Japan's 72 Microseasons - #62
"Bears Hibernate In Their Dens"
December 12 - 16
熊蟄穴
くまあなにこもる
Kuma, ana ni komoru
”Bears hibernate in their dens”
In many indigenous cultures across the northern hemisphere, bears are venerated as much as they are feared for their strength and power. In the culture of Japan’s indigenous1 Ainu and Emisihi peoples, they are worshipped as the head of the kamuy: entities that possess great spiritual energy, divinely separate to human beings, gods given shape and form in this world.
But even the strong and the holy need to rest and stay warm with their families.
Although not an animal commonly associated with the popular image of the Japanese islands, there are two types of bear that inhabit the country: the Tsuki-no-waguma (月輪熊, Japanese black bear) and the Ezo-higuma (蝦夷ヒグマ , Ezo brown bear). The black bear is mainly found north of Tokyo in more mountainous areas, and the brown bear in Hokkaido2 as well as its outlying islands that stretch towards Russia. The latter look quite similar to grizzlies and Kodiak bears, but is a distinct species native to the islands and generally less aggressive. Neither is as terrifying as the painting at the top here would suggest.
That is not to say, of course, that they’re not at all dangerous. Both species of bear come across unwary hikers every year, or wander into remote villages or mountain towns looking for food (especially as human development encroaches on more of their natural environment and hunting range). First-time visitors to Japan may be surprised to see the amount of bear warnings, and any popular hiking trail with a shop will sell “bear bells,” which jingle to alert bears of your presence and (hopefully) prevent any mutually surprising encounters. Such encounters usually happen in the spring, when protective mothers and newborn cubs emerge from their dens in search of food.
Kō 62 is exactly as it sounds: the time when these bears seek out a nice, safe place to make a den and enter hibernation. Black bears in the hollow of a tree or cave, and brown bears by digging into a slope. In the months leading up to their winter break, bears will seek out as much food as they can to build up a good layer of fat. Their main target? The humble acorn.
Rich in fats, protein, and carbs, as well as a variety of healthy vitamins like niacin, acorns make a great snack for bears bulking up. Bears are naturally skilled climbers of trees3 and upon finding one laden with autumn acorns will scale the branches as high as they can, eating along the way. When they can go no further, they pull smaller branches towards them and make themselves something resembling a giant bird nest. This impromptu arboreal seat is called kuma-dana (熊棚) in Japanese: a bear-shelf.
The word “hibernation” sometimes carries an image of being completely shut down for a fixed period of time, but in reality it’s more like a low-power mode. During this state of semi-sleep, bears heart rate and breathing slows, and they don’t eat or drink, but they’re still plenty aware of their surroundings and, if disturbed4, perfectly capable of shaking off the slumber. Part of the reason to stay so aware even in the stillness of winter: this is also often when cubs are born.
The newborns will nurse in the den, staying close and warm with their mother, sleeping on or under her soft fur. When they’re ready to move around on their own (one imagines kids excitedly shaking drowsy parents awake), the family goes out together to see what spring has brought in the new year.
The Japanese word for “hibernation” is tōmin (冬眠, lit. “winter sleep”), but this kō and most people refer to it as fuyu-gomori (冬ごもり), which uses the native Japanese pronunciation for the winter kanji “fuyu” and the word komoru5, which means “to seclude oneself” or “to hide away.” These days, the word is often seen in English speaking spaces via the term hikikomori (引きこもり), which describes a person who has withdrawn from society to live as a shut-in at home.6
In the kanji version of the kō’s name, this concept is represented by the character 蟄, which longtime readers may remember from way back in Kō 7 when we talked about hibernating insects emerging from their winter homes. As noted there, it’s an older character that mainly holds on in these types of archaic uses. And however it’s referred to or written in any age, animal hibernation has long served as a symbol of winter and the end of the year.
