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偕老同穴 kairō dōketsu Grow Old Together

偕老同穴 (kairō dōketsu) is the Japanese phrase for a husband and wife who stay together to the end. It joins lines from two poems of the Book of Songs, and both poems are sad. This study follows six centuries of vows remembered at a parting, before it became the wedding congratulation itself.

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Japanese Scroll of Grow Old Together (kairō dōketsu) — Calligraphy by Eri Takase
Grow Old Together偕老同穴kairō dōketsu

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Abstract

偕老同穴, kairō dōketsu, is the Japanese phrase for a husband and wife who stay together to the end, their vow firm; the words say to grow old together while living and to lie in one grave when dead. Its two halves come from two poems of the Book of Songs, and both poems are sad, one a soldier's memory of a promise he will not live to keep and the other read either as the proper rite of husband and wife or as the oath of lovers who could not marry. In Japan the four characters stand together by the 1190s, and for six centuries most of their uses in the chronicles, the noh and the tales are a vow remembered at a parting or a death; from the Meiji letter manuals onward it is the congratulation itself, and it is also the name of a deep-sea sponge in which a pair of shrimp live out their lives. The phrase is a wedding wish whose own history is a history of mourning, and it is none the worse for it.

Overview

The sense. Today 偕老同穴 is said of a husband and wife who stay together to the end and whose vow is firm. The 精選版 日本国語大辞典 gives 夫婦が、最後まで連れそいとげること。夫婦の契りの堅いこと, husband and wife staying together to the last; the firmness of the vow between husband and wife; デジタル大辞泉 gives 夫婦が仲むつまじく、契りの固いこと, husband and wife close to each other, and their vow firm [1]. The words themselves say more: to grow old together while living, and to be buried in one grave when dead, as the 大辞泉 explains them [1]. That sense has held since the 1190s. The modern dictionaries agree that the phrase is not itself in the Book of Songs but joins 偕老 from the poem 擊鼓 to 同穴 from the poem 大車 [1]. Two further senses stand beside it. It is the name of a glass sponge of the deep sea, Euplectella, in English the Venus's flower basket, called so because a male and female shrimp live shut inside it; the name belonged first to the shrimp and passed to the sponge [1]. And one dissenting view, which the encyclopedia Nipponica reports, holds that 同穴 comes from a poem of elopement and is unfit to be joined to 偕老 at all [1].

The words. 偕 is together, 老 to grow old, 同 the same, 穴 a hole, and here a grave pit: the commentator Zheng Xuan 鄭玄 glosses it 穴謂塚壙中也, the hole is the inside of the tomb [2]. The older Japanese reading is kairō tōketsu, unvoiced, as the fifteenth- and sixteenth-century phrase books write it [3][4]; the modern reading voices the second half. The phrase is usually followed by の契り, the vow of, and spoken as a vow rather than as a description.

The text in English. The earliest known English gloss is Hepburn's of 1867: a union lasting down to old age and unbroken in the grave [5]. Brinkley in 1896 gives the literal sense and the vow beside it [6], Saitō Hidesaburō 斎藤秀三郎 in 1915 equates the phrase with the marriage service's for better or for worse [7], and the Kenkyūsha dictionary of 1942 does the same, adding the sponge [8]. The two source poems have their own English lineage through Legge, Waley and Watson, set out below.

The historical record

The Book of Songs. 擊鼓, a soldier's song. The phrase's first half is a soldier's memory of an oath, in the poem 擊鼓 of the odes of 邶:

死生契闊與子成說執子之手與子偕老　于嗟闊兮不我活兮于嗟洵兮不我信兮

In death or life, however far apart, I made a promise with you; I held your hand: with you I would grow old. Alas, so far apart, you will not let me live; alas, so far away, you will not let me keep my word [9]. The Mao preface reads the poem as a complaint against a warlike ruler [9]. The Han and Tang commentary takes the oath to be one between comrades of one squad, swearing to come through alive together, and Kong Yingda 孔穎達, in the 毛詩正義 as Wikisource transcribes it, names the reading of Wang Su 王肅, that the soldier remembers his wife, in order to reject it: 此為軍伍相約，非室家之謂也, this is a pact within the ranks, not words about a wife [10]. Zhu Xi 朱熹 in the twelfth century takes the other side: the soldier remembers his marriage vow, 期以偕老, and expects to die without keeping it [11]. Either way, the line that gave the phrase its first half is spoken by a man who believes he will not grow old.

