are in for it. It's gonna be a great show. Thank you so much for listening. The first thing I need you to do before we jump into it is just go ahead and hit that subscribe button for me. All right. Takes five seconds of your day. It means the world to me. That's all I need you to do right now is hit the five star review button and subscribe takes five seconds. Like I said, if you're on apple podcast, Spotify, leave a review. If you are watching this on YouTube, go ahead and hit that like button wherever you're at. I appreciate you so much. And again, welcome to the revolution. We are going to jump right into it. Here are the articles we're going to discuss a nursing home has apologized after hiring strippers for their residents. . And we will discuss that. We actually have a video today, which you guys are in for a treat for. Um, there's some very, very happy old folks in this old folks home. And when I decide to put myself in one, many, many years from now, I may just have to figure out which one this one was, because it looks like they're having a great time. Um, the next one is discussing that prince, or I'm sorry, not no longer prince king, Charles himself is now, uh, seemingly going to a point prince Andrew into a high level position. And if you don't know anything about prince Andrew, you will in just a few minutes, there's a couple articles that we'll discuss on that. We are also going to talk about the Pakistan, former prime minister getting caught red handed, uh, with some documents. Now, normally I don't really care about the Pakistani former prime minister at all. Uh, but this was a, a pretty interesting one. So, um, we'll find out why he got caught red handed, uh, basically, um,  yeah. Basically putting, uh, documents out there during a legal case that didn't even exist. So we'll discuss that. We will also talk about El Paso, firing a teacher for going and calling pedophiles maps to their students and trying to convince them to do the same. So again, we will discuss all of that in a few more things, including UFOs and China, potentially finding a nuclear fusion fuel with limitless energy from the moon. All right. So lots of interesting stuff, stick around. Thanks for listening. Hit that subscribe button. If you didn't already, I forgive you, but if you don't do it now, I may not. All right. I forgive you, but just hit it. I appreciate it. Sincerely. All right, let's get. Welcome to red pill revolution. My name is Austin Adams. Red pill revolution started out with me realizing everything that I knew, everything that I believed, everything I interpreted about my life is through the lens of the information I was spoon fed as a child, religion, politics, history, conspiracies, Hollywood medicine, money, food, all of it, everything we know was tactfully written to influence your decisions and your view on reality by those in power. Now I'm on a mission, a mission to retrain and reeducate myself to find the true reality of what is behind that curtain. And I'm taking your ass with me. Welcome to the revolution. All right. Let's jump into it. Episode number 44 of the red pill revolution podcast. And I appreciate you more than, you know, the very first article that we are going to jump into today is going to be a nursing home. Apologizing, not sure why after hiring strippers for their residents. So we have heard of drag shows for infants and children, but what we have not heard of yet is strippers for old folks homes. and this is probably my favorite new video. There's a hilarious video making its round of a stripper, basically shaking her boobs  and doing all sorts of things in front of these old, old men and women in their mass. It's quite quite hilarious. So we will watch that in just a. But I do find it interesting, right? The, the, uh, drag show for children is such a hot topic. It seems like there was literally never a drag show for children. Right. Because it's a sexualized show until very, very recently. Um, so, and, and there's probably a very obvious reason why there's absolutely no reason children should be involved in drag shows, you know, but maybe that's me being crazy thinking that we shouldn't sexualize. Toddlers and infants, but who knows? So let's go ahead and watch this video here. It is quite hilarious of this nursing home debacle  and then we'll talk about some of the comments that came up in this, and then we'll move on to some more serious topics. But I thought we, you know, we'll start this one off light today. and I'll kind of talk you through what we are seeing in a, uh, you know, PG 13 fashion here. Although it's not, it's not that wild, you know, you can find it. It's not that crazy, but pretty hilarious stuff. All right, let's go ahead and pull this article or this video up. It seems like it's in a different country, but it's, uh, basically. This young woman, she looks like some type of, I don't know, I don't know if she's Asian or something, but they're speaking a different language and she's literally shaking her butt in front of these old folks on these old folks sitting in their wheelchairs. And there is just this man who is so excited to be there with holding this woman's boobs in her hands, hand. this is comical comical. Now I don't know why this isn't a thing. I think there's a company here. I, I don't know why this is not a thing already. There should absolutely be an entire stripper company. Designed to go to old folks homes. I don't know why we're like thinking that shouldn't be a thing. I don't know why these people feel like the need to apologize for hiring a stripper. Um, the only thing they should be hire, or the only thing they should be apologizing for is not hiring enough strippers. Cuz there was only one there and there's plenty of people to go around. Uh, they should absolutely bring in more people. Um, so , I don't know why they, they feel the need to do this. Now let's look through some of the comments here. Somebody says. Flips sake. They're old. They aren't dead. Yeah, of course. Why wouldn't these people enjoy themselves? You're on your way out. You might as well have a good time. Um,  let's see what somebody else said. This is coming from Reddit, Reddit slash face Palm, and somebody said, are we face palming for the apology? The hiring is exemplary.  uh, the next comment says maybe next time, mail strippers for the ladies too. Maybe that's what they forgot and why they have apologized.  all right. I think that's enough on that topic, but I think it's awesome. 100%. I am absolutely behind the strippers at old folks homes, way, way more than I am behind the children going to drag shows. Right. We see all these like horrific videos of, of literal children going to drag shows and giving money to these men. And in 90% of the time at these drag shows, they are highly unhealthy. And, and must we say overweight, and even in some cases, a Dr. May call them obese, but majority of the time it's obese obese men who are shaking the, what they did not have given to them by God, in front of children, asking them for money for sexual acts in front of. It's like literally one of the most horrific things. And like I said earlier, we didn't see that literally a year ago. We didn't see it at all. There was no drag shows, you know, shaking of, uh, you know, butts in front of children that was found to be acceptable a year ago. It's literally so baffling to me how this even became a conversation that we need to have. Um, and everybody who attends these with their children should absolutely have CPS called in them. Although there's another conversation about whether CPS is literally just designed to traffic, children for profit. Um, I heard somewhere that each child that they actually take away from the children ends up being like a hundred thousand dollars or Mo like it, it might have even been like a million. Um, every time CPS takes a child away from their family, they make money off of it from the, the country, from the state, from the federal government or the state government. They're actually profiting from taking children from their parents. And, you know, we went through a whole, you know, the whole vaccination thing. We had to look at it. Luckily, we're in a state here where they have exemptions for children, surprisingly enough, for in the state that I'm in, but they do, they have exemptions. They even have philosophical exemptions for vaccination, but there has been several, several cases. I did a ton of research on it when we decided not to give our children, the COVID vaccine. Um, for many, many reasons, the first being, it's not a vaccine, um, it's mRNA gene therapy, which has never been done before, you know, do your own research on that and make your own decisions for your own children. Um, but with my children's history and everything else, we decided not to do it. So we had to go and actually physically research what could happen if the state decided to come after us for that and have come to find out we fall under exemptions. Really nice to be in the state. I would never move to a state where that's not the case because they've actually, I looked at all of the laws in our state and I looked at all of the previous legal proceedings in cases against parents for not vaccinating. And there was like nine cases in the last hundred years or 70 years when this became a law where they attempted to do so now luckily a majority of those cases, they did not win and the parents actually ended up winning the case. Um, but just tells you how far the state is willing to go to profit from stealing children from their parents. It's horrible. So, you know, do a little bit of research on that. And I, I think it's, again, worth an episode, almost diving into what CPS actually is, what majority they go after, because it's a lot of times it's directly affecting minority communities, disproportionate. Um, you know, but I digress. So let's go ahead and move on from our nursing home strippers and we'll move into  the Royals family situation this week, uh, queen Elizabeth died. If you were hiding under a rock this week, or you're listening from the future in a time machine. Now, listening back, this is, uh, Wednesday, September 14th, 2022, that this is episode is happening and the, uh, queen died last week after almost 70 years, Ofra allowing prince Charles to become king Charles. Now some of the controversy that's coming up from that is that king Charles now, uh, you know, is now looking to so, so king Charles is now going to appoint prince Andrew to step in for him first, if he is ill or out of the country. That's right. The same prince Andrew, it says who was a close friend of Jeffrey Epstein and used $12 million of tax based income. To settle a sexual assault case with Virginia guff, the same Virginia guff, who was at the Galea Maxwell trial testifying directly. Right. You know that one. So king Charles is going to appoint a literal pedophile to potentially step in from now. We'll actually look into what that means. Um, and, and what the actual title is that he'll be getting. Um, but we'll read some of the comments here. It says he was already a counselor to his mom, queen Elizabeth II. The Regency act of 1937, decides who can be counselors. Apparently there's not a clause that has to do with, you know, paying off children for doing illegal sexual acts on them, you know, and being part of international sex trafficking rings. Maybe that should be a clause. I don't know who am I, although if you go and read the Ashley Biden journal, uh you'll know that. Our royalty, our princes and princes, our presidents and their family are not also immune to these types of acts. Um, but it goes on to say that three of them are non working Royals. Um, you guys need new legislation, so prince Andrew or prince, and can replace Peto prince. Now princess Anne is a, uh, somebody who goes on and say for real princess, Anne is a G does a lot of low profile Royal's work, charity work, zero scandals, not a big spender. Um, I could be propaganda by the news, but she seems humble and hardworking. I think she may have even been the one who was, uh, allowed to stand beside the princess, um, in one of these proceedings for like one of the very first times. Um, but quite interesting. Uh, don't really know why a king of a nation. Potentially put a pedophile in the possession of power, but you know, once you find out that maybe potentially majority of them are culprits in this type of thing, uh, you know, it starts to be much more believable. Now this article goes on to say that king Charles II appoints prince Andrew in new important role. And another article says that prince Andrew can still be deputized for king as counselor of state, but princess