Urashima Tarō

Urashima Tarō (浦島 太郎) is a Japanese legend about a fisherman who rescues a turtle and is rewarded for this with a visit to Ryūgū-jō, the palace of Ryūjin, the Dragon God, under the sea. He stays there for three days and, upon his return to his village, finds himself 300 years in the future.

History

The name Urashima Tarō first appears in the 15th century (the Muromachi period), in a genre of illustrated popular fiction known as otogizōshi; however, the story itself is much older, dating back to the 8th century (the Nara Period). Older sources such as Nihon Shoki, Man'yōshū and Tango no Kuni Fudoki (丹後国風土記) refer to Urashima Tarō as Urashimako. The change from Urashimako to Urashima Tarō reflects a shift in Japanese naming customs; while the suffix -ko ("child") was originally used in both male and female names, in medieval times it was largely restricted to female names, and replaced by -tarō ("great youth") in male names.

Comparative mythology

The story bears a striking similarity to folktales from other cultures, including the Irish legend of Oisín, and the earlier Chinese legend of Ranka. The character is also used in everyday Japanese as a metaphor for someone who feels lost in a world that has changed without them, similar to the American legend of Rip van Winkle.

Urashima Tarō (anime)

Urashima Tarō (浦島太郎) is an animated film produced by Seitaro Kitayama in 1918, which was found in an antique shop in Osaka in March 2008. The film is an adaptation of a folk tale Urashima Tarō about a fisherman traveling to an underwater world on a turtle. It premiered in February 1918.

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