Tokoyo no Kuni

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Tokoyo no Kuni 常世国, 常世の国

"Tokoyo" is an archaic word which has also been spelled with the character for "night" (常夜).



Land with a blessed climate
Land where flowers blossom the whole year
Land where bees and butterflies abound


quote
The Eternal Land (of Shinto).
situated across the ocean.
Legendary accounts describe tokoyo no kuni as a world blessed with boundless wealth, pleasure, and peace. Those who came from tokoyo no kuni to visit this world were thought to impart special blessings.
Seems to have originally been a religious concept of a dwelling place for purified souls of the dead,
but the word was also used to refer to actual foreign countries.
source : www2.kokugakuin.ac.jp


quote
. . . . . a mysterious land of legend which appears in literature and mythology. The Furukoto Fumi and Yamato Bumi depict it as a faraway land beyond the seas of Nakatsu Kuni. The water god, Watatsumi, also has his kingdom within Tokoyo no Kuni, suggesting that the land could also be underwater. People have traveled and returned from it. Mythology generally emphasizes that it is a treasure trove of unknown wonders.

Emperor Jinmu's elder brother, Mikenu-no-Mikoto, has been noted to cross the waters to it but is never seen or heard from again. This and other similar accounts of the land imply that it is a place for the dead. It is not to be confused with Yomi no Kuni, since there are no written records of anyone suffering within Tokoyo no Kuni. Takahashi no Mushimaro's song regarding Urashimako's visit to a dragon palace under the sea emphasized that it was an utopia of immortality and eternal youth. Time itself flows at a different pace than the land outside of it, creating the implications that it was another world.

"Tokoyo" is an archaic word which has also been spelled with the character for "night" (常夜). From this meaning, it can be interpreted as a land of endless nights. The word has also been argued as the name for a deity's permanent resting place, a boundary which separates the world from the dead, or a land without change.
source : koei.wikia.com/wiki


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Omizutori, お水取り Nara
The water of youth which rises at the foot of the Pavilion of the Second Moon (Nigatsu-Do), like that which bubbles up in family wells, thus comes from the other world. It is carried by waves from the distant land of the gods, the land of Tokoyo, a world both sombre and luminous, a land of abundance and immortality, but also the resting place of the dead on the other side of the sea.

. O-Mizutori Ceremony お水取り Nara .

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- - - - - Legendary people who have reached this place:

Mikenu no Mikoto, Mikenu-no-Mikoto 御毛沼命
quote
. . . . . Toyotamabime could not bring herself to abandon the child, and took him up and returned with him to her palace in the sea. Since she felt it unfit that an offspring of the Heavenly Grandchild be raised within the sea, however, she gave him to her sister Tamayoribime to be taken to the land.
Ugayafukiaezu later married his aunt Tamayoribime and fathered the kami Itsuse no mikoto, Inahi no mikoto, Mikenu no mikoto, and Kamuyamatoiwarebiko (Emperor Jinmu).
source : Mori Mizue, Kotogakuin 2005


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. Sukunabikona no kami 少彦名神 .


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Tajimamori, Tajima Mori 田道間守命 (maybe from Korea)
ancestor of Mikan and Sweets

quote
Again the Heavenly Sovereign sent Tajima-mori, ancestor of the Chiefs of Miyake, to the Eternal Land to fetch the fruit of the everlasting fragrant tree. So Tajima-mori at last reached that country, plucked the fruit of the tree, and brought of clubmoss eight and of spears eight; but meanwhile the Heavenly Sovereign had died.
Then Tajima-mori set apart of clubmoss four and of spears four, which he presented to the Great Empress, and set up of clubmoss four and of spears four as an offering at the door of the Heavenly Sovereign's august mausoleum, and, raising on high the fruit of the tree, wailed and wept, saying:
"Bringing the fruit of the ever-lasting fragrant tree from the Eternal Land,
I have come to serve thee;"
and at last he wailed and wept himself to death.
This fruit of the everlasting fragrant tree is what is now called the orange.

. . . The meaning of this name, which is written phonetically both here and in the "Chronicles," has, given rise to differences of opinion, some deriving it from the name of the province of Tajima (itself of obscure origin) and from the word mori "keeper," while others think it comes from tachibana, the Japanese word for orange, with reference to the story here told. The supporters of the former view, on the other hand, derive the tachibana from Tajima-mori.
source : www.sacred-texts.com


. WKD : tachibana 橘 (たちばな) Tachibana citrus fruit .


. Kaso Jinja 菓祖神社 Kaso Shrine, "Sweets Shrine", Kyoto .
- - - - - Deities in residence - - - - -
Tajimamori no Mikoto 田道間守命
Hayashijooin no Mikoto 林浄因命

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. Urashimako 浦島子, Urashima Taro 浦島太郎 .


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source :　withkanon.exblog.jp


常世なす秋日に煌と澄む舞楽
Tokoyo nasu akibi ni kira to sumu bugaku

like in Shangri-La
the court dancers sparkle
in the autumn sun

Oota Kooson 太田鴻村 Ota Koson

. Miyajima Court Dance 宮島, at Itsukushima Shrine 厳島神社 .

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遠しとは常世か黄泉か冬霞
tooshi to wa tokoyo ka yomi ka fuyugasumi

far away - does that mean
heaven or the yellow springs ?
mist in winter

Nakamura Sonoko 中村苑子(1913-2001)
Born in Shizuoka

. WKD : fuyugasumi 冬霞 winter mist .


. yomi 黄泉 "the yellow springs" .

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うすうすと鳥引く夕を常世とも 吉本和子
しらやまは常世の国やましら酒 仁藤稜子
カルデラの常世寂たる枯野かな 東 柊村
乳房は常世の闇か白梅か 栗林千津
五月雨のいつしかやみて常世かな 飯塚英雄
冬あざみ咲きて常世の岬道 細見綾子 存問
壁かげの雛は常世に冷たうて 臼田亞浪 定本亜浪句集
島影の常世に眠り照りかすむ 臼田亞浪 定本亜浪句集
姉消えて常世に立てる蛇の高さ 安井浩司
岩羊歯や常世の風の吹きわたり 沢木欣一

山々は常世づくりて夏かすみ 太田鴻村
牛も聞くらむ隠岐の郭公常世めく 太田鴻村
常世なす秋日に煌と澄む舞楽 太田鴻村 穂国
常世にもきつとある筈衣紋竹 加倉井秋を 『風祝』

日溜りに常世ほどよき寒の梅 中村祐子
流し雛スクラム組みて常世行 阿波野青畝
漕ぐよ常世へ帰る者なき真杉の船 高柳重信
草庵の夏や常世の一夜鮓 尾崎紅葉
蓬莱や蚕のすがる常世物 桃隣
蕃淑常世が鉢にちぎりけり 黒柳召波
遠くみるとき刈田常世の連結器 柴田美代子
雛の宿常世の濤のふところに 竹中宏
source : HAIKUreikuDB


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source :　thecountryofperpetuity

The country of perpetuity

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