Why was Japan called Japanese country in ancient times? "Wa" means short. In ancient times, Japan has always been closely associated with the word "Japanese". Japanese people, Japanese swords, Japanese horses, etc., all specifically refer to ancient Japan.
How short were the Japanese in ancient times?
Here are a few examples. Tadakatsu Honda, who is known as the most powerful general in Japanese history, is only 1.40 meters tall. Toyotomi Hideyoshi is also only 1.4 meters tall. The best one is Tokugawa Tsunayoshi . As the shogun who controls all Japan, his height is only a little over 1.2 meters. What else is there for Echigo? The Dragon Uesugi Kenshin , The Tiger of Kai Takeda Shingen, the name is really majestic, and the height is one meter and a half...
Of course, I don't mean to belittle short people here, I just want to describe the real height of the ancient Japanese. You must know that the people I mentioned above were all great aristocrats at that time, and their material conditions were quite good. The height of ordinary people in ancient Japan must have been even worse. It is estimated that the average height was only about 1.3 or 1.4 meters. Therefore, our ancestors called Japan "Japanese" at that time. It was not necessarily a mockery, it was probably just a factual description.
Why were the Japanese so short in ancient times?
This is closely related to the fact that the Japanese islands were poor in resources and had a single crop at that time. Moreover, starting from the Asuka Period in the seventh century AD, Emperor Tenmu of Japan banned everyone in the country from eating meat because he advocated Buddhism. This ban was observed by everyone from the emperor to beggars, and it was not until 1000 years later that he was gradually relaxed. We already have less to eat, but you don’t allow us to eat meat. Doesn’t this make things worse? Therefore, until many years after Japan's Meiji Restoration, the Japanese may be one of the shortest nations in the world.
Sometimes I just think about it. During Japan's Warring States Period, the two armies were fighting. The generals on both sides looked like Tokyo Sun, waving swords that were longer than their bodies. Thinking about this scene, it felt a bit inexplicably joyful.
Which country and which nation is the tallest?
After talking about the height of the Japanese, let’s talk about which country and nation was the tallest in ancient times? Not Europe, nor North Africa and West Asia, but China. Because our old ancestors lived in this fertile land with vast territory and abundant resources, the average height has always been far ahead of other ethnic groups in ancient times. This is not bragging. Do you think we have been the title of the Celestial Kingdom for thousands of years?
Take and Song Dynasty as an example. According to the "Song History and Military Chronicles", in the Song Dynasty, if you want to become one of the 800,000 forbidden troops, you must be above 1.71 meters tall. The average height is generally between 1.75 meters and 1.8 meters. This is the height requirement of the central regular army. The local Xiang army must be over 1.62 meters tall, and the average height is generally 1.7 to 1.75 meters. In other words, in the Song Dynasty, those with a low height of 1.62 meters were not eligible to join the army, but this height could have made them a general in Japan at the same time.
Some people may wonder whether it was because the Song Dynasty army had a small number of people and our population was large at that time, so we were able to select so many tall men? You are wrong about this. According to the "Song History and Military Chronicles", during the 12th year of Emperor Taizu of the Song Dynasty, the total strength of the army reached 378,000 people, of which 193,000 were in the Forbidden Army alone! By the time of Song Renzong , the total number of troops was 1,259,000, and the Forbidden Army alone had 826,000 people! In "Water Margin", this is why Lin Chong is called the instructor of the 800,000 Imperial Army. However, at that time, the population of and in the Northern Song Dynasty was only 70 million, but there were more than one million professional soldiers, accounting for a much higher proportion of the population than in modern times. Therefore, the military height standard was enough to reflect the general height level of Chinese people at that time.
In contrast, in Europe during the same period, most of the knights, not to mention ordinary soldiers, were only about 1.6 meters tall. It was not until six or seven hundred years after the fall of the Song Dynasty that the recruitment standard in modern Europe had just reached 1.6 meters, and the average height of the army did not exceed 1.65 meters.
It can be seen from this that no one is born noble, and Europeans and Americans are not born tall. All of this is just the result of the material foundation.Our ancestors have a saying that is right, "The storehouse is enough to know the etiquette." From a small family to a large nation, money is the key to success or failure.