Anne can't under new rules. And then, um, we'll go ahead and jump into one of those articles here. So it goes on to say that king, uh, king Charles I third ascended the throne after his late mother queen Elizabeth, the second passed away at her country estate in bald morale Scotland. The 73 year old was officially announced as the nation's new sovereign last Saturday, September 10th. And following his proclamation, the new head of state was supposedly appointed his younger brother, prince Andrew as counselor of state. Robert Peston journalist and political editor for ITV news, posted a thread of tweets explaining the situation. And he says the Monarch points, five counselors of state to stand in for him when he is unwell or out of the UK, Peston began, they are his spouse. Plus the top four in secession to the crown who are age 21 or over these include prince Andrew and his daughter, princess Beatrice. It says that, uh, but not prince and who is probably the most widely respected in all of the Royal family. Many would say, this is not, especially since the 2013 secession of the crown act ended Premo, gen premature. Not sure what that is though. Um, only for those born after 2011, uh, interesting. He says it continues that. So if king Charles were incapacitated, Andrew would step in as king. Not Anne. He ended his thread with the question. Do you think most British people would approve? I would certainly hope not says taken to Twitter. Many users shared their answers to passions questions. One responded, I most certainly would become a Republican under those circumstances. No way would I accept Andrew as a standin for the king? This is nuts. A second person wrote in his first week as king Charles has had two hissy fits about pens, sacked dozens of his staff at Clarence house. And now is rehabilitating prince nons. Good call is your majesty. Yeah, I saw him do that, where he was like sitting there signing documents and like pissed that there was some stuff on the table and like waved in somebody else because how dare he have to move the King's hand to move a, you know, pen off of a desk. Um, it goes on to say that a third waited or wants to wait for an outcome tweeting. Let's see what the actual outcome is. I don't think people will stomach Andrew being in that line. I'm pro monarchy. I may be, it may be a legal glitch or point of clarification may be needed, but certainly needs to be changed. Andrew had also, uh, previously served as this Queen's counselor of state, along with king Charles Prince William and prince Harry. Hmm. Um, so who better to take on the throne  than a potential Jeffrey Epstein associated pedophile literally paid off Virginia guff in a settlement claim during, uh, a legal proceeding to hush hush, the conversation surrounding him sexually assaulting a minor. Hmm. Now that could lead us into our next conversation, which, you know, would be a little bit deeper than that, about this, you know, whole map situation, which we'll get into here in a minute. Um, but let's see if there's any more substance to these articles. I don't know anything about this princess Anne. Um, but it sounds like, you know, maybe she's the one who a lot of people are rooting for, or that other person said maybe I'm being propaganda. You know, I like that word propaganda  that seems like it's a, a very fitting word in these types of situations. Um, but how terrifying is that? That literally not only the king of England, but you know, seeing over Canada, seeing over Australia, seeing over, you know, 14 different Commonwealth, uh, realms is what they referred to it as, um, would potentially be prince Andrew also known as PTO Andrew, because as we've stated, he's a pedophile. I don't know. Quite terrifying. What a horrific PR move by, you know, during all of this. Now I did see something about king Charles. I, I just can't say that seriously, king Charles, I feel like I'm in a Disney movie. It seems so bizarre that we have Kings and Queens and princesses and, you know, Royal family, you know, all based on blood lines. That's the, that's the weird thing about the Royal family is it's literally all based on bloodline. You cannot move your way into a position of power. It's literally a Royal bloodline. And we talked about this an episode ago, where if you go back far enough, according to these, you know, conspiracy theories, you know, even people like Cleopatra. And, uh, there's like basically 12 Royal families that have had these bloodlines go down and down for generations. There's a CIA document about it, which is quite quite interesting. Um, so I'll have to check that out at some point there's like a 217 page book that is, uh, put into the cia.gov. Documents, you can go to Google right now, or even better go to brave search right now and type in CIA Royal bloodlines, FOA, OIA, freedom of information act. And you will find the document that I'm discussing here. Anyways, do some research on that. Happy to discuss it with you All right. Let's move on. Dr. Fauci and ran Paul and here is the clip, uh, but she's had the flu for 14 days. Should she get a flu shot? Well, no. If she got the flu for 14 days, she's as protected as anybody can be. Cuz the best vaccination is to get infected. And if not, if she really has the flu, if she really has the flu. Now, what this is, is this is ran Paul grilling, Dr. Fauci very recently regarding this, like today, I believe it's today. He's showing him on an iPad, the, to his own statements from like a few years ago, saying these things about the flu. Okay. So take that into consideration. When you're listening to this vaccination is to get infected yourself and, uh, but she's had the flu for 14 days. Should she get a flu shot? Well, no. If she got the flu for 14 days, she's just protected as anybody can be. Cuz the best vaccination is to get infected yourself and not get it. If she really has the flu, if she really has the flu, she definitely doesn't need a flu vaccine. If she really has the flu, she should not get it again. No, she doesn't need it because the, it it's the BA it's the most potent vaccination is getting infected yourself. So when we look at this, we wonder, you know, why you seem to really embrace basic immunology back in 2004 and how you, or why you seem to reject it now. And as a matter of fact, Reuter's fact check looked at that and said, Fauci, 2004 comments do not contradict his pandemic shame, actually words don't lie. If you look at the words behind me, we can go over them a little bit at a time. She doesn't need it because the most potent vaccin vaccination is getting infected yourself. It is true. It is true Senator. It is a very potent. Way to protect. But when you're trying to tell us that kids need a third or a fourth vaccine, are you including the variability or the variable of previous infection in the studies? No, you're not. So what I love about that is the fact that Dr. Fauci is just shaking in this piece of paper in his hand, coming from Reuters, like Dr. Fauci, aren't you Mr. Science, aren't you the only person who knows about science in this whole world, didn't you claim to be the, what did they say? If you question Dr. Fauci, you question science itself, like aren't you, the guy, not Reuters, not some random journalist who decided to, you know, try and make the world believe that there three year old needs another vaccination to be safe from a, a thing that literally doesn't even exist today. That, that the CDC itself said, you don't even need the quarantine, even if you have it. Right. But you're sitting there trying to justify it. And not only trying to justify it like Dr. Fauci, do you know that this is not. Facebook jail court. This is literally Senate. This is a Senate hearing, not the hearing on Facebook's fact checking. Right. He literally brought the fact that he brought that piece of paper with him to shake in front of the court. The fact that he did that and said, well, Reuters actually says a journalist with no experience in this says that you are wrong. Like you, you said it with your own words. How can you sit here in front of us and say that Reuters is going to like, um, you know, actually Reuters said that what I meant there is different from what I actually said, no, justify your position. Maybe, maybe you should back it up, not utilize Reuters in a fact checker. Like that's how far off we've gotten. That's how 1984 Orwellian we've gotten is now that somebody's going to sit in front of the Senate and utilize a journalist. Article to try and justify their own statements. So they don't have to back it up. And they're gonna use these like abusive, uh, tactics done by these journalistic companies like Reuters to, to try and Gaslight you into thinking that, oh, I, you know, Reuters knows what I meant, not, not myself. So I'll let them explain it. You know, it's like, no, literally you used your own words there. Like it it's, it's so crazy to see that he went on to, to use Reuters of all things to justify, not even backing it up himself. Like he's literally a, according to him, a scientist. And he can't even justify his own position on a statement that he made of with his own words, saying that you do not need a booster. You don't need a vaccine if you got it, because that's the best protection that you can get is actually getting it right. And not taking that into consideration when you are actually deciding to give children experimental drugs. Right. It's it's so, so wild to see that. But I love the fact that Fauci was shaking on camera. I love that. It makes me feel so warm inside just to know that he was so uncomfortable that his body could not even handle it there. And, and then the  other thing that I want to talk about, and, and I'll talk, touch on this just super, super briefly is that there was a clip going around of. Of an employee from Chick-fil-A employee, a Chick-fil-A employee took down this guy that was committing, like trying to steal the keys of this woman who had this children in her car. If you haven't seen it yet, it's gonna start making its rounds over the next few days. It's it's a Chick-fil-A employee who just jumped at this guy, like completely when he tried to like steal this woman's car with her baby in it, and just like threw him to the ground, stood on top of him and just, you know, my pleasure to him. could you just imagine him whispering that in his ear as he took them to the ground? Just amazing. Unbelievable. Um, but you know, I digress now, the very next. Is going to be Pakistan's former prime minister, Noah Sharif's family have produced documents to prove innocence concerning ownership of properties in London. The documents were signed in 2006, but the Kalibri font used in the document was released in 2007. So basically, uh, the document was dated 2006. And the font that was used in a document was 2007. So it completely showed that he fabricated this document. So we'll get a little bit more context here and then we'll talk about it. Um, it goes on, uh, to say that in July, 2018, um, three members of the family were fined and sentenced to jail Nawaz for 10 years, Miriam for seven. And her husband captains Dar for one year in the event, field department's case, as they could not show that the posh London property had been bought legitimately while Nawaz was sentenced for owning assets beyond income, the other two were held guilty for AB Bement and not cooperating with the prob agency. It was in this case that Miriam had presented a trust deed dated February, 2006 in Microsoft's Calibri font, which became commercially available only in 2007 Noah and his kin were jailed, but in September of 2018, the Islam bad high court ordered their release in suspended their sentence pending final adjudication for the, um, of the appeals against it. Hmm. So there is your. Breakdown  of why we are even discussing a former prime minister of Pakistan. Now, a few of the comments that you'll find on this thread here are a little funny that somebody says, that's why I always stick with times new Roman. Yeah. Just in case you find yourself in a court settlement and you don't want to have to deal with a, you know, great lawyer finding out that the font that you used pre or postdated the document that you signed  or forged even better. Um, . Um, pretty, pretty wild. You know, what, what, what hot water you must find yourself in there to legitimately use font. Like how stupid would you feel right to know that you made that big of a mistake, right. And how easy is it to just, just use time, new Roman, you don't have to get fancy here, guys. We don't need your Colibri. We don't need your comic Sams. We don't need any of that times. New Roman all the way across, you're safe from lawyers