Odonatologica 3(1): 5-12 March 1. 1974
PROCEEDINGS OF THE SECOND INTERNATIONAL
SYMPOSIUM OF ODONATOLOGY
Karlsruhe, September 21-23, 1973
The developmentof odonatology in the Far East*
S. Asahina
Totsuka 3-chome 123, Shinjuku-ku, Tokyo, 160, Japan
Received December 29, 1973
An is account given of the development of odonatology in the Far East
with special reference to Japan. Knowledge of dragonflies has apparently
existed since very early times in these countries. Japanese nature lovers, in-
had of cluding children, a goodknowledge these insects and made use of them
in the daily life. Modern biology in Japan began with Siebold in about 1830,
and Japanese odonatology, as a modem science, dates from 1883 when
SELYS-LONGCHAMPS published his “Les Odonates du Japon”.Among that
of Far Eastern countries, the fauna of Japan has been worked out best; the
known odonate species in Japan total 180, while, in China, there may be 100
species in the family Gomphidae alone. As shown by the Odonata in recent
years, nature conservation is an urgent need in Japan.
It is believed that applied entomology in China started long before the Chris-
tian era. The Chinese had a good knowledge of sericulture, apiculture and insect
from pests very early times.
than before Since more one century Christ they had a kind of science, “Pen
Tshao” which less of was more or a sort pharmacopoeia. In the Liang Dynasty,
452-536 A.D., Tao Hung Ching described it in the three volumes of “ShenNung
Pen Tshao”. In the Thang Dynasty, 657 A.D., Su Kung revised this book and
produced “Sin Siu Pen Tshao”; the original edition of this had been lost in China but a copy was known in Japan, having been introduced about 731 A.D. Sub-
sequently there were a number of Pen Tshao publications in China and Japan, among which Li Shih Chen’s “Pen Tshao Kang Mu” is a standard one; it was
published in the Ming Dynasty (1596). Entomology is dealt with in volumes
39-43 of this This book and has work. was soon imported to Japan long been the bible of Japanese Pen Tshao science.
* Invited lecture, presented at the Opening Session of the Symposium
5 In Chinese literature including Pen Tshao books dragonflies were recognized as a distinct group of insects, and several group names were given in Chinese letters which represent roughly: Aeshnoidea, Anotogaster, Orthetrum, Crocothemis,
larval Sympetrum, Rhyothemis, Pantala, Calopteryx, Agrionoidea, and even the forms.
Some of these dragonflies were used as a kind of materia medica. Bernard
B. READ of the Lister Institute, Peking, recorded some dragonflies that were used as aphrodisiac material in his “Chinese MateriaMedica, Insect Drugs, 1941”.
The oldest record of the dragonfly in Japan may be the figures of a dragonfly
be sculptured on the bell-shaped bronze apparatus which was supposed to a
festival instrument used during 300 B.C. - 400 A.D., in the prehistoric Yayoi Era
(Fig. 1).
of the B.C. - 200 A.D Fig. 1. Sculptures a dragonfly made during prehistoric Yayoi Era, 300
In the first Government-compiled history of Japan, the Nihon-Shoki, 720
A.D., are two well-known episodes related to the Emperors and dragonflies.
There are, in literature, novels, poems, songs and plays, numerous passages re-
ferring to dragonflies but lack of space prevents their inclusion here. Dragonfly
hunting is a most popular pastime of children, even today, where hunting sites
are available. Because dragonflies are accepted as objects of natural beauty in the
summer season their representations are commonly used for the patterns on
cloths. As these insects are thought to be brave and strong their shapes are used
to symbolize happiness and victory (Fig. 2).
