The Dawn of Medieval Japan in Its Epics

Trans­lated from French

The peace­ful Heian pe­riod (794-1185) ended in a con­fla­gra­tion. Fol­low­ing bat­tles of rare vi­o­lence, two ri­val hous­es, the Taira and the Mi­namo­to, suc­ces­sively ousted the court aris­toc­ra­cy, which pos­sessed nei­ther suf­fi­cient army nor po­lice, and brought about the ad­vent of the feu­dal regime. Thus be­gins the Ja­pa­nese Mid­dle Ages. This pe­riod of up­heaval was such that “one would have to search in the Ger­man Mid­dle Ages to find sim­i­lar con­fu­sion.” The re­fine­ment of Heian fem­i­nine lit­er­a­ture was suc­ceeded by vir­ile tales, full of “assassinations,” “stratagems,” “mar­velous feats of arms” and “long-pre­pared vengeances” — “source of em­bar­rass­ment and trou­ble for his­to­ri­ans.”

With Rosary in Hand and Sword at the Belt

From this tur­moil were born the “war­rior tales” (gunki mono­gatari), which stand at the cross­roads of his­tor­i­cal chron­i­cle, na­tional epic, and pro­found Bud­dhist med­i­ta­tion. Their func­tion was more­over less lit­er­ary, in the sense we un­der­stand it, than memo­rial and spir­i­tu­al: it was above all a mat­ter of “ap­peas­ing […] the souls of war­riors who had per­ished in com­bat” and, for the sur­vivors, “of seek­ing mean­ing in the chaotic events that brought an end to the old or­der.” This func­tion fell to the “biwa monks” (biwa hōshi or biwa bōzu), gen­er­ally blind bards. Sim­i­lar to our troubadours of old, they trav­eled the coun­try, de­claim­ing in a singing voice the great deeds of the past. Draped in monas­tic robes, doubt­less to place them­selves un­der the pro­tec­tion of tem­ples and monas­ter­ies, they ac­com­pa­nied them­selves with their four-stringed lute, the biwa¹“Born in the king­dom of Per­sia and its bor­der­ing re­gions, the biwa spread through­out East Asia along the Silk Road. Per­fected in Chi­na, it reached the Ja­pa­nese ar­chi­pel­ago around the 8th cen­tury.” Hyōdō, Hi­romi, “Les moines joueurs de biwa (biwa hōshi) et Le Dit des Heike” (“The biwa-play­ing monks (biwa hōshi) and The Tale of the Heike”) in Bris­set, Claire-Akiko, Bro­tons, Ar­naud and Stru­ve, Daniel (ed­s.), op. cit., whose chords punc­tu­ated the melan­choly of the nar­ra­tive.