coming after you for utilizing the wrong font.  all right. So I found that to be interesting. And let's see if there's anything else of note in here. Um, so somebody says, so that's what good lawyers are for. Yes. That is exactly what good lawyers are for finding out that the person used the wrong. Interesting. All right. Anyways, I won't stick around on that one. I just found that to be quite, quite interesting now on the backs of the prince Charles or king Charles situation, let's go ahead and discuss this. There was an Al Paso teacher who was fired over, telling their students to use maps instead of the word pedophile. Um, for a comment in the classroom that touches off a firestorm says Fox news. We'll go ahead and we'll actually listen to this here. Uh, but we'll listen to where she actually says that to him. And this article even goes as far as showing, um, what the husband commented on a thread in a local Facebook group, which I found to be interesting too. So here is the article. It says Al Paso teachers firing over pedophiles comment in classroom launches, a firestorm response. It goes on to say that El Paso's independent school district board of trustees said the allegation is being investigated thoroughly. An El Paso teacher in Texas was informed of her proposed termination after telling students to call pedophiles, minor attracted persons, according to the city's school district. But some witnesses say her remarks were taken out of context. Now she literally says you shouldn't call them pedophiles. It's O you, we shouldn't make fun of them just because they wanna have sex with a five year old. She literally says to a high school student it's wild. It goes on to say that in an 18, second clip shared on TikTok, the Franklin high school teacher identified as the El Paso teachers Associa, uh, by the El Paso teachers association as Amber Parker, she'll never have a job again, um, can be heard telling students that they're not allowed to label individuals as pedophiles. She reportedly made the comment during a lesson on the play, the crucible. We're not gonna call them. That Parker said in the video, we're gonna call them maps, minor attracted persons. So don't judge people just because they want to have sex with a five-year-old. She says, what in the world kind of world are we coming to? We'll listen to the video in just a second, but it says first came the suspension. Then El Paso's independent school district board of trustees unanimously voted to fire Parker following her remarks on the evening of August 29th, 2022, the El Paso independent school district was made aware of a classroom situation. Impromptly initiated an investigation. Um, after a thorough investigation was conducted on September 6th, 2022, during a special board meeting, the board of trustees approved a decision to notify a Franklin high school teacher of proposed termination. The process will continue in accordance with the Texas education code, any allegation and potential misconduct is investigated thoroughly. And the safety of our students is the top priority as this is a personal matter, no further information will be shared at this time. So it goes on to talk about, um, some students were saying that it was taken out of context and then it gives what her husband actually said. Um, but let's go ahead and listen to this clip. It's again, it's 18 seconds long. And we'll see what this teacher had to say about maps. What? Stop it, Diego. Yeah. We're not gonna call them that. We're gonna call them maps. No mono attracted persons. No. So don't judge people just cuz they wanna have sex with a five year old. Oh, call . That was the perfect cut. You hear the guy go? What the fuck?  that's wild now. Thank the Lord that we're seeing retribution in this case. This is exactly what needs to happen across the board. And thankfully it didn't have to come to school board meetings in this, in this situation. Right? A lot of these situations have come to school board meetings, right? The sex books in children's libraries. Right. We've seen many, many videos about, uh, parents going in speaking up against those videos. Um, there's some crazy, crazy books that they're putting in children's libraries talking literally about sodomy and about sexual positions to five and six year olds in elementary schools. It's horrific, but thankfully, thankfully it didn't have to come to this case, at least as far as I know, it seems as if this school board caught it right away and, you know, surprised surprise they did it in Texas now. Um, I don't see how any of that could have been taken out of context. You can't say, you know, so don't judge people just because they won't to Hey of six, we had the five year old. Yeah, I'm gonna judge you. I'm gonna judge you and I'm gonna do way worse than that to you. If it's somebody that I know I'm gonna do far, far more to you than judge you. Yeah, dude, I'm not even gonna get into it cause that's called implication, but horrific, horrific thing to say, and to say it to an entire class of children to say it to an entire group in a high school setting, what kind of precedent is that setting? You're literally talking to minors saying it's okay. It, it, it's not only okay, but don't even judge those people for doing that to a child for literally putting the child in a position where they're going to be hurt worse than anything you could possibly imagine giving so much trauma for the rest of their lives that they're gonna have to deal with and unpack in a way that somebody who didn't deal with that could never have to imagine, could never have to imagine. And she's sitting in front of an entire school or an entire class of children saying that this should be acceptable and they shouldn't be judged. Not only that, but we're not even gonna use this term in case we hurt their little pedophile feelings. Like what in the world now, um, it goes on to say that the school district board of trustees voted to fire Parker following her remarks on the evening, uh, the El Paso school district was made aware of a classroom situation and promptly initiated an investigation. This is coming from the district's chief communications officer who told Fox news digital after a thorough investigation was conducted on Jan, uh, on September 6th, during a special board meeting, the board of trustees approved a decision to notify the teacher of proposed proposed to termination. The process will continue in accordance with the Texas education code, any allegation and potential misconduct. We already talked about that. Moving on, some students went on to say that her words were taken out of context. The teacher was expressing. This says how it was ridiculous, how they, how we might not be able to call people pedophiles that we will probably have to start calling them maps because is offensive to them. The class agreed. That's not what it sounded like now, if that is what it is, maybe you shouldn't be saying that in a group of high school students. Um, but if you are being sarcastic and then following that clip by saying, yeah, this is disgusting. This is gross. What they're doing, you know, we're absolutely going to call these people pedophiles and we're not gonna give into the woke ideology that is saying that we have to change the terms that we're using to describe the literal worst people in the world, doing the worst act in the world with the proper term for doing so and fear of you hurting their feelings, if that is the case. And she was being sarcastic. Yeah. It's definitely a distasteful joke. Should she lose her job for a distasteful, sarcastic remark? No, but if she is sitting here in front of a class of high school students protecting pedophiles and telling minors that they should also do the same, right? Literally the people that pedophiles go after minors in this case, um, Now it says that Daniel call vice president of El Paso independent school district board noted that while the lesson plans are approved by administrators, Parker appeared to stray from it in the particular class call had previously offered Parker. The benefit of the doubt saying the video had appeared to omit some important context and that it seemed Parker was only pretending to advocate the position. Now it did seem like she had some tonality there that seemed a little sarcastic, but I'm not gonna be the one to protect her update on my last post, after hearing from some of the students that were in the class, including my own nephew, I believe now that the teacher had appeared to be promoting and normalizing pedophilia was pretend, uh, I believe now that the teacher that appeared to be promoting in normalizing pedophilia was pretending to advocate a position. She didn't actually believe in, in order to challenge the students in preparation for them reading the play, the cruc. The video that many of us saw was missing. The important context. I regret the negative attention that the situation is brought to the teacher and wish her well. I'm told she is a great educator, but he ultimately voted in favor of firing her saying any reasonable person that heard what the seven trustees heard would've voted to terminate Amber Parker. Now Parker's husband. Jason said that Parker's comments were made to challenge students. Mr. Daniel call. I happen. The sick, the sick, what Mr. Daniel call, I happened to be the husband of the teacher in question Parker road on Facebook, I can tell you that we were shaken to our core about these accusations. It is both scary and disturbing that ANED 18. Second clip could destroy a 30 year career when taking completely out of context, she ex is exemplary as a teacher and truly cares about the students. Needless to say, we have spent many sleepless nights because of this cruel release to social media of the 18 seconds. We pray that you and the rest of the board will see this for what it is and not allow the edited video to destroy an innocent woman, her career, and her family in the process. I want to thank you personally for the updated post to begin to write this wrong. So it says that controversial classroom moments have been captured across the country. In recent years, driving parents to school, board meetings, demanding more of a say in their children's education. Um, Let's look at some of the comments here that says, this is a big problem with society, anything, and everything can be manipulated, um, input online or in the media to be the opposite of the actual facts. And once it is out, any correction, um, or apologies are buried and people are left with false impressions of circumstances. Uh, it also says that, um, want to know what's wrong with education today. After speaking with students and witnesses, I have come to believe that the teacher was being satirical and not expressing a view she held, but rather the opposite. I hear she is a great teacher, da, da, um, okay. That doesn't give us much information at all. Um, so it also says, so it is illegal to help a map with a cellulose nitrate and nitroglycerin assisted copper CLA PB projectile traveling at two times the speed of sound striking them with the frontal bone exiting the exci the bone, or is that still murder? Oh, I think that's called a gun.  um, interesting. All right. Anyways, so. This is, this is, this is, you know, good that these headlines are starting to lead in this direction. Right? Good. That we're starting to see pushback from not only the parents going to parent meetings, but also the school boards going in realizing the pushback that they're gonna have in these situations. Now, if this is a case where that teacher was being sarcastic, poor taste, poor timing, let's not even talk to children about the idea of normalizing pedophilia in the classroom. Obviously, you know, not the right way to go about that. Um, but should she be fired for having a sarcastic remark talking about maps? Eh, I don't know. But if she's saying that, you know, the, the sentence alone, maybe you shouldn't be talking about, you know, what did she say? So don't judge people just because they want to have sex for a five year old or with a five year old. Yeah. That's not funny. That's not a joke. That's not sarcasm. That's not that's wrong time and place. If you wanna do that at a bar and played devil's advocate on an argument, you know, you deserve to get ripped apart by whoever you're doing that with. Maybe you don't need to lose your job over it being sarcastic on that note. But in this case, don't talk to children about not judging people who wanna have sex with a five year old. Right. Anyways, now, Again, I think it's a positive thing that this is coming up. I think it's a positive thing that the school board is pushing back immediately. Not