Wa is the oldest attested name of Japan and ethnonym of the Japanese people. From Chinese and Korean scribes used the Chinese character to refer to the various inhabitants of the Japanese archipelago, although it might have been just used to transcribe the phonetic value of a Japonic ethnonym with a respectively differing semantic connotation. In the 8th century, the Japanese started using the character instead due to the offensive nature of the former. Although the etymological origins of Wa remain uncertain, proposals include a transcription of the Japanese first-person pronouns waga and ware. In modern times, 倭 is used in China and Korea as a derogatory term for Japan and the Japanese people.
Etymology Although the etymological origins of Wa remain uncertain, Chinese historical texts recorded an ancient people residing in the Japanese archipelago (perhaps Kyūshū), named something like *ɁWâ, transcribed with Chinese character , pronounced *ʔuɑi < *ʔwɑi in Eastern Han Chinese.Bentley, John. "The Search for the Language of Yamatai" in Japanese Language and Literature (42.1), p. 10 of pp. 1-43. In modern Chinese dictionaries, Carr surveys prevalent proposals for Was etymology ranging from a transcription of the Japanese first-person pronouns waga "my; our" and ware "I; oneself; thou" to Wa as implying "dwarf barbarians", and summarizes interpretations for *ʼWâ "Japanese" into variations on two etymologies: "behaviorally 'submissive' or physically 'short'".1992:9–10
The first "submissive; obedient" explanation began with the (121 CE) Shuowen Jiezi dictionary. It defines as shùnmào "obedient/submissive",説文解字 graphically explains the "person; human' radical with a wěi "bent" phonetic, and quotes the above Shi Jing poem. According to the 1716 Kangxi Dictionary (), was the name of King Tuyen () of Lu ( 249 BCE). "Conceivably, when Chinese first met Japanese," Carr suggests "they transcribed Wa as *ʼWâ 'bent back' signifying 'compliant' bowing/obeisance. Bowing is noted in early historical references to Japan."1992:9 Examples include "Respect is shown by squatting",Hou Han Shu, tr. Tsunoda 1951:2 and "they either squat or kneel, with both hands on the ground. This is the way they show respect.".Wei Zhi, tr. Tsunoda 1951:13 Koji Nakayama interprets wēi "winding" as "very far away" and euphemistically translates Wō as "separated from the continent".
The second etymology of wō meaning "dwarf; short person" has possible cognates in ǎi "short (of stature); midget, dwarf; low", wō "strain; sprain; bent legs", and wò "lie down; crouch; sit (animals and birds)". Early Chinese dynastic histories refer to a Zhūrúguó "pygmy/dwarf country" located south of Japan, associated with possibly Okinawa Island or the Ryukyu Islands. Carr cites the historical precedence of construing Wa as "submissive people" and the "Country of Dwarfs" legend as evidence that the "little people" etymology was a secondary development.
Since early Chinese information about Wo/Wa peoples was based largely on hearsay, Wang Zhenping2005:9 says, "Little is certain about the Wo except they were obedient and complaisant."
According to Whitman the Wei Shu states that "Chinhan men and women are close to Wa ()" the ethnonym for the contemporary inhabitants of the Japanese archipelago and like the Wa tattoo their bodies. The Hou Han Shu identifies this as a feature of Byeonhan, stating that "their country is close to Wa, therefore they frequently have tattoos." Wa-like toponyms have been found in Byeonhan and Jinhan confederacies, hinting at a possible presence of Japonic speaking populations who were albeit grouped together with the Koreanic speaking 韓 Han.
The Japanese endonym Wa "Japan" derives from the Chinese exonym Wō "Japan, Japanese", a graphic pejorative Chinese character that had some offensive connotation, possibly "submissive, docile, obedient", "bowing; bent over", or "short person; dwarf" in modern times.
is read as *YEli in Old Korean and appears to have been the Korean word for "Japanese" and was attested as 예〯 yěy in Middle Korean. Its morphological quality is unknown along with the differing phonetic value of the first syllable.
and 和 characters The Chinese character combines the or "human, person" radical and a wěi "bend" phonetic component. This wěi phonetic element depicts hé "grain" over nǚ "woman", which Bernhard Karlgren1923:368 semantically analyzes as: "bend down, bent, tortuous, crooked; fall down, throw down, throw away, send away, reject; send out, delegate – to bend like a woman working with the grain." The oldest written forms of are in Seal script, and it has not been identified in Bronzeware script or Oracle bone script.