At the heart of the reper­toire that these artists trans­mit­ted from mas­ter to dis­ci­ple, a fun­da­men­tal tril­ogy re­counts the frat­ri­ci­dal strug­gles that tipped the ar­chi­pel­ago into a new era: The Tale of Hō­gen (Hō­gen mono­gatari)²Re­jected forms:
Récit des trou­bles de l’ère Hogen (Tale of the Trou­bles of the Hogen Era).
La Chronique des Hogen (The Chron­i­cle of the Hogen).
Récit de l’ère Hō­gen (Tale of the Hō­gen Era).
His­toire de la guerre de l’époque Hō­gen (His­tory of the War of the Hō­gen Pe­riod).
Hōghen mono­gatari.
Hōghenn mono­gatari., The Tale of Heiji (Heiji mono­gatari)³Re­jected forms:
Épopée de la ré­bel­lion de Heiji (Epic of the Heiji Re­bel­lion).
La Chronique des Heigi (The Chron­i­cle of the Heigi).
Récit de l’ère Heiji (Tale of the Heiji Era).
Réc­its de la guerre de l’ère Heiji (Tales of the War of the Heiji Era).
Heïdji mono­gatari.
Heizi mono­gatari., and the most il­lus­tri­ous of all, The Tale of the Heike (Heike mono­gatari)⁴Re­jected forms:
Le Dit des Heikke (The Tale of the Heikke).
L’Aven­ture d’Heike (The Ad­ven­ture of Heike).
His­toire des Heike (His­tory of the Heike).
Con­tes du Heike (Tales of Heike).
Con­tes des Heike (Tales of the Heike).
La Chronique des Heiké (The Chron­i­cle of the Heike).
La Chronique de Heiké (The Chron­i­cle of Heike).
Chroniques du clan Heike (Chron­i­cles of the Heike Clan).
La Geste de la mai­son des Héï (The Geste of the House of Hei).
Geste de la famille des Hei (Geste of the Hei Fam­ily).
His­toire de la famille des Hei (His­tory of the Hei Fam­ily).
His­toire de la famille Heiké (His­tory of the Heike Fam­ily).
His­toire de la mai­son des Taira (His­tory of the House of Taira).
His­toire de la famille des Taïra (His­tory of the Taira Fam­ily).
Récit de l’his­toire des Taira (Tale of the His­tory of the Taira).
Ro­man des Taira (Ro­mance of the Taira).
La Geste des Taïra (The Geste of the Taira).
Feike no mono­gatari.. The first two, while they may ap­pear pro­saic in de­scrib­ing how the Taira and Mi­namoto grad­u­ally in­sin­u­ated them­selves into mil­i­tary power un­til ac­quir­ing de­ci­sive in­flu­ence over court af­fairs, none­the­less pre­pare the com­ing drama and al­ready con­tain that “sen­si­tiv­ity to the ephemer­al” (mono no aware) that will find in The Tale of the Heike its most ac­com­plished ex­pres­sion:

“The world where we live
Has no more ex­is­tence than
A moon­beam
Re­flected in wa­ter
Drawn up in the hol­low of the hand.”

Le Dit de Hō­gen; Le Dit de Heiji (The Tale of Hō­gen; The Tale of Heiji), trans. from Ja­pa­nese by René Sief­fert, Paris: Pub­li­ca­tions ori­en­tal­istes de France, 1976; reis­sued La­grasse: Verdier, coll. “Verdier poche,” 2007.

Impermanence as Destiny

A mon­u­men­tal work, a ver­i­ta­ble Aeneid of the in­ternecine strug­gles and bit­ter wars that tore apart the two hous­es, cul­mi­nat­ing in the Bat­tle of Dan-no-ura (April 25, 1185), The Tale of the Heike nev­er­the­less rad­i­cally de­parts from West­ern tra­di­tion. In­stead of open­ing, in Vir­gil’s man­ner, with arma virumque (arms and the man), the Ja­pa­nese chron­i­cle re­calls from its first line “the im­per­ma­nence of all things”: “The proud in­deed do not en­dure, just like the dream of a spring night.” The char­ac­ters, great and hum­ble, are all swept away by the same whirl­wind, il­lus­trat­ing to the point of sati­ety that, ac­cord­ing to Bossuet’s for­mu­la:

“The time will come when this man who seems so great to you will be no more, when he will be like the child yet un­born, when he will be noth­ing. […] I came only to make up the num­ber, yet they had no need of me; […] when I look close­ly, it seems to me a dream to see my­self here, and that all I see are but vain sim­u­lacra: Præ­terit enim figura hu­jus mundi (For the fash­ion of this world passes away)⁵1 Cor 7:31 (La Bible: tra­duc­tion of­fi­cielle liturgique (The Bible: Of­fi­cial Litur­gi­cal Trans­la­tion))..”

Bossuet, Jacques Bénigne, Œu­vres com­plètes (Com­plete Works), vol. IV, Paris: Lefèvre; Firmin Di­dot frères, 1836.

Thus, The Tale of the Heike re­sem­bles a con­tin­ual ser­mon, where all the vi­cis­si­tudes in the lives of he­roes serve to il­lus­trate this law of im­per­ma­nence (mujō) and the van­ity of hu­man glo­ries. The case of Taira no Tadanori (1144-1184) is ex­em­plary in this re­gard. Sur­prised by the en­e­my, he dom­i­nates his ad­ver­sary, but some or­di­nary ser­vant of the lat­ter in­ter­venes and cuts off his right arm at the el­bow. Know­ing his end has come, Tadanori turns west­ward and in­vokes the Bud­dha in a firm voice ten times be­fore be­ing de­cap­i­tat­ed. At­tached to his quiv­er, this farewell poem is found:

“Car­ried away by dark­ness
I shall lodge be­neath
The branches of a tree.
Only flow­ers
Will wel­come me tonight.”