waiting for parents to come to school, board meetings, calling an emergency meeting over this because this got millions and millions and millions of views. Um, but anyways, let's go ahead and move on. But before I do that, I need you to do one thing for me. And what I need you to do is if you didn't hit that subscribe button just tipity tap it. There's not very many things you can do in your day to get good karma. It's gonna come back around. I promise you, your day's gonna get better. You're gonna feel just lighter when you move around, you know, when you're going to work, you're on your way to work. Your day's just gonna work out better if you just hit that subscribe button. All right. If you're already subscribed, I appreciate you. So. Hit that five star review button. All right, leave a nice review. Write something in the comment section, whatever it is, write a five star review. Even if it's just five words helps me get up in the rankings, helps more people get the message out on these certain topics and get a normalized view on some of the craziness that is happening in the world. This is not Fox news. This is not CNN. This is just a guy standing here, ball sitting here, um, drinking a little bit of whiskey and talking to you about my opinions. So leave a five star review. Um, again, I appreciate your head over to the website. Red pill, revolution dot C o.com is for losers head over there. Right now you can sign up for subst, which gives you all of the articles, um, all of the videos. And, uh, if you don't see it, check your spam folder. All. Um, anyways, go ahead and head over there right now you can sign up for the subst stack. You'll get all of the articles free to your inbox. You'll get the full video episode, full audio podcast directly in your inbox every single week, every single episode, and the, uh, next episode we're getting, or the one after that is going to be another interview. And I'm really excited about it. So make sure you stick around for that. Go head over there right now. Red pill, revolution.co, and lastly, but not loosely  you are going to die. I'm sorry to be the one to tell you. I'm sorry to be the one to break it to you, but you're gonna die. And when you die, anything that you owe, including your home, your credit card. Your car payments, all of that taxes, all of that's going to be left to your spouse, all of that debt. Then if it's not your spouse, it's your grandchildren. And if it's not your grandchildren, it's your children. And if it's not your children, it might be some random guy that you never met. That is just, you know, Somehow related to you that the government decides to go after. So what you need to do is you need life insurance. And if you don't have life insurance already, when I became a father, I am a father of three beautiful children. And when I became a father, it helped me to realize my mortality. I was never going to die before I had children. At least I never worried about it. Didn't affect me. Right.  because when I die, it's, it's, it's done. It's over. But now I have an extension of my being on this world. I will live on forever to Val hella I go. But when I go, I do not wanna be the one to leave my children with debt. I do not wanna leave my wife with debt, right? I want to leave them a legacy and you can do that by going to red pill, revolution.com, hitting the menu button at the top, left and signing up for some life insurance. You're not gonna get any phone calls. That's the biggest problem with the life insurance industry and the health insurance industry. If you ever dealt with it, it's a pain in the, as it's the worst thing in the world. Whenever you put your number in the. This isn't gonna happen. You can sign up directly online. You don't have to talk to me. You don't have to talk to anybody. All right. We're currently in nine states. If you're not in one of those states, go ahead and send me an email. I will literally get the license just to help you get life insurance. Okay. Send me an email. Austin red pill, revolution.co all would love to help you out. All right, let's move on. But again, head over there right now. Sign up, subscribe. Five star review, everything I just said. Go ahead and do it. I love ya. I love ya. All right, let's move on. The next article that we're gonna discuss here is going to be Ukraine's astronomers. Say that there are tons of UFOs over Kiev during the war with Russia, wild stuff. If you haven't heard about. This is an article from vice and it says Ukraine's airspace has been busy this year. That's the nature of war, but scientists in the country are looking to the skies and seeing something that they even didn't expect. Inordinate number of UFOs, according to a new pre-print paper published by Kiev's main as astronomical observation in coordination with the C's national academy of science. Say that three times fast. Uh, let's try it. Um, Kiev's main astronomical observation.  I said it wrong the first time. Astronomical observa, astronomical observatory in coordination, astronomical observatory in coordination with the country's national academic. Society of science. The paper does not specifically address the war, but in the United States, the Pentagon has long hinted, speculated and warned that some UFOs could be advanced technology from foreign military, specifically China and Russia, though. It hasn't been really given any evidence that this is actually the case. The Ukraine's paper is particularly notable because it is not showing that science has continued to, uh, to occur during this war, but also explains that there has been a lot, a lot of sightings. We see them everywhere. The researcher said we observe a significant number of objects whose nature is not clear. The paper is titled unidentified, aerial phenomenon, one observations and events come from observations made by NAS main astronomical observatory in Kiev, in a village south of Kiev called VIN. RKA. According to the papers authors, the observator took on the job of hunting for UFOs as an independent project because of the enthusiasm around the subject. Yeah. Interested. You got my interest. It goes on to say that it describes a specific type of UFO. The researchers call Phantoms. That is an object that is completely black body that does not emit and absorbs all of the radiation falling on it. The researchers also observed that the UFOs that seeing are so fast that it's even hard to take pictures of them. The eye does not fix phenomenon lasting less than one 10th of a second. The paper said it takes four tenths of a second to recognize an event. Ordinary photo and video recordings will also not even capture. The UAPs to detect UAPs. You need a to fine tune, the equipment, shutter speed frame rate, and dynamic range. Wow. So video cameras, recordings, photos, and even your eyes cannot see the UFOs that are flying across Kiev right now. And there's an astonishing number of them. It says wild. So the researchers did just that using two media monitoring stations in Kiev, in Veka, we have developed a special observation technique taking into account the high speeds of the observed objects. The paper said the exposure time was chosen so that the image of the object did not shift significantly. During ex exposure. The frame rate was chosen to take into account the speed of the object in the field of view of the camera in practice. The exposure time was less than one millisecond and the frame rate was no less than 50 Herz. Not sure what that means. Not a photographer. The scientist divided the phenomenon they observed with two into two different categories. Cosmics and PTO. We note that cosmics are luminous objects brighter than the background of the sky. We call these ships names of birds, swift Falcon, and Eagle. The paper said Phantoms are dark objects with contrast from several to about 50% says using camera stationed, roughly 75 miles apart allowed the scientist to make repeated observations of strange objects. Moving in the sky. The paper did not speculate on what the objects were. Merely noted the observations and mentioned the objects. Incredible speeds. They went on to say that flights of single group and squadrons of ships were detected. Moving at speeds from three to 15 degrees per second, Phantoms were observed in the troposphere at distances of up to 10 to 12 kilometers. We estimate their size from three to 12 meters and speeds up to 15 kilometers per second. Wow. 15 kilometers per second. If you break that down is something like, I don't know. It's like 1.8 to times, something like that. I don't know. So it's basically like nine miles per second. That math is probably terribly off. And I'm so sorry if you're somebody who goes by the metric system, I am not. So just trying to help you guys out  it says the easy explanation would be that these are missiles or rockets or something else associated with the war. But the scientists insist that their nature is not clear. UFOs are back in the public conscious. After a string of sightings were caught on camera by Navy pilots. Congress has demanded answers and the Pentagon responded by saying this is seen, that has seen some strange stuff, but needed more time and money of course, to, because they don't have enough money to send to Ukraine and also look into potential, you know, UFOs entering our airspace with alien beings inside of them. At the same time  to study the phenomenon appropriately. Congress gave them both. And the Pentagon open to the a, a R O oh, the a a R O is that we talked about this about a week or two weeks ago where the Pentagon basically opened an entire subdivision section specifically to study this phenomenon of alien UFOs, not, not potentially, you know, China and Russia, uh, military aircraft, they already sub sectioned off the potential of that. Right. They said that we believe that some of these are not of human origin. They defy the laws of physics as we know them. Okay. Wild, wild stuff. And they're starting to come out and talk more about. All right. The article goes on to say, um, a recent addendum in the Senate intelligence budget report said that the thread of UFOs was increasing exponentially and that the Pentagon's new office needed to focus on the UFOs that aren't manmade. Yep, exactly what we just talked about and exactly what we talked about a few episodes ago. So go ahead and listen to that one. When you're done with this one, um, Boris, the lead researcher of the paper declined to comment. This says that there's an update from nine 13, which is yesterday says the original version of this article stated that the Kiev study was a joint venture with the Pentagon and NASA. It was not vice has corrected the story and regrets this era. Wow, good on you. Vice way to go way to go. Now, one thing that, you know, speaking of corrections, there's been a lot of articles recently talking about how IRA Mein was allegedly put in. I think it was the CDC or the who said that IRA Mein is now an allowable substance when it comes to COVID and has helped significantly. Now, um, the correction that was made was basically that they are still not recommending it. They still want to do trials. That was the big correction that a lot of people made. Um, but they're saying that it's potential. Hmm. Um, but there's been a few people like Russell brand came out and made like an apology statement. Um, Russell brand's the actor. Awesome dude. One of my favorite favorite podcasts. I've like tried to categorize myself as a podcast and I'm like, I don't want to technically be Tucker Carlson. I don't want to technically be a political podcast. I want to be more like there's one person I can put myself in a category with. That's like kind of a mixture of like libertarian politics, not left or right. Mainstream narratives also kind of conspiracy based with a touch and little bit of like globalism pushback  and some good humor. Hopefully you think so. Um, it's Russell brand Russell. Brand's got a great thing going, if you haven't listened to his podcast, go check it out. It's definitely, uh, a bit on the same genre and topics that we discuss here. Pretty interesting stuff. A mix of politics, current events, pop culture, and a little bit of conspiracy stuff. If you know what I mean. All right. Now, Um, pretty wild stuff. The, the, the UFO situation is just wild to me. You know, there's been so many conversations, so many articles, so many, you know, governmental institutions that are pouring money into this now that are saying, and making this conversation mainstream, you cannot ignore it at this point, right. Whether they're pushing an agenda or not, because for how long they've known this stuff's going on, right. From Roswell to, you