Last modified: 2023-06-03 by zachary harden
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image by Kazutaka Nishiura and Peter Hans van den Muijzenberg, 23 March 2014
Located at Yamagata
Prefecture.
Last lord's name: Sakai Tadamichi.
They used white field charged with
red disc and black three stars as domain's
ensign.
白地赤丸黒三ツ星旗
Nozomi Kariyasu, 23 March 2014
image by Jaume Ollé and Peter Hans van den Muijzenberg, 23 March 2014
The 2nd Battalion of Shonai Domain used a blue war flag charged with an
inverted Big Dipper (Ursa Major) called HAGUN-SHICHISEI-KI, 破軍七星旗 meaning "defeating
the enemy’s seven stars".
According to HOKUTOKI YURAIKI (the origin story of this flag, written by Genba
Sakai, the chief of 2nd Battalion of Shonai Domain), by placing the
constellation upside-down and therefore the seventh star in the first position,
the star points toward position of the Polar Star, which is called HAGUNSEI,
meaning "a star to defeat the enemy". In ancient China during the 3rd century
B.C., it was said that an army fighting toward the top star would win and an
army fighting behind the top star would lose - the star had the power to defeat
an enemy.
Nozomi Kariyasu, 23 March 2014
I don't know which star is the 1st, originally, and which is the 7th. But
over here, the two stars that are now closest two the ground normally point
together to the North Star. In the flag, they seem to point to the ground.
The story is reminiscent of the story about the Raven banner: Both teach you the
difference between good circumstances and bad circumstances- For the Raven
banner, it's a matter of attacking with a sea wind, so you can row away
afterwards while sailing foe will be unable to reach you. Here, it seems to be
about positioning your opponent with the sun in his eyes: Fighting towards the
North means your opponents are looking South.
There's one problem, though: In the third century B.C. there was no North Star.
Before that, Beta Ursae Minoris had been a fairly usable North Star, and in
times AD, Polaris (Alpha Ursae Minoris) has become the North Star, but in
between there really wasn't anything very usable. Still, I wonder whether the
constellation this story was linked to wasn't originally supposed to be Ursa
Minor. Its two brightest stars are the older and newer North Stars, thus just
one of its stars is enough to point to the North, whereas Ursa Major needs two
stars to point in a direction, of only the current North Star. And with the
progression from one North Star to the other, the constellation would have to be
turn
upside down for the story to remain as true as possible.
Peter Hans van den Muijzenberg, 24 March 2014
Yes, The star closest to hoist is the 1st star pointing Polar Star.
The flag has a hoist on left side. The three white ones are not a part of the
flag design but cloth tube to fix the flag to the flagstaff. This is common
style tube called CHI 乳 in traditional Japanese Hatasashimono.
Nozomi Kariyasu, 24 March 2014
I'm not sure how that one star would be able to point. But also, apart from
the two stars together now pointing into the ground, I don't see how flipping
the constellation would make any difference for pointing to the North Star.
If the lower hoist of a Japanese flag is the place of honour, then it makes at
least some sense, but otherwise I don't get it. The only effect I see that if
this is Ursa Major, you now have to look at the other side of the flag to see it
as it's visible in the night sky.
When is the oldest source for Hokutoki Yuraiki? Does it describe someone doing/ordering
the flipping? Or does it merely give an explanation for the current flipped
image, that may not be historical?
I've draw a version with transparent holes on both sides. I take it the "left
side" means the dexter side of the flag, but since the ones on the
sinister side look like openings as well, I made them transparent too. Since no
specific colours were mentioned, I used standard Blue, Red, and White. For the
constellation I've followed Jaume, but I've assumed yellow as the colour. As a
side-effect, it's 1/20th of the size of the other image.
Peter Hans van den Muijzenberg, 24 March 2014
Sorry but I don't have further information on this flag but think they might
consider the Polar Star as an enemy and believe flipping flag upside down could
defeat the enemy.
Hokuto Yuraiki was written by chief of 2nd battalion of Shonai Domain himself (
1843-1876). As my text says Ancient China 3rd Century B.C. used same idea for
army flag.
Shonai Domain is located Yamagata Prefecture Tsuruoka City.
Nozomi Kariyasu, 25 March 2014
I was trying to determine whether it was written contemporary with the
flipping, or whether that had occurred much longer ago. It would, of course, be
interesting to learn more about the Chinese flag, though.
It's not like Croatian ceremonial flags, where a tube is three parts with
openings in between. It's more like the Tibetan regiment
flags that have a tube, with in the middle a lozenge with a lace, so you can
tighten the tube to the flag there. A chi then has three such tightening points
(they're just not lozenges).
Do we have terms for how a flag is fixed to its bearer, BTW?
Slightly idealised, but I left in the chi patches in two colours as I don't know
which colour might be original. It's definitely a taller flag than we had
before, which gives the constellation more space. (It also has one tail more
than we had previously.)
I've used dark yellow for the stars, as that seems closest to the intended
colour. There are a lot of different colours in them in the photograph, though,
so it may be that in reality they are painted with a reflecting gold paint. If
anyone ever visits the Chido Museum, please remember to check the actual flag.
Peter Hans van den Muijzenberg, 04 April 2014