We close this chapter with an event which evinced the advance which Japanese civilization had made, and aided greatly in promoting this advance in the subsequent centuries. This event was the publication of the _Kojiki_ (Record of Ancient Things) and the _Nihongi_ (Chronicles of Japan). A book still older than these is said to have been composed in A.D. 620, but it perished in a fire in A.D. 645, although a fragment is said to have been rescued. The circumstances attending the preparation of the _Kojiki_ are given by Mr. Satow in his paper(92) on the “Revival of Pure Shintō,” and also by Mr. Chamberlain(93) in his introduction to the translation. The Emperor Temmu had resolved to take measures to preserve the true traditions from oblivion. He had the records carefully examined and compiled. Then these collated traditions were one by one committed to one of the household officers, Hiyeda-no-Are, who had a marvellously retentive memory. Before the work of compilation was finished the emperor died; but the Empress Gemmyō, who after an interval succeeded him, carried it on to its completion in A.D. 712. By her direction the traditions were taken down from Are’s dictation in the form in which we now have them. It is by no means a pleasing or attractive work, even in the opinion of the Japanese. It is bald and archaic in its form and composition. It is, however, notable as being freer from the admixture of Chinese learning, and therefore a better index of the native culture of the race than the works which followed it.(94) Much of it consists of mere genealogies of the emperors and naked statements of leading events, but there are besides this many legends and poems which bear evidence of having been handed down in essentially their present form. As an authority for the chronology of the early events it is, of course, of small value. It is evident that where a narrative of events has been carried through many centuries by tradition alone, without written records to check or assist it, no dependence can be placed on the chronology of the events, further than, perhaps, on the order of sequence. Only eight years after the publication of the _Kojiki_, a second work termed _Nihongi_ or Chronicles of Japan was issued. It was prepared by imperial command and appeared in A.D. 720 in the reign of the Empress Genshō. It differs from the older book in being composed in the Chinese idiom, and in being much more tinctured with the ideas of Chinese philosophy. These two works, so nearly contemporaneous, both of them composed in so great a degree of the legendary elements of Japanese history, must be looked upon as marking a distinct epoch in the story of Japan. CHAPTER VI. THE MIDDLE AGES OF JAPAN.