know, literally, um, who's the guy that went on to Joe Rogan. Um, uh, gosh, I blanking on the name. Um, but there's been so many people that have come out and said that they were a part of this, uh, you know, from anything from seeing UFO Aircrafts, you know, how long have those sightings been going on? Uh, Jeremy Corbe was the guy I'm thinking of. Um, and he basically is one of the most, uh, mainstream people talking about this. He's had so many good conversations, really good, uh, footage that he's caught on it, um, breaks down these things very, very well. Um, so. If you haven't heard that go listen to the Jeremy Corbe podcast, uh, with Joe Rogan, it it's quite quite interesting. Um, and he even talks to somebody else who claims to have been a part of it at Roswell. So that's pretty wild too. Um, and that was with, uh, who, what is that other guy's name? Of course I'm like, just trying to think of names that of people I can't recall. Um, but it's pretty crazy. He like says that he basically went in and saw the UFOs, saw the, um, saw Bob Laar is a whole documentary on it. Bob Laars documentary by Jeremy Corbe and they go into how he was literally taken by. It was like the, um, by the military, by the CIA or whoever was conducting these operations. And because he was like in the newspaper for building rocketships  and so, um, he, they, he basically went into, um, area 51. And said that he saw the ships, he saw, literally believed that he said saw aliens. It was like years and years ago, but he said that he saw them, um, in, in, so there's, uh, all of these things that came out, like the chemicals that they, the chemical compounds that he talked about prior to the government even saying they existed. So there's all these really weird correlations and all of these things. And Bob Laar is a very interesting character. Um, he doesn't seem to want a ton of attention off of it. He seems to just be like, he, he legitimately seems to be telling the truth. Um, it's a very interesting conversation. Go look up that documentary too, giving you lots of homework assignments today. Sorry. um, so, um, then we'll go ahead and talk about this in just a moment, which is the, the China situation with moon chemicals or. Nuclear fusion stuff. But one thing I did wanna show is that, you know, apparently Dr. Fauci, Dr. Fauci, Mr. Science himself is getting still grilled by Ram Paul, which I love. And you'll see in this clip, he's literally shaking due to this conversation. So let's go ahead and watch this Ram Paul article take a little bit of a shift from the alien stuff, um, which would kind of have been a nice segue into China going to the moon and finding this, but let's, let's, let's stop that segue. And let's go ahead and look at this. Yeah, actually, you know what, let's talk about it. if you have not heard China discovered a stunning crystal on the moon, which they believe could give us unlimited energy of nuclear fusion fuel. Now this article is by vice and it says that the find makes China the third country to discovery a new mineral on the moon. And the country says it's analyzed the soil for rail rare helium three. Interesting. It says that China has discovered a crystal from the moon made of a previously unknown mineral while also confirming that the lunar surface contains a key ingredient for nuclear FIS vision, a potential form of effective or effectively limitless power that harnesses the same forces that fuel the sun and other stars. The crystal was a part of a batch of lunar samples collected by China's change five mission, which landed on the moon in 2020 loaded up with about four pounds of rocks and delivered them to earth days later, each carefully sifting through the samples, which are now the first moon rocks returned to earth since 1976. If you believe that scientists at the Beijing research Institute of uranium, geology spotted a single crystal particle with a diameter smaller than the width of a human hair, the crystal is made of a novel mineral Chan change site. Named after the Chinese moon goddess change or changey, I don't know how you pronounce that. There's a hyphen between C H a N G and then the hyphen, and then E it also inspired China's series of lunar missions. It is confirmed that as a new mineral on Friday by the commission of new minerals, it's a weird commission, um, nomenclature in classification, which is, uh, brought down to C N M N C  of international mur neurological association. According to the Chinese state run publication. Global times change site is the sixth new mineral to be identified in moon samples. And the first to be discovered by China before China, only the us in Russia could claim to have discovered a moon, moon mineral. It is a transparent crystal that formed in a region of these Northern lunar nor near face. That is volcanically active about 1.2 billion years ago. Um, let's see what this article continues to say, which is according to the state media, the new lunar samples also contain helium three, a new version of the element helium that has long fascinated scientists and science fiction creators because of its potential as a nuclear FIS vision fuel source, the hypothetical form of power aims to harness energy released by atoms that merge under tremendous pressure, such as those in the interior of stars. Starlight is a ubiquitous product of nuclear fusion, but human made fusion reactors will still likely take decades to develop assuming that they are fusible at all that sad. If these reactors do become a reality, helium three would be a good fuel candidate because it produces less radioactive byproducts and nuclear waste compared to other atoms. Whereas helium three is incredibly scarce on earth. It is abundant on the moon, a disparity that has stoked dreams of mining the minerals on the lunar surface. Along those lines, China has joined the United States and other nations and expressing interest in extracting resources from the moon. In the future. Very, very interesting. Now, a couple article titles that I'll go through here, and I'm not gonna dive deep into these articles, but I just want you to know them. It says that China is planning to turn the moon into a giant space shield sounds like some star war shit. Um,  uh, and another one is also, um, space junk, crashing all over the world, upsetting everyone. You know, I, I'm not that upset about space junk. Haven't heard about it much other than the fact that it's an unbelievable amount of space junk surrounding our earth. If you haven't heard about that, there's literally, there's a, I'm pretty sure there's a, a map that you can look at of the earth. And it shows all of the space junk, which is like little things that we've sent up in pieces of, uh, satellites and things like that. Like when they're done with a satellite, they're done using it, all of the satellites we've ever put up there, they just leave them there. Even if they break down, even if there's things that go on with them, um, pretty, pretty wild stuff. Like they almost be like the, when they go to plan a mission. To go into space. Oh, allegedly. Um,  when they go to plan the mission, they do math calculations because they track all of the space junk and try to figure out. How, what timing of day based on the trajectory, the speed of the, uh, the speed of the rocket or whatever, um, to try and make it. So it does not hit space junk because even if it hits a marble size of space, junk going 35,000 million miles an hour, however fast they go, it's going to destroy, destroy the, um, destroy the ship. So they have to calculate it based on the timing. And there's so, so much junk in space, um, that it's very difficult for them to time. Um, another article here from this is from a little while ago, it says Mars formation that looks like alien doorway spotted by NASA Rover. How do we not hear about this stuff? There's so much wild things going on in the world today that it's. I, I am so under the idea  this is a simulation, the simulation theory is so interesting to me because what is the likelihood there was like literally horse and buggies, like a hundred years ago, right? 1922 people were literally riding horses almost. And now just so it happens to be the timing that we're alive, that we get to see the most interesting technological booms ever. Right. You wanna go back and talk, you know, and it's like a hundred years ago is literally your great grandparents. Your great grandparents were alive a hundred years ago for sure. A hundred years ago, right? Maybe, maybe not maybe your great-great grandparents, but maybe your great grandparents, depending on how old you are. Um, and maybe your parents even right. A hundred years is not that long ago. Right. And 500 years is not that long ago, either 500 years ago is literally your great, great, great, great, great grandparents. That means five people had sex and now you're here  and all of a sudden we went from all living like the Amish or the Indians. And all of the sudden, since the 15 hundreds, we are looking at space formations, nuclear, fission rocks, talking about aliens, visiting us. I'm literally speaking to you through a plastic piece of, uh, you know, bullshit that nobody know how knows exactly how it works. You know, it's like, it's so wild that we live here today in this reality on this timeline that it just seems so unprobable to me, I just don't get it. There's, there's literally no way.  the likelihood that I am not a Amish person on a farm, you know, 1500, you know, and even the fact of like 2000 years ago,  being that far again, that's not that far. That's literally not that far. Not that far. Right? 25, 30, 30 sexes ago.  that's gonna be the way that I, I, I think of time now is how many people had to have sex between now and then for you to be in that era 30 sexes ago, you could have been living in a. The same time as Jesus. And now they want to tell us that like, you know, literally the worth was the earth was, you know, however many, you know, years old. It's like, nah, I don't believe ya. I don't believe ya. I don't think so. There was an article that came out there was like 30,000. Um, they found the body that, you know, was kind of disputing all science on humanities, you know, uh, timeline. It was like 30,000 years old or even, maybe even longer than that. But there's some really interesting scientific articles and things that have come out that, that even say that it's longer than that. Right. That, that say that the pyramids were really from like there's, there's all of the sentiment that's been eroded underneath. Like there's like pyramids under the pyramids that are coming. and, uh, they they're like challenging all of the science, all of their religious beliefs. All of the things that we talk about today is being the timeline of humanity, right. It it's, it's pretty wild stuff. Um, and, and it's something they'd be interested in because, you know, we even go back into the conversation from yesterday of like the, or yesterday of last week and the queen and the reptilian species. it's so funny how easily you can jump into reptilian, Illuminati, reptiles, uh, controlling the world. Um, but there's like this whole idea of the Sumerians and the Sumerians being visited. And the Sumerians are like one of the very first humanity, like, uh, very first peoples, um, that humanity believed existed and the Sumerian race being visited and given technology that, that we can't even comprehend today. The, the ancient Sumerian societies had mathematical equations to map out the cosmos and, and like, let me look up the timeline of like, when, um, the Sumerian, uh, We're even around, um, because it's, it's so wild when you look up the actual history of, of ancient Sumeria. Um, this says it was like 2,350 BC. So 4,005,000 years ago, um, in Sumer, uh, the Sumerians were people of Southern Mesopotamia whose civilization flourished between 4,100 to 1750 BC. So six, 7,000 years ago, um, like the ancient Sumerian technology let's, you know, let's, let's dive into it. I got a little bit of whiskey left. Let's dive into the ancient Sumerian technology.  we, we might as well, let's see if I can find it. Um, let's see, ancient Sumerian technology. And if you're still here with me, I appreciate ya. This is fun. Let's do it. Ancient Sumerian technology. Um, let's go ahead and see what, uh, is questionable. Let's see what we can find here. So a few of the articles that are coming up is ancient Sumerian technology, nine ancient Sumerian tech, uh, inventions that changed the world. Um, let's see, there's like photo there's like hieroglyphics of the Sumerians with, you know, weird technology and seeing like, um, Kymera reptiles and, and different beings and g