The Book of Songs. 大車, a vow to share a grave. The second half is the last stanza of the poem 大車 of the odes of the Royal Domain:

穀則異室死則同穴謂予不信有如皦日

Alive, we live in separate rooms; dead, we share one grave. If you say I am not true, I swear it by the bright sun [12]. The Mao preface makes the poem a satire on the officials of Zhou in an age when 禮義陵遲男女淫奔, ritual had decayed and men and women ran off together, told by describing a stricter past [2]. The Mao commentary accordingly reads the stanza as the rite of husband and wife: 生在於室則外内異死則神合同爲一也, alive, in the house, inner and outer are kept apart; dead, their spirits join and are one [2]. Kong Yingda's subcommentary, as Wikisource transcribes it, spells it out: 生則異室而居，死則同穴而葬, in life they live in separate rooms, in death they are buried in one grave [12]. Zhu Xi reads it as the words of lovers who are afraid to run away together and can hope only to share a grave when they are dead: 庶幾死得合葬以同穴而已 [13]. This is the elopement reading the Nipponica entry reports.

The happy line. 女曰雞鳴. One poem in the Book of Songs uses 偕老 for a contented marriage, the dialogue of a wife and husband at dawn in the odes of 鄭: 宜言飲酒與子偕老琴瑟在御莫不静好, we will drink wine and grow old together; the two zithers at hand, everything at peace and good [14]. Zhu Xi calls it the words of a worthy husband and wife rousing each other [14]. It is not the line the phrase was built from.

223. Zhuge Liang 諸葛亮 on a joint burial. In China the half from 大車 became the scriptural ground for burying husband and wife together. Zhuge Liang, petitioning that the first ruler of Shu be buried with his empress, quotes it, in the 三國志 as Wikisource transcribes it: 《詩》曰：『谷則異室，死則同穴。』 [15]. Tang ritual debate, in the 通典 as Wikisource transcribes it, uses it the same way, 生則齊體，死則同穴, in life one body, in death one grave, and draws from it that a widow does not remarry: 故死則同穴，無再醮之義 [16].

The 1190s. A husband's memorial for his wife, in the 言泉集. The national dictionary's first citation for the four characters together is Japanese, from the 言泉集, a collection of Buddhist memorial addresses compiled in the 1190s, and the dictionary quotes it: 偕老同穴之契無レ変、合歓同心之交尤厚, their vow to grow old together and share one grave never changed; their union of one heart was deep [1]. The Diet Library's full-text search of the collection's two modern printings places the sentence in the address headed 右少辨定長爲亡室, for the late wife of Sadanaga, Junior Controller of the Right, and the sentences around it tell that since she put up her hair the two had lived together many years; then she conceived, they hoped for a son, and before long she died [17][18]. The vow is named at the moment it is broken.

The Kamakura chronicles. 保元物語 and 平治物語. In the 保元物語, as the retired emperor Toba 鳥羽 falls ill in 1156, his consort Bifukumon'in 美福門院 takes the tonsure: 近衞ノ院も先だち給ひ、又偕老同穴の御契淺からざりし法皇も、御惱重らせ給ふ, the emperor Konoe had died before, and now the cloistered emperor, with whom her vow to grow old together and share one grave was deep, lay gravely ill [19]. In the 平治物語 the wife of the courtier Shinzei 信西 is left behind at his death in the disturbance of 1159: 偕老同穴の契深かりし入道には後れ給ひぬ, she was left behind by the lay priest with whom her vow to grow old together and share one grave had been deep [20].

The Kamakura tales. 宝物集 and 撰集抄. In the 宝物集, a collection of Buddhist tales whose recensions date from about 1179 to 1183, a rich man's wife speaks of the years 偕老同穴の契りあさからすして過しに, passed in a vow that was not shallow [21]. In the 撰集抄 of the thirteenth century the phrase is said of a wife who has left the world as a nun: 年比階老同穴の契りあさからさりし女のさまをかへにけるなり (the print has 階 for 偕) [22].