Hoff­mann, Yoel, Poèmes d’adieu japon­ais: an­tholo­gie com­men­tée de poèmes écrits au seuil de la mort (Ja­pa­nese Death Po­ems: An An­no­tated An­thol­ogy of Po­ems Writ­ten on the Thresh­old of Death), trans. from Eng­lish by Ag­nès Rozen­blum, Malakoff: A. Col­in, 2023.

A Mixed Legacy

This Bud­dhist sen­si­bil­i­ty, which per­me­ates even the blood­i­est sce­nes, is nev­er­the­less not al­ways suf­fi­cient to el­e­vate a nar­ra­tive that may ap­pear slow, reg­u­lar, uni­form to minds formed by West­ern aes­thet­ics. Like the sound of the Gion bell, the march of the tales is reg­u­lar, too reg­u­lar even, and some­what mo­not­o­nous. I re­gret that such il­lus­tri­ous nar­ra­tives have not found an equally il­lus­tri­ous poet who might have fixed them forever; that they lacked a Homer who might have given them a va­ri­ety, a sup­ple­ness eter­nally ad­mired.

As Georges Bous­quet notes, Home­ric he­roes of­ten have “strange gai­eties or weak­nesses that let us touch their hu­man­ity with our fin­ger; those of Taira never cease be­ing con­ven­tional and cold.” While the naive Greek sto­ry­teller al­ways lets a vague and fine smile show through be­hind the words, “the Ja­pa­nese rhap­sodist never leaves the epic tone and stiff bear­ing.” Where “the joy­ful ex­pan­sion of the trou­vère res­onates like a fan­fare, here one hears only the melan­cholic ac­cent of the des­o­late Bud­dhist: ’The val­or­ous man [too] ends up col­laps­ing no more no less than dust in the wind’.”

Further Reading

On The Tale of Hōgen; The Tale of Heiji

Quotations

“[…] the night of that day, around the hour of the Dog, fi­nally he passed away.

A peach blos­som, his face had not yet suf­fered the at­tacks of spring mists; and yet, del­i­cate or­chid as­sailed by au­tumn fogs, he had with the morn­ing dew van­ished. He was barely in the sev­en­teenth year of his age when the un­think­able ac­ci­dent oc­curred. Man in­deed, old or young, is as­sured of noth­ing, they said, and the For­bid­den Palace was plunged in mourn­ing.”

Le Dit de Hō­gen; Le Dit de Heiji (The Tale of Hō­gen; The Tale of Heiji), trans. from Ja­pa­nese by René Sief­fert, Paris: Pub­li­ca­tions ori­en­tal­istes de France, 1976; reis­sued La­grasse: Verdier, coll. “Verdier poche,” 2007.

On The Tale of the Heike

Quotations

“祇園精舎の鐘の声、諸行無常の響きあり。娑羅双樹の花の色、盛者必衰の理をあらはす。驕れる人も久しからず、ただ春の夜の夢のごとし。猛き者もつひにはほろびぬ、ひとへに風の前の塵に同じ。”

平家物語 on Wik­i­books 日本語, [on­line], ac­cessed Sep­tem­ber 26, 2025.

“From the monastery of Gion the sound of the bell, of the im­per­ma­nence of all things is the res­o­nance. Of the shara trees⁶In San­skrit sāla (साल) or śāla (शाल). Tree of the trop­i­cal and sub-Hi­malayan re­gions of In­dia. It is sa­cred in Bud­dhism, whose cra­dle is lo­cated in these same re­gions: it was while lean­ing on a sāla that Māyā would have given birth to the fu­ture Bud­dha, and it was also be­tween two of these trees that the lat­ter would have passed away. the color of flow­ers demon­strates that all that pros­pers nec­es­sar­ily de­clines. The proud in­deed do not en­dure, just like the dream of a spring night. The val­or­ous man like­wise ends up col­laps­ing no more no less than dust in the wind.”

