Urashima Tarō (otogi-zōshi)

Urashima Tarō (浦島太郎) is a Japanese otogi-zōshi in one volume.

Date, genre and title

Urashima Tarō was composed during the Muromachi period.[1] It is a work of the otogi-zōshi genre.[1] Most of the surviving manuscripts of the work give its title as simply Urashima, written in hiragana.[1]

Plot

Urashima Tarō of Tango Province spares the life of a turtle he has caught and releases it.[1] The next day a beautiful woman arrives on a small boat, and requests Tarō escort her back to her country.[1] He takes her to her home in the Dragon Palace, and becomes her husband.[1] Three years later, he becomes homesick and requests her leave to go visit his home.[1] His wife protests, but allows him to return home for time, admitting that she is the turtle[lower-alpha 1] he saved and entrusting him with a box as a keepsake, which she warns him never to open.[1] On Tarō's return to his home, he learns to his shock that 700 years have passed.[1] Without thinking, he opens the box he had received from his wife, and from it emerges purple cloud[lower-alpha 2] and his form changes.[1][lower-alpha 3] He becomes a crane and at Hōrai meets again with the turtle.[1][lower-alpha 4] After this, he appears as the god Urashima-myōjin (浦島明神).[1]

Textual tradition

The work is generally in one kan (scroll or book).[1] It survives in numerous manuscripts, including:

  • a fragmentary picture scroll in the holdings of the Japanese Folk Crafts Museum, dating to the middle of the Muromachi period and including only the latter portion of the work;[1]
  • a picture scroll from the late Muromachi period, also in the holdings of the Japanese Folk Crafts Museum;[1]
  • a manuscript in the holdings of the Dai-Tōkyū Kinen Bunko (大東急記念文庫);[1]
  • the Takayasu-kyūzō-bon (高安旧蔵本), which is of a different textual line to the above three copies;[1]
  • the Tokushi-kyūzō-bon (禿氏旧蔵本), which is close to the later printed text (see below);[1]
  • a manuscript in the holdings of the Akagi Archive (赤木文庫, Akagi-bunko), which is of the same line as the printed text.[1]

It was also printed as part of the Otogi-Zōshi Nijūsan-pen (御伽草子二十三編).[1]

There is also a picture scroll containing no text, the Urashima-shin Emaki (浦島神絵巻).[1]

Notes
  1. Some texts have her as the daughter of the Dragon King (竜女, ryūnyo) or as Oto-hime.[1]
  2. Some texts have smoke or white mist.[1]
  3. Picture scrolls from the mid-Muromachi period, but not later, have smoke from his funeral pyre seen in the Dragon Palace, and Oto-hime transforming into a turtle to come and mourn him herself.[1]
  4. Picture scrolls from the late Muromachi period end the story here.[1]

References
  1. Fujii 1983, p. 318.

Works cited
  • Fujii, Takashi (1983). "Urashima Tarō". Nihon Koten Bungaku Daijiten 日本古典文学大辞典 (in Japanese). 1. Tokyo: Iwanami Shoten. p. 318. OCLC 11917421.CS1 maint: ref=harv (link)
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