The 源平盛衰記. The longest of the Heike chronicles uses it twice: for the retired emperor Go-Shirakawa 後白河 mourning his consort, 偕老同穴の玉の臺 among the images of his loss [23], and for Kenreimon'in 建礼門院 recalling the emperor her husband, 偕老同穴の昵びをなして千秋萬歳と祝ひし龍顏に別れ奉りて, parted from the face of the sovereign with whom she had lived in that vow, and wished him a thousand autumns [24].

The fourteenth century. The 太平記. In book 11, the wife of the steward of 牛原 in 越前, whose husband has killed himself, resolves to drown with her children rather than outlive him: 同じくは思ふ人と共にはかなく成りて、埋れん苔の下までも、同穴の契を忘れじと, if it must be, let me pass away with the one I love, and not forget our vow of one grave even beneath the moss [25]. In the same book, after the fall of Kamakura, the widows who will not take a second husband are 偕老ノ契空クシテ夫ニ別タル妻室, wives parted from their husbands, their vow to grow old together left empty [26].

The Muromachi stage and the tale. 楊貴妃 and 浦島太郎. In the noh 楊貴妃 the ghost of Yang Guifei 楊貴妃 remembers 偕老同穴のかたらひ with the emperor, ended when their bond ran out, and now alone on her island [27]. The tale of 浦島太郎 uses it at the marriage itself, of Urashima and his turtle-bride, 偕老同穴のかたらひも淺からず, in the same breath with the wing-paired bird and the joined branch of 比翼連理 [28].

1472. Ichijō Kaneyoshi 一条兼良 on a wedding night. The one medieval use tied to a wedding is a commentary. Explaining the rice cakes of the third night of marriage in the Tale of Genji, Kaneyoshi writes: 女の男のもとへよめ入しては二たひ父母の家にかへるましきなれは偕老同穴の契をなつけて とつくといふもしも帰の字を用たる, once a woman has gone as a bride to her husband she must not go back to her parents' house, so it is named the vow of growing old together and sharing one grave, and the word for a woman marrying is written with the character 帰, to return home [29].

1496 and 1597. The phrase books. The 節用集, the household dictionary of the age, glosses the phrase in a manuscript of 1496 as 偕老同穴 カイラウトウケツ 毛詩云夫婦堅約之儀也, the Book of Songs: the firm vow of husband and wife [3], and in a print of 1597 in nearly the same words [4].

About 1595. The 謡抄 on the noh 籠太鼓. A commentary on the noh, glossing the phrase under the play 籠太鼓, defines it: 偕老同穴トハ夫婦共ニ老テ同時ニ死シテヲナシアナニウツマレン事ヲ契リタル義也, a vow by husband and wife to grow old together, die at one time and be buried in one grave [30].

1656. A proverb. The proverb collection 世話尽 records 偕老同穴のかたらひも緣次第, even a vow to grow old together and share a grave is as fate allows; it is cited from there by the later dictionaries of proverbs, the 1899 edition of 俚言集覧 in that form [31] and the 諺語大辞典 of 1910 as 偕老同穴ノ語ラヒモ緣次第 [32].

1717. Chikamatsu Monzaemon 近松門左衛門, 鑓の権三重帷子. On the puppet stage the phrase becomes a joke about a coffin. A barrel is sung as the vessel to the land of the dead: 是ぞ冥途に通ひ樽。契りは偕老同穴と一つ棺に一つ穴, this is the barrel that goes to the land of the dead; our vow is to grow old together and share one grave, one coffin and one hole [33].

The mid-eighteenth century. A cook's book, 料理無言抄. The manuscript cookbook 料理無言抄 records that women in service refuse shrimp at celebrations, because かいらう is a word for a shrimp and the phrase sounds like it, and calls their scruple an error: 但女中方忌事あり 海老をかいらうと云 かいらうとうけつのかたらひと云て … 祝儀にたゝすと云 是甚誤也 偕老同穴ト書 … 偕老同穴とはちきりの深き事也 海老の事にてはなし, the women in service avoid it: shrimp is called kairō, and since it sounds like the vow of kairō tōketsu … they say it should not be served at a celebration. This is quite wrong. It is written 偕老同穴 … and means the depth of a vow; it has nothing to do with shrimp [34]. The pun was real: the dictionaries of 1857, 1889 and 1896 give かいらう, 海老, as a name for the lobster, the first with the genus Palinurus, the second referring it to the spiny lobster [35][36][6].