Le Dit des Heiké (The Tale of the Heike), trans. from Ja­pa­nese by René Sief­fert, Paris: Pub­li­ca­tions ori­en­tal­istes de France, 1976; reis­sued La­grasse: Verdier, coll. “Verdier poche,” 2012.

“One hears vi­brat­ing the voice of the bell of the tem­ple of Guion re­peat­ing: ’Ev­ery­thing is un­sta­ble in this world.’ The bright­ness of the teak flower pro­claims that the most flour­ish­ing go in­fal­li­bly to ru­in. The proud do not sub­sist long and their life is but the dream of a spring night. The valiant war­riors them­selves suc­cumb, like a flame ex­posed to the wind.”

Épisodes du Heiké mono­gatari (Episodes from the Heike mono­gatari), trans. from Ja­pa­nese by Gotō Sueo and Mau­rice Prunier, fore­word by Syl­vain Lévi, Paris: E. Ler­oux, 1930.

“The sound of the bells of Gion­shōja is like the echo of the im­per­ma­nence of things. The tint of the teak flow­ers shows that those who flour­ish must be brought low. In truth, the power of the proud lasts but a mo­ment, like the reverie of a spring evening. The great are de­stroyed in the end, they are but dust swept by the wind.”

Katō, Genchi, Le Shin­tō: re­li­gion na­tionale du Japon (Shin­to: Na­tional Re­li­gion of Japan), trans. from Ja­pa­nese by the Fran­co-Japanese House of Tokyo, Paris: P. Geuth­n­er, 1931.

“Ev­ery­thing is un­sta­ble in this world, says the trem­bling sound of the bell of the Sa­cred Tem­ple. The most flour­ish­ing go in­fal­li­bly to ru­in, pro­claims the bright­ness of the sāla flow­ers. The pow­er­ful proud do not sub­sist long, and their life is but the dream of a spring night. The valiant war­riors end up per­ish­ing, like a flame ex­posed to the wind.”

Satō, Teruo, “Le pathé­tique dans la Chan­son de Roland et dans le Heike-monogatari: es­sai de com­para­i­son thé­ma­tique” (“The Pa­thetic in the Song of Roland and in the Heike-monogatari: Es­say in The­matic Com­par­ison”), Bo­letín de la Real Academia de Bue­nas Le­tras de Barcelona, vol. 31, 1966, p. 273-279. (RACO (Re­vistes Cata­lanes amb Ac­cés Obert)).

“If the sound of the bell of the tem­ple of Gi-on is the echo of hu­man vi­cis­si­tudes, the pass­ing bright­ness of the flow­ers of the two sara trees shows that all pros­per­ity has its de­cline. The proud do not sub­sist long; their life is like the dream of a sum­mer night. War­riors too end up falling; they re­sem­ble a lamp ex­posed to the wind.”

Heike mono­gatari: réc­its de l’his­toire du Japon au 12^e siè­cle (Tales from Ja­pa­nese His­tory in the 12th Cen­tury), trans. from Ja­pa­nese by François Au­guste Tur­ret­tini, Geneva: H. Georg; Paris: E. Ler­oux; Lon­don: Trüb­ner and Co, 1873-1875.

“If the sound of the bell of the tem­ple of Gion is the echo of hu­man vi­cis­si­tudes, the pass­ing bright­ness of the flow­ers of the trees shows that all pros­per­ity has its de­cline. The proud do not sub­sist long; their life is like the dream of a sum­mer night. War­riors too end up falling; they re­sem­ble a lamp ex­posed to the wind.”

Bous­quet, Georges, “Le Japon lit­téraire” (“Lit­er­ary Japan”), Re­vue des Deux Mon­des, Oc­to­ber 1878.

“The sound of the Gion bell ren­ders the echo of the im­per­ma­nence of all things. The nu­ances of the teak flow­ers say that those which bloom must fade.

Yes, the brave are so but for a mo­ment, like a dream of the evening in spring. The strong end up be­ing de­stroyed, they are like dust un­der the wind.”