Most characters written with this wěi phonetic are pronounced wei in Standard Chinese:
wèi ("ghost" radical) "the state of Wei" wēi ("motion" radical) "serpentine; winding, curving" [in wēiyí "winding (road, river)"] wěi ("plant" radical) "wilt; wither; atrophy; tire, grow weary; (metaphorically) decline, fade" wěi ("sickness" radical) "paralysis; impotence" wěi ("speech" radical) "shirk; shift blame (onto others)" wèi ("food" radical) "feed (animals)" The unusual Wō "Japan" pronunciation of the wěi phonetic element is also present in: wō 踒 ("foot" radical) "strain; sprain (sinew or muscle)" wǒ ("woman" radical) "beautiful" [in wǒtuǒ "beautiful; pretty"] (In this word's case, the phonemic segments are identical, but the tonemes differ.) A third pronunciation is found in the reading of the following character: ǎi ("arrow" radical) "dwarf, short of stature; low; inferior"
Nara period Japanese scholars believed that Chinese character for Wō "Japan", which they used to write "Wa" or "Yamato", was graphically pejorative in denoting "bent down" "people". Around 757 CE, Japan officially changed its endonym from Wa to Wa "harmony; peace; sum; total". This replacement Chinese character hé 和 combines a hé "grain" phonetic (also seen in ) and the "mouth" radical 口. Carr explains: Graphic replacement of the 倭 "dwarf Japanese" Chinese logograph became inevitable. Not long after the Japanese began using to write Wa ~ Yamato 'Japan', they realized its 'dwarf; bent back' connotation. In a sense, they had been tricked by Chinese logography; the only written name for 'Japan' was deprecating. The chosen replacement wa 'harmony; peace' had the same Japanese wa pronunciation as 'dwarf', and - most importantly - it was semantically flattering. The notion that Japanese culture is based upon wa 'harmony' has become an article of faith among Japanese and Japanologists.1992:6
In current Japanese usage, Wa "old name for Japan" is a variant Chinese character for Wa 和 "Japan", excepting a few historical terms like the Five kings of Wa, wakō (Chinese Wōkòu "Japanese pirates"), and Wamyō Ruijushō dictionary. In marked contrast, Wa 和 is a common adjective in Sino-Japanese compounds like Washoku "Japanese cuisine", Wafuku "Japanese clothing", Washitsu "Japanese-style room", Waka "Japanese-style poetry", Washi "traditional Japanese paper", Wagyu "Japanese cattle".
Pronunciations
In Chinese, the character can be pronounced wēi "winding", wǒ "an ancient hairstyle", or Wō "Japan". The first two pronunciations are restricted to Classical Chinese bisyllabic words. Wēi occurs in wēichí "winding; sinuous; circuitous; meandering", which has numerous variants including wēiyí and . The oldest recorded usage of is the Shi Jing (162) description of a wēichí "winding; serpentine; tortuous" road; compare (18) using wēituó "compliant; bending, pliable; graceful". Wǒ occurs in wǒduòjì "a woman's hairstyle with a bun, popular during the Han dynasty". The third pronunciation Wō "Japan; Japanese" is more productive than the first two, as evident in Chinese names for "Japanese" things (e.g., Wōkòu "Japanese pirates" above) or "dwarf; pygmy" animals. wōqī "Japanese lacquerware" wōdāo "Japanese sword" wōguā (lit. "Japanese melon") "pumpkin; squash" wōhémǎ "pygmy hippopotamus" wōzhū "pygmy hog" wōhúhóu "dwarf lemur" wōheixingxing "pygmy chimpanzee"
Reconstructed pronunciations of wō in Middle Chinese () include ʼuâ (Bernhard Karlgren), ʼua (Zhou Fagao), and ʼwa (Edwin G. Pulleyblank). Reconstructions in Old Chinese () include *ʼwâ (Karlgren), *ʼwər (Dong Tonghe), and *ʼwər (Zhou).
