whom the epithet
"Tsuchi" (earth-spiders) was applied. Their identity has been a
subject of much controversy. The first mention made of them in
Japanese annals occurs in connexion with the slaughter of eighty
braves invited to a banquet by the Emperor Jimmu's general in a
pit-dwelling at Osaka.* The Records apply to these men the epithet
"Tsuchi-gumo," whereas the Chronicles represent the Emperor as
celebrating the incident in a couplet which speaks of them as
Yemishi. It will be seen presently that the apparent confusion of
epithet probably conveys a truth.

*This incident has been already referred to under the heading
"Yemishi." It is to be observed that the "Osaka" here mentioned is
not the modern city of Osaka.

The next allusion to Tsuchi-gumo occurs in the annals of the year
(662 B.C.) following the above event, according to the chronology of
the Chronicles. The Emperor, having commanded his generals to
exercise the troops, Tsuchi-gumo were found in three places, and as
they declined to submit, a detachment was sent against them.
Concerning a fourth band of these defiant folk, the Chronicles say:
"They had short bodies and long legs and arms. They were of the same
class as the pigmies. The Imperial troops wove nets of dolichos,
which they flung over them and then slew them."

There are four comments to be made on this. The first is that the
scene of the fighting was in Yamato. The second, that the chiefs of
the Tsuchi-gumo had Japanese names--names identical, in two cases,
with those of a kind of Shinto priest (hafuri), and therefore most
unlikely to have been borne by men not of Japanese origin. The third,
that the presence of Tsuchi-gumo in Yamato preceded the arrival of
Jimmu's expedition. And the fourth, that the Records are silent about
the whole episode. As for the things told in the Chronicles about
short bodies, long limbs, pigmies, and nets of dolichos, they may be
dismissed as mere fancies suggested by the name Tsuchi-gumo, which
was commonly supposed to mean "earth-spiders." If any inference may
be drawn from the Chronicles' story, it is that there were Japanese
in Yamato before Jimmu's time, and that Tsuchi-gumo were simply bands
of Japanese raiders.

ENGRAVING: AINUS (INHABITANTS OF HOKKAIDO, THE NORTHERN ISLAND)

They are heard of next in the province of Bungo (on the northeast of
Kyushu) where (A.D. 82) the Emperor Keiko led an army to attack the
Kumaso. Two bands of Tsuchi-gumo are mentioned