Haber­set­zer, Gabrielle and Haber­set­zer, Roland, “Heike-mono­gatari” in En­cy­clopédie des arts mar­ti­aux de l’Ex­trême-Ori­ent (En­cy­clo­pe­dia of Far East­ern Mar­tial Arts), Paris: Am­phora, 2000.

“From the monastery of Gion / the bell mur­murs // that ev­ery act of this world / is but van­i­ty. // And the color of flow­ers / of shara trees // demon­strates that all the liv­ing / are al­ways des­tined to die. [la­cu­na]”

“Heike mono­gatari” in En­cy­clopédie de la lit­téra­ture [Garzan­ti] (En­cy­clo­pe­dia of Lit­er­a­ture [Garzan­ti]), trans. from Ital­ian, Paris: Li­brairie générale française, 2003.

Downloads

Sound Recordings

• Par­tial read­ing of The Tale of the Heike by Olivier Mar­tin­aud, in the trans­la­tion by René Sief­fert. (France Cul­ture).
• Robert Klaus Heine­mann on The Tale of the Heike. (U­ni­ver­sity of Geneva (U­NIGE)).

Printed Works

• Par­tial trans­la­tion of The Tale of the Heike by François Au­guste Tur­ret­tini (1873). (Bib­lio­thèque na­tionale de France (B­n­F)).
• Par­tial trans­la­tion of The Tale of the Heike by François Au­guste Tur­ret­tini (1873), copy. (Google Book­s).
• Par­tial trans­la­tion of The Tale of the Heike by François Au­guste Tur­ret­tini (1873), copy 2. (Google Book­s).
• Par­tial trans­la­tion of The Tale of the Heike by François Au­guste Tur­ret­tini (1873), copy 3. (Google Book­s).
• Par­tial trans­la­tion of The Tale of the Heike by François Au­guste Tur­ret­tini (1873), copy 4. (Google Book­s).
• Par­tial trans­la­tion of The Tale of the Heike by François Au­guste Tur­ret­tini (1873), copy 5. (Google Book­s).
• Par­tial trans­la­tion of The Tale of the Heike by François Au­guste Tur­ret­tini, re­vised by Georges Bous­quet (1878). (Google Book­s).
• Par­tial trans­la­tion of The Tale of the Heike by François Au­guste Tur­ret­tini, re­vised by Georges Bous­quet (1878), copy. (Google Book­s).
• Par­tial trans­la­tion of The Tale of the Heike by François Au­guste Tur­ret­tini, re­vised by Georges Bous­quet (1878), copy 2. (Google Book­s).
• Par­tial trans­la­tion of The Tale of the Heike by François Au­guste Tur­ret­tini, re­vised by Georges Bous­quet (1878), copy 3. (Google Book­s).
• Par­tial trans­la­tion of The Tale of the Heike by François Au­guste Tur­ret­tini, re­vised by Georges Bous­quet (1878), copy 4. (Cana­dian Li­braries).
• Par­tial trans­la­tion of The Tale of the Heike by François Au­guste Tur­ret­tini, re­vised by Georges Bous­quet (1878), copy 5. (Cana­dian Li­braries).
• Par­tial trans­la­tion of The Tale of the Heike by François Au­guste Tur­ret­tini, re­vised by Georges Bous­quet (1878), copy 6. (Google Book­s).
• Par­tial trans­la­tion of The Tale of the Heike by François Au­guste Tur­ret­tini, re­vised by Georges Bous­quet (1878), copy 7. (Google Book­s).
• Par­tial trans­la­tion of The Tale of the Heike by François Au­guste Tur­ret­tini, re­vised by Georges Bous­quet (1878), copy 8. (Google Book­s).
• Par­tial trans­la­tion of The Tale of the Heike by François Au­guste Tur­ret­tini, re­vised by Georges Bous­quet (1878), copy 9. (Google Book­s).
• Par­tial trans­la­tion of The Tale of the Heike by François Au­guste Tur­ret­tini, re­vised by Georges Bous­quet (1878), copy 10. (Google Book­s).
• Par­tial trans­la­tion of The Tale of the Heike by François Au­guste Tur­ret­tini, re­vised by Georges Bous­quet (1878), copy 11. (Bib­lio­thèque na­tionale de France (B­n­F)).
• Par­tial trans­la­tion of The Tale of the Heike by François Au­guste Tur­ret­tini, re­vised by Georges Bous­quet (1878), copy 12. (Google Book­s).
• Par­tial trans­la­tion of The Tale of the Heike by François Au­guste Tur­ret­tini, re­vised by Georges Bous­quet (1878), copy 13. (Amer­i­can Li­braries).
• Par­tial trans­la­tion of The Tale of the Heike by Gotō Sueo and Mau­rice Prunier (1928). (Bib­lio­thèque na­tionale de France (B­n­F)).
• Par­tial trans­la­tion of The Tale of the Heike by Gotō Sueo and Mau­rice Prunier (1928), copy. (Bib­lio­thèque na­tionale de France (B­n­F)).
• Par­tial trans­la­tion of The Tale of the Heike by Gotō Sueo and Mau­rice Prunier (1931). (Bib­lio­thèque na­tionale de France (B­n­F)).
• Par­tial trans­la­tion of The Tale of the Heike by Michel Revon (1910). (Bib­lio­thèque na­tionale de France (B­n­F)).
• Par­tial trans­la­tion of The Tale of the Heike by Michel Revon (1918). (Google Book­s).
• Par­tial trans­la­tion of The Tale of the Heike by Michel Revon (1923). (Google Book­s).
• Par­tial trans­la­tion of The Tale of the Heike by Michel Revon (1928). (Google Book­s).