From 1807. Kyokutei Bakin 曲亭馬琴, 椿説弓張月. In the novel's sequel a retainer speaks to his wife, who has just died: 凡いきとし活る物、夫あればかならず妻あり。一世の安危を等くし、百年の苦樂を共にする、偕老同穴の契、孰かは他に思ふべき, of all living things, where there is a husband there is always a wife; the vow to share the safety and peril of one life and the joys and griefs of a hundred years, to grow old together and share one grave: who would think otherwise of it? [37]. In the illustrated popular fiction of 1821 to 1861, books written almost wholly in kana, the Diet Library's full-text search, which reads the cursive by machine, finds the phrase spelled out in kana, of married couples [38].

1876–1879. The Meiji letter manuals. The phrase becomes the congratulation. The model-letter books for every occasion give it among the phrases for a wedding letter, glossed for the learner: in 作文捷径 of 1876 and a run of manuals through 1879 it is the stock wish for a marriage [39]. A Japanese abridgement of Western etiquette in 1878 says it of a Western bridegroom, 偕老同穴ノ契ヲ結ヒシ新郞 [40].

1885 and 1889. The sponge. By 1885 a zoology textbook, in its third edition, names a genus of glass sponge 偕老同穴屬 Euplectella [41]. A fisheries report of 1889 gives the reason and the custom: the sponge's tissue is a net that always holds a male and a female shrimp, which is how it got the name, and in some regions it is an ornament at weddings [42]. Ichishima Shunjō 市島春城 heard in 1933 that around Fukuoka it had long been an indispensable wedding decoration [43].

1889–1907. The dictionaries, and an error. Ōtsuki Fumihiko 大槻文彦's 言海 of 1889 gives the two senses, the couple and the sponge with its two small shrimp [36]. Yamada Bimyō 山田美妙's 日本大辞書 of 1893 traces the phrase to a poem of Bai Juyi 白居易, モト白樂天ノ詩カラ來タ語 [44], and a dictionary of 1896 copies the attribution [45]. It is an error: neither half is Bai Juyi's. The 辞林 of 1907 restores the source, 詩經より出づ [46].

1897. Fukuzawa Yukichi 福沢諭吉 makes it an ethic. In 福翁百話, Fukuzawa titles an essay 一夫一婦偕老同穴 and writes: 開闢以來今日に至るまでの進步に於ては一夫一婦偕老同穴を最上の倫理と認め苟も之に背くものは人外の動物として擯斥す可きものなり, in all the progress since the world began, one husband and one wife growing old together and sharing one grave is to be held the highest ethic, and whoever goes against it should be shunned as a beast outside humanity [47].

1905–1906. Natsume Sōseki 夏目漱石. In 吾輩は猫である a character mocks the ideal, in the words of the book edition of 1907: 夫だから階老同穴とか號して、死んでも一つ穴の狸に化ける。野蠻なものさ (the print has 階 for 偕), so they call it growing old together and sharing one grave, and even dead they turn into two badgers in one hole; barbaric [48].

1961. The Supreme Court. A judgment on a broken engagement sets marriage apart from commerce because it is 利害を離れ愛情によつて結ばれ偕老同穴の契りを結ぶといふ神聖なるべき点にある, bound by love apart from interest, in a vow to grow old together and share one grave, which ought to be sacred [49].

Today. A wedding guide of 2024 calls it a word しばしば used in wedding speeches, and advises the speaker to explain the characters first and to avoid 老いる and 墓穴, grow old and grave, in explaining them, since those are words to avoid at a wedding [50]. The four-character dictionary at kotobank calls it 披露宴で使われる文句の極めつけ, the phrase of phrases at a wedding reception, and notes that in an age of scattered ashes the speech is coming to sound old-fashioned [1].