durée : 01:47:34 - Été Classique Après-midi du vendredi 12 août 2022 - par : Julien Hanck - Le rendez-vous des collectionneurs et autres amoureux du disque, cet après-midi quelques originaux et génies notoires sont à l'affiche : Erich Wolfgang Korngold, le chef Teodor Currentzis, Tom Waits, Elise Bertrand ou encore Jacob Collier, multi-instrumentistes de génie ! - réalisé par : Fanny Constans

Wade and Connor are back on a Tuesday with the final edition of their USPORTS wish list, and today they cover off the AUS, as the Steve Sumarah Era begins in Halifax. Subscribe, review and tell a friend to help us bring you even more Canadian football content.

Sumera Rashid is a dental director at Northern Virginia Community College, VA. She is also a mom of 2 boys. Join us as Sumera discusses motherhood, raising boys, work/life balance, marriage and parenting tips and career tips as well as mental health.

Sumera shares her recovery journey with us as she explains the complexities of being raised in a western country while dealing with the daily influence and culture of being raised by a family with an Indian background. The mishmash of cultures was difficult for her to process as a child and culminated in her escaping an arranged marriage with the help of the British Consulate and a stranger she meet at a call center. Her alcohol use increased as she entered young adulthood and progressed to a cascade of negative consequences years later. She experienced blackouts and the loss of jobs and finally arrived at the general feeling that something was wrong with her, even though she had no idea what it was. Her entrance into recovery was swift and beautiful. Her love of the AA program and helping others is strong and inspiring. Her future looks bright and she has embraced 12-step sobriety for all its worth. She also tells us about her love for the arts and baking. You may see her soon on the Food Network if things go according to plan and it is meant to be. Please enjoy this super charged episode of recovery and you will hear how Sumera carries herself today as a loving, kind, compassionate, and tolerant woman. Website: www.SoberShares.com Email: mike@SoberShares.com Click link to Donate: https://www.paypal.com/donate/?hosted_button_id=MD6DFY5RUYT5A