Bibliography

• Bous­quet, Georges, Le Japon de nos jours et les Échelles de l’Ex­trême-Ori­ent (Japan of Our Days and the Scales of the Far East), vol. I, Paris: Ha­chet­te, 1877. (Google Book­s).
• Bris­set, Claire-Akiko, Bro­tons, Ar­naud and Stru­ve, Daniel (ed­s.), De l’épopée au Japon: nar­ra­tion épique et théâ­tral­ité dans Le Dit des Heike (From Epic in Japan: Epic Nar­ra­tion and The­atri­cal­ity in The Tale of the Heike), Paris: Riveneuve édi­tions, 2011.
• Gol­li­au, Cather­ine (ed.), L’E­sprit du Japon (The Spirit of Japan), Le Point Références, no. 80, April-May-June 2020.
• Hérail, Francine, His­toire du Japon: des orig­ines à la fin de l’époque Meiji (His­tory of Japan: From the Ori­gins to the End of the Meiji Era), Paris: Pub­li­ca­tions ori­en­tal­istes de France, 1986.
• Hoff­mann, Yoel, Poèmes d’adieu japon­ais: an­tholo­gie com­men­tée de poèmes écrits au seuil de la mort (Ja­pa­nese Death Po­ems: An An­no­tated An­thol­ogy of Po­ems Writ­ten on the Thresh­old of Death), trans. from Eng­lish by Ag­nès Rozen­blum, Malakoff: A. Col­in, 2023.
• Satō, Teruo, “Le pathé­tique dans la Chan­son de Roland et dans le Heike-monogatari: es­sai de com­para­i­son thé­ma­tique” (“The Pa­thetic in the Song of Roland and in the Heike-monogatari: Es­say in The­matic Com­par­ison”), Bo­letín de la Real Academia de Bue­nas Le­tras de Barcelona, vol. 31, 1966, p. 273-279. (RACO (Re­vistes Cata­lanes amb Ac­cés Obert)).
• Sief­fert, René, “Le Dit des Heiké: une grande épopée sur le pe­tit écran” (“The Tale of the Heike: A Great Epic on the Small Screen”), Le Cour­rier de l’UNESCO, vol. 38, no. 8, 1985, p. 2. (UNESCO).
• Stru­ve, Daniel and Tschud­in, Jean-Jacques, La Lit­téra­ture japon­aise (Ja­pa­nese Lit­er­a­ture), Paris: Presses uni­ver­si­taires de France, 2008.