What is not a source. The pine trees of 高砂, which grow old together in the noh and at Japanese weddings, are the native Japanese picture of the same wish and a parallel, not a source. 比翼連理, wing to wing, branch to branch, from Bai Juyi's 長恨歌, is said in the same breath from the 浦島 tale onward and is a companion phrase. The poem 女曰雞鳴 is the happy 偕老 of the Book of Songs, but the phrase was not built from it.

The text in English

1867. James Curtis Hepburn, A Japanese and English Dictionary. Under the entry for 偕老: Growing old together, (of husband and wife) … a union lasting down to old age and unbroken in the grave [5].

1871. James Legge, The She King. 擊鼓: For life or for death, however separated, / To our wives we pledged our word. / We held their hands; — / We were to grow old together with them. 大車: While living, we may have to occupy different apartments; / But when dead, we shall share the same grave [51]. Legge follows the marriage reading in the first poem and the rite in the second.

1896. F. Brinkley, An Unabridged Japanese-English Dictionary. Becoming old together and being buried in the same spot; a very intimate attachment between man and woman … to swear to be faithful even to the grave (said of a married couple) [6].

1897. Paul Ehmann, Die Sprichwörter und bildlichen Ausdrücke der japanischen Sprache. Kairo döketsu no chigiri … Der Bund des zusammen Altwerdens und gemeinschaftlichen Grabes. Ein treuer Ehebund, the bond of growing old together and a common grave; a faithful marriage [52].

1915. Saitō Hidesaburō, Saito's Idiomological English-Japanese Dictionary. In the revised edition of 1918, under better: They have taken each other for better or for worse, 偕老同穴の契を結んだ; under cast and lot: To cast in one's lot with a partner for life, 偕老同穴の契を結ぶ, with lot adding (も進退を共にするの類), the same sort of thing as sharing one's fortunes [7]. Saitō makes the phrase the Japanese of the English marriage vow.

1937. Arthur Waley, The Book of Songs. Waley puts 擊鼓 among the songs of warriors and battles: 'For good or ill, in death as in life; / This is the oath I swear with you. / I take your hand / As token that I will grow old along with you.' / Alas for our bond! / It has not lasted even for our lifetime. 大車, as a song of elopement: Alive, they never shared a house, / But in death they had the same grave [53]. Waley's 擊鼓 keeps the poem's grief; his 大車 follows Zhu Xi's lovers.

1942. Kenkyusha's New Japanese-English Dictionary. kairō-dōketsu … be united as man and wife for weal or woe; take each other for better or for worse … A Venus's flower-basket [8].

1984. Burton Watson, The Columbia Book of Chinese Poetry. The happy poem, 女曰雞鳴: you and I growing old together, / harps and lutes at our mealtime, / nothing not peaceful and good [54].

The sponge in English. An English encyclopedia article on the Venus's flower basket says, from its first version of 2003, that in traditional Asian cultures the sponge was given as a wedding gift, with no source [55]. The Japanese witnesses above carry the shrimp, the name and a regional wedding ornament, not a gift, and the English sentence cites nothing.

Today: JMdict gives happy life partnership; living faithfully together till death, and as a second word the sponge, Venus's flower basket [56]. The English this history gives, grow old together, share one grave, is the phrase word for word, not its sense, which the dictionaries give as a husband and wife together to the end, their vow firm [1].

A reading

The phrase is a wedding wish assembled from two poems that are not about weddings, and for most of its Japanese life it was said when the vow was being lost, not made: over a wife who died soon after she conceived, beside an emperor's sickbed, by a widow about to drown, by a ghost on an island. That is not a reason to keep it off a wedding. It is what the phrase has always meant: a promise that takes the end into account. The guest who says it at a wedding table is promising what the soldier of 擊鼓 could not keep and what the lovers of 大車 could only hope for, and saying it in a happy room is the point. Read beside 比翼連理, which is a lovers' oath, and 琴瑟相和, which is a household in tune, 偕老同穴 is the most sober of the three: it names old age and the grave out loud. The sponge is a pleasing coincidence and has a real place in Japanese weddings in some regions, but the vow came first, and the sponge was named for it through the shrimp.