There are so many tools to use to increase our life force, we often overlook the obvious. Our sense of smell is one of the strongest senses, it channels memories, ideas, and can set off a cascade of hormones to create a new experience. Listen in to this episode where guest Sumera Shaman shares her experience with essential oils and the many benefits. Grab the book: https://amzn.to/2OTfzgi (Beginner's Guide: Everything You Need to Know About Essential Oils) Sign up for the next https://www.recoverlikeamother.com/ (CALM CIRCLE) This podcast uses the following third-party services for analysis: Chartable - https://chartable.com/privacy

“ I saw chunks of body parts and ripped bodies of people.” Reporting from the past 15 years. Sumera Khan has spent most of her time on roads covering events from terror attacks to incidents of child abuse. She also has the credit of being the only female journalist to interview Hakeemullah Mehsud. This is the third episode of Journalist Diaries, a series of untold stories of news breakers and their experience of reporting in Pakistan. #JournalistDiaries #SumeraKhan

Fasten your seatbelts.  Breeani is, first and foremost, the mother of two beautiful keiki; Kūpaʻa and He'olu.  She's also the manager of the Hilo Seaside Hotel, Keaukaha General Store, started the Hawaii Rise Foundation, and has spearheaded numerous other community oriented programs.   No big deal.  We dive in to the story behind KGS, the history and future plans of the hotel, and the approximately 7546 other things she's involved with in helping the Big Island community.  

Saade "Dünastia" uurib, kui kaugele ulatub Sumerate muusikaarmastus, milline on elu Gonsiori tänava muusikat täis kodus ning mida vaatasid Sumerad igal esmaspäeval koos televiisorist?

Saade "Dünastia" uurib, kui kaugele ulatub Sumerate muusikaarmastus, milline on elu Gonsiori tänava muusikat täis kodus ning mida vaatasid Sumerad igal esmaspäeval koos televiisorist?

Algaval nädalal pühendab Klassikaraadio toimetus eritähelepanu Lepo Sumera (1950-2000) loomingule. Armastatud helilooja 70. sünniaastapäev on 8. mail. Sumera nädala sissejuhatuseks kuulame tema ilmutuslikku Esimest sümfooniat ERSO esituses Peeter Lilje juhatusel.

Algaval nädalal pühendab Klassikaraadio toimetus eritähelepanu Lepo Sumera (1950-2000) loomingule. Armastatud helilooja 70. sünniaastapäev on 8. mail. Sumera nädala sissejuhatuseks kuulame tema ilmutuslikku Esimest sümfooniat ERSO esituses Peeter Lilje juhatusel.

I kēia pukana, lohe mākou maiā Breeani Sumera-Lee no  kāna mau hana ma ke kaiaulu o Keaukaha a me nā mea i paipai ai iā ia e  lilo he alakaʻi wiwoʻole ma ke kaiaulu! E nanea a aʻo mai! In this episode, we hear from Breeani Sumera-Lee about her work in the community of Keaukaha and what has encouraged her to become a fearless community leader. Come enjoy- promise you want to hear this! Such an educational segment! OUR GUEST Instagram: @justbreecause  + @hawaiirisefoundation Facebook: Breeani Sumera-Lee - fb.com/breerii Website: hawaiirisefoundation.com Donations of the following are also greatly appreciated: Monetary donations are accepted through the “donate” link at the bottom of the site Volunteers for kupuna delivery packages Prayers for health & peace of our communities FOLLOW US Brandy: @asamurawolfpak Grace: @absolutelywanted Kēhau: @kehau Nikki: @hauoli_nikki Tita Talk: @titatalk --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/titatalk/message

