Mount Penglai

 

Mount Penglai
Penglai (Chinese characters).svg
"Penglai" in Traditional (top) and Simplified (bottom) Chinese characters
Chinese name
Traditional Chinese 蓬萊仙島
Simplified Chinese 蓬莱仙岛
Japanese name
Kanji 蓬莱

  

Penglai (Chinese: 蓬萊仙島; literally: "Penglai Immortal[1] Island") is a place Chinese mythology. In Japanese mythology it is called Hōrai.[2]

Since before the Qin dynasty people said that immortals live there.[3]

In the story of Urashima Tarō Mount Penglai is linked with Tokoyo. In the original Chinese text, Mount Penglai is called Horai, but it's also noted that it should be pronounced as Tokoyo-no-kuni.[4][5]

Related pages

References

  1. The character literally refers to a Daoist holy person/immortal or a mythological being, but is often used to describe places which exhibit the qualities of these beings.
  2. McCullough, Helen. Classical Japanese Prose, p. 570. Stanford Univ. Press, 1990. ISBN 0-8047-1960-8.
  3. Ng, Wai-ming (2019). Imagining China in Tokugawa Japan : Legends, Classics, and Historical Terms. Albany: State University of New York Press. p. 190. ISBN 978-1-4384-7308-6. OCLC 1089524439.
  4. McKeon (1996).
  5. Poulton, M. Cody (2001), Spirits of Another Sort: The Plays of Izumi Kyōka, Center for Japanese Studies, the University of Michigan, p. 88, ISBN 9780939512010
  • "Horai". Kwaidan: Stories and Studies of Strange Things (digital version @ sacred-texts.com). Retrieved February 22, 2006.