Last week, everyone researched a place name that interested them. We discovered many different stories, some of them historical, some of them mythical.
We also learned a few things about place names in Tokyo specifically:
1) Many of them have histories stretching back to the Edo Period (1600-1868)
2) Many of them mix place names, and kanji (Chinese characters) can shift according to preferences for writing and meaning.
For the old sources and influences for Japanese place names:
Mayu wrote about the history of Kurikara Pass, between Toyama and Ishikawa. The name derives from Sanskrit (倶利伽羅), which came to Japan at least as far back as 718. Its history includes the 1183 strategy of Kiso Yoshinaka, who defeated the Heike troops by surprising them with bulls that had had torches attached to their heads. The strange sight caused panic and a massacre of the Heike, and so a valley new Kurikara Pass is called 'Hell Valley' (地獄谷).
Kabuto-cho, which Atsuya wrote about, also has a history stretching back to the Medieval period, named for the helmet (kabuto) of Taira no Masakado (903-940).
Some places named for more recent historical events include Seiseki Sakuragaoka (聖跡桜が丘). Yuuri found that 'seiseki' (sacrament) referred to the Emperor, who hunted there in the prewar period. The name changed from Sekido, a Kamakura-era name, in 1937.
Kana wrote about a street caleld Banchobunjin-dori (番町文人通り) near Yotsuya Station. Bancho was the old name for the west side of Chiyoda-ku, and 'bunjin' refers to the 'people of letters' - the authors who lived around the street: Shimazaki Toson, Izumi Kyoka, Arishima Takeo, Yosano Tekkan and Yosano Atsuko.
Mizuko, after researching the place names Koenji, Jinbocho, and Funabori discovered all of them had roots in the Edo Period, and that many places in Tokyo still have names that originated at that time.
Many places have seen changes of meaning and marking through the use of various kanji.
Maako wrote about how the name of Fussa came from the character for 'protect' (塞ぐ) in the Muromachi Period (1336-1573). But the characters chosen to represent the place were 'lucky life' or 'luck lives' (福生), to appeal to the gods of good fortune.
Yuki S. wrote about his home town, Edacho (Eda Town). It was named for the rice fields there. But there is a difference between the kanji used for the town (荏田町) and the kanji used for the train station (江田町). It seems that when the train station was built, the character 荏 was not a common one, so they used 江 instead.
Through learning place names, we also can learn more about the names of topographical features. Aika researched the name of a place called Kaminoge (上野毛). She thought that 'noge' (field hair) was a funny word. It turns out that it means 'ledge.'
Some of the stories behind place names are not actual histories, but fantastical
stories. Masaki wrote about Odoriba (踊場). It means 'dancing place,' and apparently refers to a story about cats stealing towels from a soy sauce shop and gathering to dance when them in the night!
Yuki wrote about Madrid, which also has a kind of mythical name origin: apparently it comes from 'Run mother' (Madre huid), which some children screamed when a bear interrupted a picnic they had with their mother.