In today’s season 4 premier episode (40) of the EAT, CAPTURE, SHARE Podcast, I’m speaking with creatives, food bloggers and solopreneurs within the food and drink space about how they are navigating the COVID-19 crisis, what they are cooking to feel nourished and what they are doing to push through some of the tougher challenges this pandemic has thrown their way. Here’s what else you can expect from today’s episode….   I talk about why I decided to bring the podcast back earlier than intended Yone, Sumera, Caroline, Abby and Silvia introduce themselves Everyone shares how COVID-19 has impacted their immediate and wider community in Taiwan, Spain, France, the UK, Italy and the USA Sumera shares some hopeful news regarding shopping behaviour changes through the pandemic We chat about what surprising things people are hoarding and which they refuse to eat, even during a pandemic We discuss the whole toilet paper issue! Everyone shares ideas, experiences and tips around what they are doing to make it through the darker days of the pandemic as well as their struggles on a day to day basis We talk about what we’re cooking and enjoying eating during the pandemic and some of the answers may surprise you We also explore the positive impact the pandemic has had on our cooking and eating habits We delve deep into the value of slowing down We chat about cravings!   LINKS MENTIONED: Join my FREE instagram food photography challenge. Find out more here. Find out more about my signature online food photography course here Find Yone’s instagram here and her blog here Find Sumera’s doughnut store DELISH’s instagram here and her website here Find Caroline’s instagram here and Lyon Wine Tasting’s instagram here Find Silvia’s instagram here and her blog here Find Abby’s instagram here and her blog here My previous interview with Sumera from Delish Vegan Doughnuts on the Eat, Capture, Share Podcast can be found here Tune into my previous interview with Silvia on the Eat, Capture, Share podcast here Heart Sutra Ru Paul Schitt’s Creek Find my instagram here Join my free creative community here or my signing up to the newsletter below. 3 healthy quarantine cooking tips blog post   Find the full show notes here. 

Hoy tenemos un caso "alien", como lo define Sumera, la protagonista de esta historia. Emprendedora, música y cantante, Sumera abrió las puertas de la primera tienda de donuts veganos de Madrid en octubre de 2017. Si quieres saber sus estrategias de marketing y comunicación, sus consejos financieros y mucho más, dale al play.

We discuss the new Pakistani movie Paray Hut Luv and the controversy with Priyanka Chopra

On this week’s show Don Diablo kicks off with the first ever radio play of his VIP edit of “Brave” with Jessie J, and plays brand new music MK, DJ Zinc X Chris Lorenzo, Sumera, Sleepy Tom, Loopers, Landis and many more. Don Diablo Ft Jessie J - Brave (Don Diablo VIP Mix)Loopers - Deep InsideAntex  - Let You Go (Club Dub Edit)Jack Shore - Feel It (Original Club Mix)Matt Caseli & David Jimenez - Get Yourself Together (Calippo Remix)Landis - Nobody Like You (RetroVision Flip)Sleepy Tom - All On YouMK - Body 2 Body (Extended Club Mix) Matrix & Futurebound - Got You There DemoDay: Darren & Cashwell - HIGHER Habstrakt - Control KOS (UA) - Frequency Low (Original Mix) Laidback Luke & Keanu Silva - Oh Yes (RetroVision Remix) Valentino Khan - Pony Hot Goods - Time's Up DJ Zinc X Chris Lorenzo - Conditioning F.O.O.L & Midranger - Neon Mazare & Luma - Nothing More Sumera - Skin

Don and Hex are back with a brand new episode featuring music from Landis, PNAU, Oliver Heldens, Sumera, Agoria, Dave Winnel and many more. 01. Ellie Goulding - Sixteen (Don Diablo Remix)02. David Guetta Ft. Raye - Stay (Don't Go Away)03. Bassic & Ray - You Were Mine 04. Landis - Nobody Like You05. Fort Arkansas - You And Me06. Sigma Ft. Louisa - Here We Go Again (Just Kiddin Remix)07. Lauv, Troye Sivan - I'm So Tired08. Waterbeld & Nalestar - With You09. PNAU - Solid Gold Ft. Kira Divine & Marques Toliver10. DEMO - Mohtiv - Need Somebody11. Volac - Feel It12. Birthdayy Partyy - Move It13. NØ SIGNE & TWOLOUD - No Fcks Given (ft. Rell Rock) 14. Dankann - I'm Burning For You15. Oliver Heldens Ft Devin & Nile Rodgers - Summer Lover (Keanu Silva Remix)16. Sound Of Legend - Tell Me Why (Siks Remix)17. Dave Winnel - Ksamil18. Agoria - Remedy ft. Noemie 19. Sumera - Skin

Join me this week as I consider the causes of Self-Harm behavior, wrap up the De Anima, and talk to the Ladies from the Fishers of Men podcast about how to help christian teens navigate their dating lives. You can find Mary and Lara over at their website www.fishersofmenpodcast.com Check us out over at the website www.ColorOfThought.com Become a Patron today and get many more colorful thoughts in your life at www.Patreon.com/ColorOfThought

EMTA kammersaalis on pühapäeval juubelikontsert "Õpetaja portree" - Kersti Sumera!

The Ladies of the Fishers of Men podcast, Mary Ashley Burton and Lara Sumera join me to talk about dating and the spiritual life.

In today's episode, I am speaking to Sumera from DELISH Vegan Doughnuts all about how to start a brick and mortar food business, how to make it a success and how to overcome your fear. Please check out the show notes for links to all the resources mentioned here 

Grace-filled Tuesday to everyone! Welcome to our #GabaySaRV846 Tuesday Edition with Bro. Obet Cabrillas, Feast Builder of Feast Valle Verde and Bro. Philip Sumera Feast Builder of The Feast SM Manila. Today we talk about how Jesus gives life to the dead. Are there areas in your life tgat are dead right now? Relationship? Finances? Health? Faith? Invite Jesus and open your heart to Him. Allow Him to give light and life to you today. Watch and be bless. Share and be a blessing! https://www.facebook.com/Veritasph/videos/545314225920315

Episode 39 Leave us a message @ https://www.speakpipe.com/SoberSpeak Email us @ feedback@soberspeak.com Visit our website @ www.soberspeak.com

The National's Mustafa Alrawi and personal finance editor Alice Haine mark two years of the weekly column, The Debt Panel, and speak with reader Sumera Hasan about her ultimately successful five-year ordeal with personal debt. We also focus on new rules from the Central Bank capping how much lenders can charge customers for their services and products and explain the importance of developing money-management skills no matter how much you earn.  **More about Sumera's story here:** [The Debt Panel: Single mother of four is being hounded by debt collectors over Dh43,000](https://www.thenational.ae/business/money/the-debt-panel-single-mother-of-four-is-being-hounded-by-debt-collectors-over-dh43-000-1.726393) [Ramadan spirit: Generous readers clear single mother's debts after The National plea](https://www.thenational.ae/business/money/ramadan-spirit-generous-readers-clear-single-mother-s-debts-after-the-national-plea-1.738565)

Episode 17 Leave us a message - https://www.speakpipe.com/SoberSpeak Email us - feedback@soberspeak.com Visit our website - www.soberspeak.com

Episode 8 Leave us a message - https://www.speakpipe.com/SoberSpeak Email us - feedback@soberspeak.com Visit our website - www.soberspeak.com

Klaveripedagoog Kersti Sumera ja helilooja Lepo Sumera kohtusid konservatooriumis esimesel kursusel. Nende kolm last Kadri-Ann, Tammo ja Eva-Maria on valinud samuti muusikutee. Eetris pühapäeval 21. mail kell 9 ja kordub kolmapäeval 24. mail kell 21.

Klaveripedagoog Kersti Sumera ja helilooja Lepo Sumera kohtusid konservatooriumis esimesel kursusel. Nende kolm last Kadri-Ann, Tammo ja Eva-Maria on valinud samuti muusikutee. Eetris pühapäeval 21. mail kell 9 ja kordub kolmapäeval 24. mail kell 21.

Ready to shake things by slowing things down? Feeling some type of way and need the tunes that match? Let Sumera's primal track take you on a wild ride through your inner consciousness. Be prepared to let yourself go to get the full experience.

Puntata N.27 di Atlanticast, il Podcast per tutti gli appassionati di civiltà antidiluviane e di archeologia misteriosa: La Lista Reale Sumera e il Culto Astronomico Precessionale.

Puntata N.27 di Atlanticast, il Podcast per tutti gli appassionati di civiltà antidiluviane e di archeologia misteriosa: La Lista Reale Sumera e il Culto Astronomico Precessionale.