/jp/ - Otaku Culture

>>20292879
I'm finally back after finishing Mamizou. Eiki should, thankfully, not be all that complicated. Eiki Shiki's (四季映姫 Shiki Eiki) name is not all that convoluted. Thanks to a translation fuck up, a lot of Western fans think that her first name is "Shikieiki/Sikieiki" and that her last name is "Yamaxanadu". This is not correct, however. "Shiki Eiki" is just the Japanese order of her full name, with the surname appearing before the first name. "Yamaxanadu (ヤマザナドゥ)" is just her title (she is a judge after all). In true English order her full name + title should have been formated like "Yamaxanadu, Eiki Shiki". Eiki (映姫) literally means "mirror/reflection princess" but 姫 (hime, pronounced "ki" in this case) doesn't literally mean princess in her name. It's just a feminine way to end a female name in Japanese and was (in older times) only used in the names of females of noble birth (Eiki herself is a yama, a respected position in hell). It most likely refers to 浄玻璃鏡 (Johari no Kagami), a type of magical mirror used by Enma-o and the other judges of hell that reflects all the sins of a person's life. The kanji also appears in PoFV's title, 花映塚 (Kaedzuka lit. "Flower Viewing Mound") where 花映 ("flower reflection") refers to the Japanese cultural custom of 花見 (hanami lit. "flower viewing") (which connects to the game since the flowers of Gensokyo are unusually beautiful due to blooming all at once thanks to souls inhabiting them, making it a perfect time to view flowers as expressed by many characters in the in-game dialogue). 映 can also mean to "transfer" or "move" and can refer to the transferring of souls from Higan to the flowers of Gensokyo. Shiki (四季) literally means "four seasons" and most likely refers to the incident of the game in which wandering souls cause flowers of all four seasons to bloom out of season. Her name and theming also seems to take inspiration from the obscure Chinese god, 四季花神 (lit. “Four Seasons Flower God”), but this is most likely a coincidence and nothing more. Another probable coincidence is that it could have been inspired by the Japanese name for the quarter sessions (old English courts that were held 4 times a year) is 四季法廷 (shiki hotei lit. “four seasons court”). Eiki is related to the seasons because, obviously, the game deals with flowers of every season blooming suddenly because of a vast amount of souls inhabiting them due to an event that happens every sixty years. Sixty year periods (a sexegenary cycle) was a common way of measuring and marking time in ancient China and Japan. It’s associated with the seasons and isn’t used much in modern times unless a major event (usually a war) occurs. This makes sense giving the reasoning for so much human souls appearing in Higan is apparently due to an event that happens in the Outside World about every sixty years (probably a tragedy such as a war that would cause death at a large scale). PoFV was released on August 15th, 2005. World War II ended on September 2nd, 1945, shortly after Japan surrendered on August 14th of that year, days after the nuclear bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. PoFV was released almost exactly sixty years after Japan’s surrender on August 14th, 1945. This implies that the previous flower blooming incident in Gensokyo occured because of the mass death that happened due to the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. What happened in the Outside World on August 2005 to cause PoFV’s flower blooming is a mystery, but it's most likely some sort of war. Getting back on track, Eiki's title, ¨Yamaxanadu (ヤマザナドゥ)” combines both Yama (the Hindu god of death and the old name for Japan's judge of hell, Enma) and Xanadu (the summer palace of Kublai Khan which in modern days is just a synonym for ¨paradise”). Thus, it would translate to Yama (Judge) of Paradise” which is extremely similar to Eiki's other title, Supreme Judge of Paradise (楽園の最高裁判長). However, in Touhou, "yama" is a species and not an individual. It isn't reserved for Enma-O. Eiki's omake.txt and PMiSS article reveal that "Yamaxanadu" is not a unique title, it just goes to the yama currently in charge of Gensokyo (Eiki). This implies that many yama were assigned to Gensokyo before Eiki and that Eiki herself won't be Gensokyo's yama forever. A lot of people, even Japanese fans, mistakenly think that Eiki is based on the main judge of Japanese hell, Enma-O (閻魔王 lit. "King Enma" also known as Emma or Enma-Daio 閻魔大王 lit. "Great King Enma" and used to be referred to as Yama). Eiki is not Enma, she is never called Enma in the series at all. Enma used to be called Yama because he's actually based on the Hindu god of death, Yama (यम), because Buddhism, as you probably already know, originated in the Indian subcontinent and was heavily influenced by Hinduism. Enma is the fifth of the Ten Kings (Ju-o 十王) of Hell (Naraka/Jigoku) that judge the souls of the deceased. In Touhou, each of these hell kings is still called a yama (species, not capitalized).