As for practical use of dragonflies, some libellulid species are sold in Japan at
particular drug-stores even today. They are said to be effective against throat
inflammations as an antifebrile substance. We can find Sympetrum frequens and
S. darwinianum such to be most common in insect drugs (Fig. 3).
the which the 18th and 19th During Tokugawa-Shogunate times cover 17th,
centruries of Japan the books of Pen Tshao, encyclopedia and iconographiae
dealt with dragonflies. In his “Standard Pen Tshao (Honzo-Komoku-Keimo)”
Ranzan Ono discussed Odonata and the other insects, identifying Japanese spe-
6 Fig. 2. A helmet with a dragonfly,made duringTokugawa times, 17th century.
cies with corresponding Chinese ones. There were some published encyclopediae among which Wakan-Sansai-Zukai in 52 volumes (1713), may be cited as an
example. Also nine natural history iconographiae dealing exclusively or partly
and with Odonata were prepared, many Japanese dragonfly species were illustra-
local and ted precisely, each with the Japanese name, some remarks on their
natural The and history. pictures are accurate there is no difficulty in identifying
them to species, but, though copied by hand such pictures have unfortunately
neither been printed nor published.
In the Pen Tshao science there seem to have been attempts to identify
Japanese insects with their Chinese counterparts, but the idea ofmodem nomen-
clature and systematics has not been developed in Japanese natural history at
that The of coloured illustrations be correlated time. development insect may
with the difficulty of preserving insect specimens in Japan. The high humidity, attacks of mold and pest-insects must have made it impossible.
As is well known, the Government of Tokugawa-Shogunate closed Japan
for 300 The allowed against foreign countries nearly years. only exception were
the Dutch who were allowed to settle on a small island attached to the city of
Nagasaki. Among the Europeans who came to Nagasaki as Dutch the following
three scientists are most famous: Engelbert Kaempfer (1651-1716), a German
bom in Lemago; Carl Peter Thunberg (1743-1828), a Swedish biologist; and
7 materia medica Fig. 3. Dragonflies sold as (above) in a traditional drug-store in Tokyo
(purchased in 1960), showing two species, Sympetrum darwinianum (left) and S. frequens
(right).
Philips Franz von Siebold (1796-1866), a German biologist, born in Wurzburg
(Fig. 4).
THUNBERG (1823) was the first to list Japanese dragonflies with scientific
names but he did not describe any new dragonfly species from Japan. Siebold
stayed for a long time, (1823-1829, and 1856-1861) in Japan and taught many
Japanese Pen Tshao scientists. He collected many Japanese animals and plants and sent them to European institutions.
that modem with the collections One may say Japanese odonatology began of Siebold whose Odonata material went to Leiden and then to Selys Long-
champs. Thus, the first Japanese dragonfly described by SELYS was Mnais
pruinosa Selys which appeared in his “Synopsis des Calopterygines” (1853) ;
some other specimens were also described in his 1869 paper, the specimens
coming from the Paris Universal Exhibition heldin 1867. These latter specimens
be the first were collected by Baron Y. Tanaka who is known to native Japanese
insect-collector in the modern sense of the term.
8 4. Franz Siebold drawn in Fig. Philip von (1796-1866), by a Japanese artist 1826,
In 1883 SELYS published a paper entitled “Les Odonates duJapon”, which is the standard work of Japanese systematic odonatology: it lists 67 “species” with the of descriptions many new species. The material came from the Siebold collection of the Leiden Museum, the MacLachlan collection taken by H.J.S.
Fryer, George Lewis, J. Milne, etc., and from the museum collections of Genoa,
Zurich and Berlin. The other fragmentary records were made by several authors:
UHLER (1856) treating the collection of the United States North Pacific Ex- ploring Expedition taken by Captain John Rodger; FOERSTER (1909) de- scribing specimens taken by Japanese students; RIS (1916) reporting well on
Hans Sauter’s collection; and FRASER (1933) describing several new species taken during his short visit.
In the meantime Japanese entomologists conducted research on Odonata.
M. assistant in NAMIE, an zoologist Tokyo Imperial University, produced very fine coloured plates of the Odonata (1901-1904) which were correctly named. I learned, from Dr. Philip P. Calvert in 1954, that he identified the Japanese dragonfly specimens sent to the Columbia Exhibition, Chicago in 1893, and still safely preserved in the U.S. National Museum. Undoubtedly, Namie must have used the duplicate specimens of that material left in Tokyo Imperial University
9 that but these all lost at time, unfortunately were in Tokyo.
