,"
on account of her conquests; "Chuai" means "lamentable second son,"
with reference to his evil fate, and "Keiko" implies "great deeds."
These three sovereigns were called during life, Okinaga-Tarashi,
Tarashi-Nakatsu, and 0-Tarashi, respectively.

CRITICISM OF THE ALLEGED CONQUEST OF KOREA

By some learned historiographers the whole of the above account is
pronounced a fiction. There was no such invasion of Korea, they say,
nor does the narrative deserve more credit than the legend of the
Argonauts or the tale of Troy. But that is probably too drastic a
view. There can indeed be little doubt that the compilers of the
Nihongi embellished the bald tradition with imaginary details; used
names which did not exist until centuries after the epoch referred
to; drew upon the resources of Chinese history for the utterances
they ascribe to the Empress and for the weapons they assign to her
soldiers, and were guilty of at least two serious anachronisms.

But none of these faults disfigures the story as told in the pages of
the Kojiki, which was written before the Nihongi. It has always to be
remembered that the compilers of the latter essayed the impossible
task of adjusting a new chronology to events extending over many
centuries, and that the resulting discrepancies of dates does not
necessarily discredit the events themselves. It has also to be
remembered that the same compilers were required to robe their facts
in Chinese costume and that the consequent ill-fits and
artificialities do not of necessity vitiate the facts. In the
particular case under consideration did the Kojiki stand alone,
little doubt would ever have been entertained about the reality of an
armed expedition to Korea, under the Empress Jingo. The sober and
unexaggerated narrative of that history would have been accepted,
less only the miraculous portents which accompany it.

As to the date of the invasion, however, it must have remained
obscure: the Kojiki's narrative furnishes one clue. According to
Korean history, an apparently unimportant descent upon Sinra
(Shiragi) took place in A.D. 219; a more serious one in 233, when the
Japanese ships were burned and their crews massacred, and a still
more formidable one in 249, when a Sinra statesman who had brought on
the invasion by using insulting language towards the sovereign of
Japan in presence of a Japanese ambassador, gave himself up to the
Japanese in the hope of appeasing their anger. They burnt hi