Once upon a time, there lived an old man who made a living cutting down bamboo stalks and
making them into items to sell on Etsy.
One day, the old bamboo cutter came across a bamboo stalk that was shining at the base.
His vast experience with bamboos told him they weren’t supposed to shine like that,
and so he cut it open.
Inside was a lil baby girl the size of his finger.
The bamboo cutter rejoiced.
He was currently childless.
Surely this was a gift from the gods.
And so he took the pinky-sized bamboo babe home to his wife.
Hey did you know I’m on social media?
Follow me on Insta and Twitter where I post random things for randos.
Being awesome parents, they named her Nayotake no Kaguya-hime (なよたけのかぐや姫),
or Shining Princess of the Young Bamboo.
Or just Kaguya-hime (かぐや姫), Shining Princess.
Yeah you wish your parents named you with a title.
From then on, the bamboo cutter would often find bamboo stalks filled with gold on his
bamboo hunts.
He soon became rich, and left Etsy to host his own online store.
Kaguya-hime grew really fast into a smoking hot young lady who gave out third degree burns.
The bamboo cutter tried to keep his daughter a secret, but a beauty like that was hard
to keep secret from thirsty men.
And the thirst was real.
When Kaguya-hime reached adulthood, men of the entire realm lusted after her.
There’d be men of the stalker variety hanging around the residence just to catch a glimpse
of the bamboo cutter’s famed daughter.
The family tried their best to ignore them.
However, there were five men who were persistently persistent, for years.
They were constantly dehydrated.
And these weren’t just any men, they were all either imperial princes or people with
high positions in the capital.
These were men who used servants instead of toilet paper and were not used to rejection.
They eventually persuaded the old Bamboo Cutter to agree to a marriage.
The old man was a typical father who wanted a good marriage for his hesitant daughter
anyways.
And you couldn’t get much better than these guys.
Kaguya-hime argued at first, but being a good daughter, she finally consented.
Kinda.
She made a deal with her father.
Sure, she had to marry, but she could choose who was worthy.
She would give each of the five candidates a task to do.
Whoever completes his task would be her husband.
Her father agreed to the deal with a huge smile...
until the sly bamboo girl revealed
the tasks.
Candidate 1 had to bring to her the stone begging bowl of the Buddha.
Yeah, THE Buddha.
Candidate 2 had to go to some mythical island and retrieve the bejeweled branch of a certain
tree.
It was a tree which had silver roots, a gold trunk, and white jeweled fruits.
The Third Candidate’s task was to get her a robe made of the fur of the fire-rats of
China.
Apparently China had stories of fire-rats.
Candidate 4 had to retrieve a five-colored jewel from a dragon’s head.
And Candidate 5 had to get the seashell from a swallow.
It was said that swallows had a certain type of seashell in their bellies, which they took
out when they gave birth.
Upon hearing the impossible tasks, the old bamboo cutter was like,
“Ermm, those are impossible tasks,”
and she was like, “Ya.”
He trudged out and gave the five men their tasks.
They were like, “Ermm, those are impossible tasks,”
and he was like, “Ya.”
Well, the candidates set off on their quests.
And here’s what happened.
Candidate 1 thought he was clever and brought back a stone bowl from a random temple, pretending
it was the Buddha’s.
Kaguya-hime was not fooled because the bowl did not have a holy glow.
Candidates 2 and 3 also tried giving her fake items, and were also caught.
Candidate 4 gave up during a storm.
And Candidate 5, um, died *snort*
So they all failed and went home, except Candidate 5 who went to the underworld.
News of the event reached the ears of the Emperor and he was curious.
He pretended to go hunting near the bamboo cutter’s place, and succeeded in catching
a glimpse of this woman who would not marry.
That tiny peek was enough.
He fell in love, as emperors are wont to do, and asked for her hand in marriage.
She refused.
The Emperor, famous for his inability to recognize hints when they hit him upside the head,
kept proposing to Kaguya-hime for years.
She kept politely rebuffing him.
One day, Kaguya-hime was looking at the moon, teary-eyed.
Her parents were worried and asked her what happened.
At first she pretended it was nothing, but finally admitted her secret.
She was not of this world.
Her parents were shocked, shocked that a child born from a bamboo was not normal.
Kaguya-hime said,
“Father, the gold you found among the bamboo was sent from the heavens
to take care of me.
I am from the Palace of the Moon.
I was sent to Earth because of some obligation, but I must return soon on the night of the
next full moon.”
“Oh my god, you’re Sailor Moon!” Her father said.
“Shut up, honey,” her mother said.
With that, they all cried together.
When the day came, the Emperor sent guards to surround her house and prevent the Moon
people from taking her.
But dude, they’re celestial Moon beings, what are you gonna do?
The Moon men came down amidst the brightest moonlight they’d ever seen.
The guards were terrified, and the few arrows that were shot bounced off the invaders.
The leader of the heavenly group said that Kaguya-hime had committed a sin long ago and
for that, she had to stay for a short time on Earth.
But her punishment was over, and she must return home.
There was no fighting it.
Kaguya-hime apologized to her parents and gave them her cloak as a keepsake.
She also gave a guard the elixir of life which granted immortality along with an apology
letter and asked him to give it to the Emperor.
The Moon folk then placed a magical feather cloak around Kaguya-hime, and her sadness
disappeared, forgotten.
She had become a princess of the Moon.
Her parents were devastated and never left their beds again.
When the Emperor received the elixir of life and the letter, he was so sad that he ordered
his men to go up up to the top of a high mountain, the closest place to Heaven, and burn the
letter and elixir so that they would reach Kaguya-hime above.
The Emperor did not want to live forever if he could no longer see her.
Legends say that the characters for immortality (不死), fushi, became the name of that very
mountain: Mount Fuji (富士山).
They say the smoke from the fire continues to rise into the sky even today.
The Tale of the Bamboo Cutter is a very old story, and it’s actually a lot longer too.
The full story tells of the five candidates’ quests to retrieve the items Kaguya-hime asks
for.
The five men are actually named in the story and are all princes and people high up in
the Japanese court.
The tale makes these powerful men seem like bumbling idiots.
You can’t help but wonder if the author intentionally made fun of them.
Powerful men who have everything, reduced to groveling to a common girl.
If you’re a history fan, you can see some of the interesting customs of Classical Japan.
Notice that the five suitors never talk directly to Kaguya-hime.
She stays hidden in her chamber, unseen by outside men, as was the custom at the time.
In the full story, the suitors also write her notes and poems instead of talking directly.
I also employ this method in my love life, highly recommended.
The theme of exile is explored in the story.
Back in Classical Japan, if you did something bad as an aristocrat, they preferred to exile
you rather than kill you.
Now, exile is better than death, but it was still terrible as Emperor Sutoku would tell you.
Kaguya-hime was exiled from the Moon for something she did.
In a dick move by the author, we never find out what it was.
You could say the Moon represents the capital, and Earth some backwater village that no one
wanted to go to.
Humans in the story see the Moon as a majestic and unreachable place, similar to how peasants
saw the Japanese capital back then.
Exiled nobles must have looked toward the capital, craving the extravagant life they
once tasted.
The Tale of the Bamboo Cutter was written around the 900s.
It is the oldest surviving Japanese work of fiction.
Hey guys, if you wanna see more folktales, check em out on the side here.
And the winner of last week’s contest is user hellokitty11432!
Yay.
I’ve already shipped the book out, enjoy!
Alright, much love guys, now get out there and spread the knowledge!