As an authentic Odonata specialist we have Dr. Kan Oguma (1885-1971); he worked Hokkaido in University on the systematics of our fauna (1906-1926),
but his interest was soon directed towards insect histology (1913-1919), and
then to animal cytology (1915-1951). Therefore his essential contribution to
odonate systematics remained nearly at the level of 1913. There were some
contributions the to knowledge of our odonate larvae by Dr. S. Uchida
and (1907-1913) Mr. S. Kinoshita (1929-1931). Prof. H. Oka made some contri- butions odonate to experimental morphology (1930-1936), and one of his pupils
S. Asahina, started studying Odonata about 1933.
After World War I reckoned the Odonata of to II, Japan proper be 114
species and 4 subspecies, excluding those of the Ryukyu Islands. Today, in-
the of the cluding species Ryukyus and the Bonin Islands, our indigenous Odo-
nata comprise nearly 180 species of which more than two-thirds are described
also in the larval stage.
In other than for areas taxonomy, one may mention, example, a work on
comparative ASAHINA a on morphology by (1954), histological study sperma- OMURA and togenesis by (1955-1957) a comprehensive work on descriptive
embryology by ANDO (1962).
In 1958 we established in Tokyo “the Society of Odonatology”, the member-
ship of which today is about 180. The 142 domestic members fall into the
following categories;
Odonatists and entomologists 31
Local teachers 39
Students 23
Amateurs 44
Natural history photographers 5
As information regards odonatology in China, is sparse. Starting with Lin-
naeus (1758) who named “Libellulachinensis” there are only fragmentary works
made by: Donovan (1798, 6 species), Selys (1853, 1886, etc.), MacLachlan
(1894, 1896, Szechuan and Tibet), Kirby (1900, Hainan), Ris (1912, 1916,
Taiwan and S. China), Bartenef (1912-1915, 1930, Manchuria), Fraser (1923,
Yunnan), Sjostedt (1925), and Morton (1928, Yunnan).
In 1930 J.G. NEEDHAM published a monographic study ofChinese Odonata,
the result of his one year’s stay in China as a visiting professor. This work,
about advancement the although containing some errors, brought a great in
of the Far East. In NAVAS’s - based odonatology contrast, papers (1930 1936) the on collection of the Musee Heude, in the Universite 1’Aurore, Shanghai, are
misleading. When I visited the Musee Heude, I found the material studied by him
to feature many misidentifications, even the commonest species. Some of the
determinations were criticized by CHAO (1962), but I would suggest that
10 Navasian records be ignored so far as Chinese Odonata are concerned.
Dr. S.F. Chao studied in Massachusetts, United States, underProf. Alexander.
Among Chao’s works a revision of Chinese Gomphidae is important. Based on his work list we can up about 100 species of Gomphidae referable to 23 genera from China. this count Against figure we can 25 species referable to 13 genera from Japanese islands. This fact clearly indicates that the knowledge of con- tinental Chinese fauna is absolutely indispensable for the study of Asiatic Odo- nata.
The of the Odonata of the other knowledge Far Eastern countries is very insufficient, and in many cases fragmentary. No native authentic specialist has appeared up to the present.
for the As present and future of Japanese odonatology, we feel that much
to remains be done in various aspects of it. Even in recent years new or unrecor- ded species have been found within Japanese faunal limits, whereas several
lowland threatened with indigenous, coastal, species are being extermination. The dragonfly, which is a good natural indicator of environmental quality, should be used in this new and important aspect of odonatology in Japan. While
have we many regrettable cases due to habitat destruction there are a few en-
of the of couraging examples recovery dragonfly populations in some areas of
We that the unfavourable Japan. hope experiences we have had will not be repeated in the other countries of the Far East.
One may conclude: The development of odonatology in the Far East, in particular in Japan, seems to have been due originally to a national interest and the nature knowledge acquired by lovers among the natives; since the middle of the nineteenth century it has owed much to the stimuli, advice, suggestions and cooperation of western scientists.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
I am greatly indebted to Mr. HITOSHI HASEGAWA, of the National Institute of Agri- cultural Sciences, Tokyo, for his suggestions and cooperationin connection with my investi- gation ofliterature.
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