Japanese syllables.
The Chinese characters in their entirety were the first symbols employed by the Japanese in writing their native tongue. These characters were used phonetically, each standing for the sound of a Japanese syllable, sometimes for a word. In this way it happened that the Japanese letters, instead of an alphabetic, took a syllabic form. The most ancient books, as the Kojiki (古事記), which dates from A.D. 711, and the Manyōshu (萬葉集), some fifty years after, were written in this way.
The first effort to do away with these cumbersome characters, and simplify their letters, gave rise to the Kana, a contraction of Kari-na, signifying borrowed names. The Kata-kana (片假名), or side letters, are the oldest and most simple. They are said to have been invented by Kibi Daishi, a man of high rank in the Court of the Emperor Kōjin, who died A.D. 776. They are derived from the Chinese characters, where, instead of the whole, only a part of the character is used; as, イ from 伊, ロ from 呂, ホ from 保. Sometimes the whole character is used; as, チ for 千. But these characters being separated, and not admitting of being run into each other as a grass hand, they have been little used, except in dictionaries, books intended for the learned, or to spell foreign names.
The Hira-kana (平假名), or plain letters, are also Chinese characters written in a running or grass hand, and more or less contracted. Thus, ゆ is the grass hand of 由, あ of 安, を of 遠. They are said to have been invented by Kūkai, a Buddhist priest, better known by his posthumous name of Kōbōdaishi, who died in the 2nd year of the reign of the Emperor Jimmyō, A.D. 835. This man is also said to have arranged the syllables in their present order of i, ro, ha, forming them into a stanza of poetry.
If the Japanese had confined themselves to a certain number of fixed symbols to represent their syllables, the labor of acquiring a knowledge of their written language would have been comparatively easy; but having such a wide field in the Chinese ideographs from which to select, they have multiplied these symbols, making that which should be simple and plain, complex and confusing, to the great annoyance and trouble of all learners, and not unfrequently even perplexing themselves. A great change, however, in this respect has been produced by the use of movable metallic types in printing and the abandonment of the old method of printing on blocks. The forms of the Hiragana syllables have consequently been reduced to two or three varieties.
The Japanese syllabary.
The Japanese syllabary consists of seventy-two syllabic sounds, and including the final ン, of seventy-three. Among these there are several having the same sound; as, イ and ヰ, ヱ and エ, ヲ and オ, ジ and ヂ, ヅ and ズ. If these be deducted it leaves sixty-eight distinct sounds.