Before you go into hibernation yourself, it’d be good to fill up your belly a little first. If there’s no handy trees to climb nearby, here’s a few alternatives:
● Seasonal fish
hamachi, ハマチ, young amberjack● Seasonal vegetable
negi, ねぎ, spring onion● Seasonal flower
tsubaki, 椿, camellia
The Ainu believed bears to be the earthbound embodiment of the gods. When they found an abandoned cub, or killed a mother with children too young to fend for themselves, they would take the young bear back to their homes to raise it, treating it with the honor and comforts naturally afforded to such an esteemed guest from far, far away. When it reached adulthood some years later, they would sacrifice it to send it home in a ritual called Iomante, which means “seeing someone off.” In this case, the kamuy would return to its divine world separate from ours.
For most of us, we’re unlikely to ever encounter a bear face-to-face, much less invite one into our homes to share our food and fires. Even still, we think about how they spend the winter, and can’t help but compare it to our own seasonal sheltering. We may be unseen to one another, living in what feels like completely different, untouchable worlds, but at the end of the day, we’d all like to spend those cold nights warm, safe, and well-fed.
May the season bring you all that and more.
See you next kō~
Thanks to all of your kind words and much appreciated shares, we flew past my humble little goal of 150 subscribers! I’d be tempted to set another one, but part of the goal to this writing is appreciating what’s in front of you and being present, so I’ll just say thank you and I hope you continue to enjoy your time here
[Images & info courtesy of kurashikata.com, kurashi-no-hotorisya.jp, 543life.com, and Wikipedia except where otherwise noted]
Japan as a nation, like many, has a…complicated history with its indigenous peoples: the most well-known of which are the Ainu, who were gradually driven off Honshū to the northern island of Hokkaido; and the Ryūkyūan/Uchinaa, some names for the dozens of distinct groups of people who have inhabited the chain of islands now known as Okinawa and Kagoshima Prefectures far prior to when the Meiji Government of Japan formally claimed them in 1879
The Matagi people are thought to have split off from the Ainu as the latter moved northward into Hokkaido, sharing some traditions and language while also developing their own unique culture around hunting and bear worship—it was they who bred and propagated the Akita dog breed
Others, such as the Emishi and the Mishihase are all but disappeared: conquered, killed, or assimilated as the Empire that would become Japan expanded
What is now considered by most to be the “homogenous” Japanese ethnicity is in fact a long-term assimilation of three distinct groups who arrived from mainland and Southeast Asia at different points: the Jōmon (thought to be the first arrivals to the archipelago, circa 14,000 BCE), then the Yayoi and the Kofun
It’s believed that the Yayoi gradually became the dominant group, forming the Yamato Empire (with “Yamato” coming to refer to “true Japanese,” a linguistic phenomenon still present in certain biological names for flora and fauna endemic to Japan)—the Jōmon peoples that weren’t assimilated into the Yamato culture migrated to the north and south from central Honshū, mixing with other indigenous populations to form groups such as the Ainu and Ryūkyū
Needless to say, a full overview of Japan’s indigenous history is well beyond the scope of this newsletter, but Japan is far more ethnically and culturally diverse than is often claimed or represented within or outside the country—if you’ve read this far and are still interested, a great place to start is with Unseen Japan’s video essay The Colonization of Hokkaido and their article The Indigenous Ryukyu People of Okinawa
Anyway, we should both get back to the top of the newsletter
The word “Ezo” (蝦夷, lit. “shrimp barbarians”) historically referred to both the “wild, uncivilized” lands north of Edo/Tokyo, as well as the people who lived there
These days, it’s mainly used in the names of flora and fauna native to the region, such as the Yezo sika deer (“Yezo” being an early romanization of “Ezo” due to a perceived y sound to English ears, which still exists in the word “yen” and the beer "Yebisu”)
Thus the old advice of climbing one to escape will not help you
Which is best avoided
In Japanese compound words, words that originally began with a hard consonant sound like K get softened—in this case to a G sound—this phenomenon is called rendaku (連濁)
The change from komoru to komori is the change from a verb to a noun: “to hide away” versus “the act of hiding away”
This is, of course, not a unique problem to Japan—same as the Nordic hygge we talked about last time, it’s generally just the first place to name and highlight a thing becomes associated with it