Prominent among personal ornaments were magatama (curved jewels) and kudatama (cylindrical jewels). It is generally supposed that the magatama represented a tiger's claw, which is known to have been regarded by the Koreans as an amulet. But the ornament may also have taken its comma-like shape from the Yo and the Yin, the positive and the negative principles which by Chinese cosmographists were accounted the great primordial factors, and which occupy a prominent place in Japanese decorative art as the tomoye.* The cylindrical jewels evidently owed their shape to facility for stringing into necklaces or chaplets. The Chronicles and the Records alike show that these jewels, especially the magatama, acted an important part in some remarkable scenes in the mythological age.** Moreover, a sword, a mirror, and a magatama, may be called the regalia of Japan. But these jewels afford little aid in identifying the Yamato. Some of them--those of jade, chrysoprase, and nephrite***--must have been imported, these minerals never having been found in Japan. But the latter fact, though it may be held to confirm the continental origin of the Yamato, gives no indication as to the part of Asia whence they emigrated. *Professor Takashima has found magatama among the relics of the primitive culture, but that is probably the result of imitation. **The goddess of the Sun, when awaiting the encounter with Susanoo, twisted a complete string, eight feet long, with five hundred magatama. Lesser Kami were created by manipulating the jewels. When Amaterasu retired into a cave, magatama were hung from the branches of a sakaki tree to assist in enticing her out. Several other reverential allusions are made to the jewels in later times. ***The jewels were of jasper, agate, chalcedony, serpentine, nephrite, steatite, quartz, crystal, glass, jade (white and green), and chrysoprase. Mention is also made of rakan, but the meaning of the term is obscure. Probably it was a variety of jade. YAMATO POTTERY