Japanese Numbers Game (Nissan Institute/Routledge Japanese Studies)

224 Pages·1992·1.3 MB·English

by  T Crump

The Japanese numbers game
The Nissan Institute/Routledge Japanese Studies Series
Editorial Board:

J.A.A.Stockwin, Nissan Professor of Modern Japanese Studies,
University of Oxford and Director, Nissan Institute of Japanese
Studies
Teigo Yoshida, formerly Professor of the University of Tokyo, and
now Professor, The University of the Sacred Heart, Tokyo
Frank Langdon, Professor, Institute of International Relations,
University of British Columbia, Canada
Alan Rix, Professor of Japanese, The University of Queensland
Junji Banno, Professor, Institute of Social Science, University of Tokyo
Other titles in the series:
The Myth of Japanese Uniqueness, Peter Dale
The Emperor’s Adviser: Saionji Kinmochi and pre-war Japanese
Politics, Lesley Connors
Understanding Japanese Society, Joy Hendry
Japanese Religions, Brian Bocking
Japan in World Politics, Reinhard Drifte
A History of Japanese Economic Thought, Tessa Morris-Suzuki
The Establishment of Constitutional Government in Japan,
Junji Banno, translated by J.A.A.Stockwin
Japan’s First Parliaments 1890–1910, R.H.P.Mason,
Andrew Fraser, and Philip Mitchell
Industrial Relations in Japan: the peripheral workforce,
Norma Chalmers
Banking Policy in Japan: American attempts at reform during the
occupation, William Minoru Tsutsui
Educational Reform in Contemporary Japan, Leonard Schoppa
How the Japanese Learn to Work, Ronald Dore and Mari Sako
Militarization in Contemporary Japan, Glenn Hook
Japanese Economic Development: theory and practice,
Penelope Francks
Japan and Protection, Javed Maswood
Japan’s Nuclear Development, Michael Donnelly
The Soil, by Nagatsuka Takashi: a portrait of rural life in Meiji
Japan, translated and introduced by Ann Waswo
Biotechnology in Japan, Malcolm Brock
Britain’s Educational Reform: a comparison with Japan,
Michael Howarth
Language and the Modern State: the reform of written Japanese,
Nanette Twine
Industrial Harmony in Modern Japan: the invention of a tradition,
W.Dean Kinzley
Japanese Science Fiction: a view of a changing society,
Robert Matthew
The Japanese numbers
game

The use and understanding of
numbers in modern Japan

Thomas Crump

London and New York
First published 1992
by Routledge
11 New Fetter Lane, London EC4P 4EE
This edition published in the Taylor & Francis e-Library, 2003.
Simultaneously published in the USA and Canada
by Routledge
a division of Routledge, Chapman and Hall, Inc.
29 West 35th Street, New York, NY 10001

© 1992 Thomas Crump
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or
reproduced or utilized in any form or by any electronic,
mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter
invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any
information storage or retrieval system, without permission in
writing from the publishers.

British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data
Crump, Thomas
The Japanese numbers game: the use and understanding of
numbers in modern Japan.
1. Japan. Numbers. Sociology
I. Title II. Nissan Institute of Japanese Studies
306.45

ISBN 0-203-03897-5 Master e-book ISBN

ISBN 0-203-22170-2 (Adobe eReader Format)
ISBN 0-415-05609-8 (Print Edition)

Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data
Crump, Thomas.
The Japanese numbers game: the use and understanding of numbers
in modern Japan/Thomas Crump.
p. cm.— (The Nissan Institute/Routledge Japanese Studies
series)
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 0-415-05609-8
1. Folklore—Japan. 2. Numerals—Folklore. 3. Symbolism of
numbers—Japan. 4. Japan—Civilization—1945– 5. Japan—Social
life and customs. I. Title. II. Series.
GR340.C78 1992
398(cid:1).356(cid:1)0952–dc20 91–10047
CIP
Contents
List of figures vi
List of tables vii
General editor’s preface viii
Preface x
1 The numerical paradox 1
2 Numbers in the written and spoken language 14
3 Alternative number systems 33
4 The culture of numbers 46
5 What’s in a Japanese name? 63
6 Fortune-telling 76
7 Time 96
8 The spatial world of numbers 114
9 The Japanese abacus 126
10 Games—ancient and modern 139
11 The ecology of numbers—past and present 155
Notes 163
References 196
Index 202

v
Figures
3.1 Simple and complex mandala 38
3.2 Gogy) 40
3.3 Kanshi 42
4.1 Why 10=10,000 55
5.1 Seimeigaku 69
5.2 Gogy) equivalents of the kana syllabary 71
6.1 Omikuji temple scene 78
6.2 Omikuji written advice 79
6.3 The basic h)iban 86
6.4 The directional magic square 87
6.5 The order of numbers in the nine h)iban in the ky*sei
cycle 88
6.6 Ky*sei cycles of good and ill fortune 90
7.1 Yakudoshi 103
7.2 The ritual cycle of life and death 105
7.3 The production cycle in the perspective of life and
death 108
8.1 Japanese floor-plans 123
9.1 The Japanese abacus 128
9.2 Abacus multiplication 129
10.1 Sumo: the Kanroku scale 152

vi
Tables
2.1 Chinese numerals 26
3.1 Trigrams 37
3.2 Jikkan j*nishi 44
6.1 Nenrei hayamihy) 82
6.2 Nenrei hayamihy) (English version) 83
6.3 The nine ky* 84
6.4 Affinity between man and woman 85
6.5 The lines of trigrams and hexagrams 93

vii
General editor’s preface
Now that we are in the 1990s, most would agree that Japan is a
nation of absolutely first-rate significance. The successes of the
Japanese economy and the resourcefulness of her people have long
been appreciated abroad. More and more people are also becoming
aware of the increasing impact of Japan on the outside world in a
widening variety of fields of endeavour. This tends to produce
painful adjustment and uncomfortable reactions. It also leads to the
formation of stereotypes and arguments based on outdated or ill-
informed ideas.
The Nissan Institute/Routledge Japanese Studies Series seeks to
foster an informed and balanced—but not uncritical—
understanding of Japan. One aim of the series is to show the depth
and variety of Japanese institutions, practices and ideas. Another is,
by using comparison, to see what lessons, positive and negative, can
be drawn for other countries. There are many aspects of Japan
which are little known outside that country but which deserve to be
better understood.
The Japanese popular use and understanding of numbers is
something which is hardly known at all outside Japan. Dr Thomas
Crump, writing from the perspective of social anthropology,
introduces the reader in fascinating detail to the world of numbers
in which fortune-telling, the abacus, games involving numbers as
well as curious numerical names (of both people and places)
illustrate a popular obsession with systems of counting,
calculation and forecasting. The cultural roots of attitudes towards
numbers are meticulously explored, and suggestions are made
about the contemporary implications of a culture in which
mechanical numeracy (and number obsession) is general but the
highest levels of academic mathematics still fall short of world
standards. Dr Crump takes the reader through intriguing byways
viii
General editor’s preface ix
which suggest that many Japanese people truly treat numbers as
their friends.
J.A.A.Stockwin
Director, Nissan Institute of Japanese Studies
University of Oxford