Notes

Japanese Scrolls by Master Calligrapher Eri Takase

Japanese Scroll of Grow Old Together (kairō dōketsu) in a block font by Master Japanese Calligrapher Eri Takase
偕老同穴VB5JBlock
Japanese Scroll of Grow Old Together (kairō dōketsu) in a cursive font by Master Japanese Calligrapher Eri Takase
偕老同穴VC5JCursive
Japanese Scroll of Grow Old Together (kairō dōketsu) in Master Japanese Calligrapher Eri Takase's own style (jiun)
偕老同穴VD5JJiun
Japanese Scroll of Grow Old Together (kairō dōketsu) in a semi-cursive font by Master Japanese Calligrapher Eri Takase
偕老同穴VS5JSemi-Cursive

Sources not seen

『言泉集』, the compilation of memorial addresses by the 安居院 preachers, in the 金沢文庫本 as printed in 『安居院唱導集』上 (角川書店, 1972), and the 東大寺北林院本 as printed in 2000; both are in the National Diet Library (pids 12261878 and 14033970) and are served only to readers in Japan. Seeing the page would settle the full text of the 右少辨定長爲亡室 address and its date, and so the date of the earliest known use of the phrase, which this history gives only as the 1190s.

A reader with access to any of these is invited to write to Takase Studios at Tim@Takase.com.