In Japanese, the Chinese character has Sinitic on'yomi pronunciations of wa or ka from Chinese wō "Japan" and wǒ "an ancient hairstyle", or wi or i from wēi "winding; obedient", and native kun'yomi pronunciations of yamato "Japan" or shitagau "obey, obedient". Chinese wō "an old name for Japan" is a loanword in other East Asian languages including Korean 왜 wae or wa.
Lexicography In modern dictionaries, an article by Michael Carr1992:1 "compares how Oriental and Occidental lexicographers have treated the fact that Japan's first written name was a Chinese Wō < *ʼWâ 'short/submissive people' insult." It evaluates 92 dictionary definitions of Chinese Wō to illustrate lexicographical problems with defining ethnically offensive words. In modern dictionaries, this corpus of monolingual and bilingual Chinese dictionaries includes 29 Chinese-Chinese, 17 Chinese-English, 13 Chinese to other Western Languages, and 33 Chinese-Japanese dictionaries. To analyze how Chinese dictionaries deal with the belittling origins of Wō, Carr divides definitions into four types, abbreviated with Greek alphabet letters Alpha through Delta. Α = "dwarf; Japanese" Β = "compliant; Japanese" Γ = "derogatory Japanese" Δ = "Japanese" For example, Alpha (A) type includes both overt definitions like "The land of dwarfs; Japan" (Liushi Han-Ying cidian [Liu's Chinese-English Dictionary] 1978) and more sophisticated semantic distinctions like "(1) A dwarf. (2) Formerly, used to refer to Japan" (Lin Yutang's Chinese-English Dictionary of Modern Usage 1972). Beta (B) "compliant; Japanese" is illustrated by "demütig [humble; submissive; meek], gehorchen [obey; respond]" Praktisches zeichenlexikon chinesisch-deutsch-japanisch [A Practical Chinese-German-Japanese Character Dictionary] (1983). Gamma (Γ) "type definitions such as "depreciatingly Japanese" (e.g., A Beginner's Chinese-English Dictionary of the National Language (Gwoyeu) 1964) include usage labels such as "derogatory", "disparaging", "offensive", or "contemptuous". Some Γ notations are restricted to subentries like "Wōnú (in modern usage, derogatively) the Japs" (Zuixin shiyong Han-Ying cidian [A New Practical Chinese-English Dictionary] 1971). Delta (Δ) "Japanese" is the least informative type of gloss; for instance, "an old name for Japan" (Xin Han-Ying cidian [A New Chinese-English Dictionary] 1979).
Carr evaluates these four typologies for defining the Chinese "bent people" graphic pejoration. From a theoretical standpoint, A "dwarf" or B "submissive" type definitions are preferable for providing accurate etymological information, even though it may be deemed offensive. It is no transgression for an abridged Chinese dictionary to give a short Δ "Japan" definition, but adding "an old name for" or "archaic" takes no more space than adding a Γ "derogatory" note. A Δ definition avoids offending the Japanese, but misleads the dictionary user in the same way as the OED2 defining wetback and white trash without usage labels.1992:12
The table below (Carr 1992:31, "Table 8. Overall Comparison of Definitions") summarizes how Chinese dictionaries define Wō . Definition Type Chinese–Chinese Chinese–English Chinese–Other Chinese–Japanese Α "dwarf; Japanese" 3 (10%) 10 (59%) 5 (38%) 4 (12%) Β "compliant; Japanese" 0 0 1 (8%) 4 (12%)Γ derogatory Japanese 0 1 (6%) 3 (23%) 11 (33%) Δ "Japanese" 26 (90%) 6 (35%) 4 (31%) 14 (42%) Total Dictionaries 29 17 13 33