The Story of Jigoro Kano founder of Judo

By Gary Goltz

A Boiling Cradle, written by Nicolas Messner of the International Judo Federation (IJF), offers an excellent insight into Kano’s influences that led him to develop his judo. I am sharing this article as my Black Belt Judo Blog for this week.

In the first article dedicated to Jigoro Kano, the founder of judo, we review his early childhood, his birthplace near Kobe and some of the history of Japan, to begin to understand who he was and what were the stages of his life. that he had guided him towards the creation of judo.

To understand the character even better, it is important to study his family a little closer because here again we can find the deep roots of his future motivation.

Jigoro Kano, on his father’s side, came from a line of priests, the Shōgenji, whose origins date back to the time of the Shinto god Kamotaketsunumi no Mikoto in Japanese mythology thousands of years ago. Initially located in the vicinity of Kagoshima, the Shōgenji eventually settled in Ôtsu.

Jigoro Kano’s paternal grandfather, Shōgenji Maretake, was the head priest of Hiyoshi-taisha Temple, a Shinto shrine, which is part of the list of 22 Shinto temples. It includes 22 buildings, most of which are located in the Kyoto region, listed from the Heian period (794-1185). As such, these shrines receive special offerings from the Imperial Court of Japan. Hiyoshi-taisha Temple is located in Otsu, Shiga Prefecture, east of Kyoto.

Shōgenji Maretake was reputed with special knowledge of classical Japanese poetry, as well as classical Chinese poetry, but also because of his large family, since he had no less than fifteen children (ten boys and five girls). It was one of his sons, Shōgenji Marenu, who succeeded him at the head of the Hiyoshi-taisha. One of Kano’s grandfather’s brothers, a poetry author, became a tutor to children of Japanese nobility. If Jigoro Kano did not really know those members of his family, since he was only three years old when his grandfather died, it is no less true that he bathed, from his earliest childhood, in a world where the intellectual tickle was strong.

Jigoro Kano’s father, the son of Shōgenji Maretake, was born in October 1813. Jirōsaku Mareshiba, who dreamed of discovering the world, left the family cradle and began to explore Japan. He ended up leaving his bags at Mikage, where he met the Kano family. They were an ancient Japanese lineage involved in sake brewing and trading since at least the 17th century.

Therefore, Jirōsaku Mareshiba began working with the Kanos, in this case with Jisaku Kano. The latter, very happy with the effort made by Jirōsaku Mareshiba, thanked him by giving him his daughter Sadako. Even more surprising to a modern observer, though commonplace in Japan at the time, Jisaku Kano adopted it. This is how Shōgenji Maretake took the name Kano, which later stayed in the family, which Jigoro obviously benefited from.

Over the years, Jirōsaku ‘Kano’ became the official representative of the Kanos. He was at the heart of the development of the first Japanese commercial companies, he was also one of the founding members of the first maritime line between Kobe, Oita and Edo (Tokyo) and intervened in the military-industrial development of the country. He later entered the administration and was involved in developing Japan’s trade relations in the shipyards and expanding the Imperial Palace. When Jirōsaku Kano died in 1885, he was the Secretary General of the National Army.

If we go back to Jigoro Kano’s childhood, a few years earlier, in Kobe, we are in full swing of Japan opening up to the world and contacts with the outside are intensifying. The Kano family was on the front line. Jigoro therefore inherited a strong intellectual baggage from the paternal branch and the baggage of openness to the world from the maternal branch; a mix that worked wonders.

Jigoro had two brothers (Kyūsaburō and Kensaku) and two sisters (Ryūko and Katsuko). He was the youngest of the boys. His older brother worked with his father and various families around Kobe before moving to northern Japan to start his own business. His second brother participated in the construction of the Osaka port, while his sister had three children who followed Jigoro’s teachings, later in their adulthood. We will return to this in a later article, when we focus on the achievements of the founder of judo.

It should be noted that one of his nephews, Nango Jirō, became the second president of the Kodokan. It is also important to say that most of the members of the Kano family held important positions or were married to notables in the Japanese administration, as well as in industry or the private sector. The Kano family was well established and played an important role in the development of Japan.

As we saw in the first article, unfortunately, Kano lost his mother very early, when he was only ten years old. However, although he only knew her during the first few years of her life, she continued to inspire him for a long time with her loving but strict educational approach. Sadako was a guide for Kano, whether she was physically present in his life or not. She laid the foundation for what would be her life as an educator.

It is undeniable that Kano, from his earliest childhood, displayed amazing abilities in matters of the mind. Being highly curious, he was thirsty for knowledge and flourished in discovering everything around him. His parents, later only his father, as well as his entire family, wanted the best for his children and placed great importance on education. Therefore, Kano should have attended one of Mikage’s neighborhood schools, the so-called ‘Terakoya’.

Those schools had appeared at the beginning of the 17th century. They were a kind of extension of the school structures in relation to the Buddhist temples. Before the Edo period in Japan, public schools were only for the sons of Samurai and ruling families. They then gradually opened up to the rise of the merchant class. Numerous in the big cities, as well as in rural and coastal regions, however they did not correspond to the idea that Jigoro’s parents had of learning. However, they were abolished at the beginning of the Meiji era and replaced by a system with public schools for all.

This is what Jigoro Kano said about it, (Source)

“When I was a child there were no primary schools like today and most of the children in the neighborhood went to what were called terakoyas where they received their primary education. As for me, however, my father, who was originally the son of Shōgenji Maretake, minister of Gōshū Hiyoshi Shrine, a scholar of Japanese, Chinese, and Buddhist letters, had studied Chinese letters since childhood, was adopted into the family. Kanō while passing through the surroundings of Mikage and happened to comment on the talks of Confucius, which pleased Kanō’s grandfather who finally adopted him, that is why my father did not accept that he could be sent to an ordinary terakoya. From the age of seven, Under the guidance of course from my father and my grandfather, I began to visit the home of a man named Yamamoto Chikuun, a painter from Sanuki who had a second home in Mikage where I learned calligraphy and Chinese classics in particular, then I went to a doctor named Yamagishi where they took me my first steps in kanji.”

Therefore, Jigoro Kano would attend private classes. After his mother’s death, Kanō was sent to Tokyo to meet his father. He only had one desire in life: to learn and transmit. He entered a first private course where he continued his learning of Chinese classics and calligraphy. His abilities were noticed by his master. Ubukata Keidō advised him to study English. He then enrolled in Sannyū’s private course. He then he was equipped to pursue Japanese studies and Western studies at the same time.

Very soon, Kano joined Ikuei’s private course, with teaching oriented towards foreign languages, and later entered a public school, the Foreign Language School. He continued his education marathon by entering the Kaisei school. He graduated in 1877, which opened the doors to the newly founded University of Tokyo. During a four-year college course, he became interested in economics and political science, which he completed with a year of study in philosophy.

Jigoro Kano was barely twenty years old, and his knowledge was already encyclopedic. With a well-formed head, it seemed obvious that a great career was ahead for him. Strengthened by his family heritage, he was ready to face life, however, he suffered and had been suffering for a long time due to his short stature and the teasing and bullying he received at school. He had a solution, but for that he had to study, study in a field that at first glance seemed the opposite of what he had undertaken. He had to be able to defend himself. We will see that in a future episode.

Fuente: https://blackbeltmag.com/kano-early-life