References

  1. 「偕老同穴」, デジタル大辞泉, 精選版 日本国語大辞典, 日本大百科全書 (ニッポニカ), 四字熟語を知る辞典 and 世界大百科事典 (ドウケツエビ), at kotobank. https://kotobank.jp/word/偕老同穴-458758
  2. 毛詩 二十卷, 毛亨 傳, 鄭玄 箋, movable-type print of the Keichō years (1596–1615) in the library's record, National Diet Library pid 2569978: 王風 大車, the preface scan 29, the poem's last stanza with the Mao commentary and Zheng's note scan 30. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/2569978/1/30
  3. 節用集, manuscript dated 明応5 (1496), National Diet Library pid 2545061, scan 40. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/2545061/1/40
  4. 節用集, print with a postface of 慶長2 (1597) in the library's record, National Diet Library pid 2543886, scan 45. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/2543886/1/45
  5. J. C. Hepburn, A Japanese and English Dictionary; with an English and Japanese Index, 1867 (the Japanese title spread: 慶應丁卯新鐫, 一千八百六十七年, 日本横濱梓行; the preface signed Shanghai, May, 1867), p. 169. Internet Archive japaneseenglishd00hepb. https://archive.org/details/japaneseenglishd00hepb
  6. F. Brinkley, F. Nanjō and Y. Iwasaki, An Unabridged Japanese-English Dictionary, Sanseidō, Tokyo, 1896, p. 537, s.v. Kairō and Kairō-dōketsu. Internet Archive cu31924082117288. https://archive.org/details/cu31924082117288
  7. 斎藤秀三郎『熟語本位英和中辞典』, Saito's Idiomological English-Japanese Dictionary, 正則英語学校出版部, Tokyo, first published 1915 (the Harvard copy at HathiTrust, hvd.32044086539269); read in the revised edition of 1918 (改訂版, in the colophon, scan 806), National Diet Library pid 1681530, s.v. better scan 57, cast scan 83, lot scan 379. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/1681530/1/57
  8. Takenobu Yoshitarō, ed., Kenkyusha's New Japanese-English Dictionary, American edition, Harvard University Press, 1942, photolithographed from the printing of 1939, s.v. kairō-dōketsu.
  9. 詩經 二卷, movable-type print of the Keichō years in the library's record, National Diet Library pid 2544551, 邶風 擊鼓, scan 29, https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/2544551/1/29 ; the Mao preface at Wikisource, https://zh.wikisource.org/wiki/詩經/擊鼓
  10. 毛詩正義 卷二, 邶風 擊鼓, 毛傳, 鄭箋 and 孔穎達 疏, at Wikisource. https://zh.wikisource.org/wiki/毛詩正義/卷二
  11. 朱熹, 詩集傳, 擊鼓, in 胡廣 et al., 五經大全, an early Ming print in the library's record, National Diet Library pid 2545477, scan 69. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/2545477/1/69
  12. 詩經 二卷, the Keichō print, pid 2544551, 王風 大車, scan 49, https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/2544551/1/49 ; 孔穎達's subcommentary in 毛詩正義 卷四, 王風 大車, at Wikisource, https://zh.wikisource.org/wiki/毛詩正義/卷四
  13. 朱熹, 詩集傳, 大車, in 御案五經, 嘉慶16 (1811), 揚州 十笏堂 blocks, in the library's record, National Diet Library pid 2582816, scan 73. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/2582816/1/73
  14. 詩經 二卷, the Keichō print, pid 2544551, 鄭風 女曰雞鳴, scan 53, https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/2544551/1/53 ; 朱熹, 詩經集傳 卷之三 on the poem, at Wikisource, https://zh.wikisource.org/wiki/詩經集傳/卷之三
  15. 陳壽, 三國志 卷三十四, 先主甘皇后傳, at Wikisource. https://zh.wikisource.org/wiki/三國志/卷34
  16. 杜佑, 通典 卷八十九, 禮四十九, 凶禮十一, the memorial of 元行沖 and the argument of 皇密, at Wikisource. https://zh.wikisource.org/wiki/通典/卷089
  17. 『安居院唱導集』上, 角川書店, 1972 in the library's record, the 金沢文庫本 of the 言泉集, 右少辨定長爲亡室; National Diet Library pid 12261878, snippet view. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/12261878
  18. 『言泉集 : 東大寺北林院本』, 2000; National Diet Library pid 14033970, snippet view. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/14033970
  19. 保元物語評釋, 1913, 鳥羽院崩御ノ事, p. 11, scan 24. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/925166/1/24
  20. 平治物語, in 有朋堂文庫 保元平治物語, the printing of 1918 (大正七年三月四日發行, in the colophon, scan 384; 1913 in the library's record), scan 84. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/1913627/1/84
  21. 平康頼, 宝物集, print of 1661 in the library's record, scan 8. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/2567385/1/8
  22. 撰集抄, early print, scan 29. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/2543927/1/29
  23. 源平盛衰記 卷二十五, in 日本文学大系 16, 1926, scan 34. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/1018065/1/34
  24. 源平盛衰記 卷四十八, 女院六道, in 日本文学大系 16, 1926, scan 439. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/1018065/1/439
  25. 太平記 卷十一, 越前牛原地頭自害の事, 大町桂月 校, 1911, pp. 330–331, scan 171. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/877607/1/171
  26. 太平記 卷十一, print of 慶長8 (1603) in the library's record, scan 25. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/8943158/1/25
  27. 楊貴妃, in 謡曲集 上, 有朋堂文庫, the printing of 1926 (大正十五年五月二十五日發行, in the colophon, scan 376; 1914 in the library's record), scan 67. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/1913546/1/67
  28. 浦島太郎, in 御伽草子 後, 1891 in the library's record, scan 95. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/992892/1/95
  29. 一条兼良, 花鳥余情, on 葵, scan 77. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/2551179/1/77
  30. 謡抄 第七冊, 籠太鼓, 慶長 print, scan 3. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/2544646/1/3
  31. 太田全斎, 俚言集覧, enlarged by 井上頼圀 and 近藤瓶城, the volume of 1899 (明治三十二年八月三十日發行, in the colophon, scan 438), scan 243, citing 世話尽 (1656 in the library's record of that book, pid 2554767, 明暦2刊). https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/991569/1/243
  32. 藤井乙男, 諺語大辞典, 1910, scan 126. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/2938227/1/126
  33. 近松門左衛門, 鑓の権三重帷子 (1717), 中之巻, in 近松門左衛門全集 卷七, 1923 (大正十二年五月十八日發行, in the colophon, scan 328), pp. 602–603, scan 319. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/970017/1/319
  34. 舟木伝内, 料理無言抄, manuscript, scans 85–86. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/2557694/1/85
  35. 和魯通言比考, 1857 in the library's record, scan 66. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/3464024/1/66
  36. 大槻文彦, 言海, 1889, かいらう and かいらうどうけつ, scan 155. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/992954/1/155
  37. 曲亭馬琴, 椿説弓張月 續編卷之五, in 有朋堂文庫, scan 233. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/2218940/1/233
  38. 宝寿玉岩井模様, 1821, https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/9893382 · 江戸紫春乃曙, 1830, https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/10301016 · 童絵解万国噺, 1861, https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/2559378 (each year in the library's record)
  39. 作文捷径 : 和漢日用, 1876, scan 51. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/864766/1/51
  40. 高橋達郎 抄訳, 泰西礼法, 1878, scan 87. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/759146/1/87
  41. 丹波 and 柴田, 普通動物学, the third edition, its notice dated 明治十八年十月 (1885) (the library's record gives 明16.8, the date of the first edition's preface), scan 211. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/832886/1/211
  42. 大日本水産会報告, June 1889, National Diet Library pid 1761439, and 日本之殖産, July 1889, pid 1551812 (each issue's date in the library's record), snippet view. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/1761439
  43. 市島春城, 小精廬雑筆, 1933, §104 偕老同穴, pp. 372–374, scan 200. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/1234347/1/200
  44. 山田美妙, 日本大辞書, 1893, かいらう·どうけつ, scan 204. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/902835/1/204
  45. 帝国大辞典, 1896, かいらう-どうけつ, scan 182. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/2387590/1/182
  46. 辞林, 1907, かいらう-どうけつ, scan 110. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/863016/1/110
  47. 福沢諭吉, 福翁百話, 第二十 一夫一婦偕老同穴, first published 1897 (明治三十年七月二十日發行, in the colophon of the first edition, pid 781922, scan 202); read in the printing of 1907, p. 72, scan 47. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/1082748/1/47
  48. 夏目漱石, 吾輩ハ猫デアル, the volume holding chapter 11, 1907 in the library's record, National Diet Library pid 888727, scan 101, https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/888727/1/101 ; the modern text at Aozora Bunko, https://www.aozora.gr.jp/cards/000148/files/789_14547.html
  49. 最高裁判所裁判集 民事 49, March 1961, scan 107. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/1674003/1/107
  50. 「偕老同穴（かいろうどうけつ）とは夫婦が仲睦まじいこと！意味やスピーチ例をご紹介」, Oggi.jp, 小学館, 3 October 2024. https://oggi.jp/7298184
  51. James Legge, The Chinese Classics, vol. IV, The She King, 1871; the Hong Kong University Press reissue of 1960, read in its reprint of 1970, the odes of Pei, 擊鼓, and of the Royal Domain, 大車.
  52. Paul Ehmann, Die Sprichwörter und bildlichen Ausdrücke der japanischen Sprache, Tokyo, 1897, no. 1123. Internet Archive bub_gb_TbsIAQAAMAAJ. https://archive.org/details/bub_gb_TbsIAQAAMAAJ
  53. Arthur Waley, The Book of Songs, George Allen and Unwin, London, 1937, p. 113 (擊鼓) and no. 58 (大車).
  54. Burton Watson, ed. and trans., The Columbia Book of Chinese Poetry, Columbia University Press, 1984, p. 29.
  55. Wikipedia, Venus' flower basket, first revision, 21 November 2003. https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?oldid=1782067
  56. JMdict, 「偕老同穴」. https://jisho.org/word/偕老同穴
  57. 金安老, 希樂堂文稿 卷七下, at Wikisource. https://zh.wikisource.org/wiki/希樂堂文稿/卷七下
  58. 盧守愼, 穌齋集 卷九, at Wikisource. https://zh.wikisource.org/wiki/穌齋集/卷九

Authors

Tim Jackowski (Systems Architect, Takase Studios, LLC) · 典 Ten (Anthropic Claude Opus 5.5, Takase Studios, LLC)

AI written · Ten wrote the history. Tim Jackowski commissioned it and answers for it.

Not yet reviewed.

Cite as: Tim Jackowski and Ten, "Philology of 偕老同穴 (kairō dōketsu)," Takase Studios, 2026, https://takase.com/library/philology/kairo-doketsu.