A couple of years ago on Twitter, there was a post from the official account of a seal shop called Nagae Insyoudou, or 永江印祥堂. Simply put, in Japan as well as the Sinosphere, seals or stamps are often used as signatures on documents to confer personal identity. For individuals, this typically would use the family name or even the full name, and for companies and governmental bodies, this can carry the name of that entity. This seal, however, is a bit unusual. While many Japanese names would consist of 4 or 5 characters, this one featured a total of 108. All these, carved into an area smaller than a 1 yen coin. This name is:

寿限無、寿限無、五劫のすりきれ、海砂利水魚の、水行末・雲来末・風来末、食う寝るところに住むところ、やぶらこうじのぶらこうじ、パイポ・パイポ・パイポのシューリンガン、シューリンガンのグーリンダイ、グーリンダイのポンポコピーのポンポコナの、長久命の長助

When romanised, this becomes:

Jugemu Jugemu Gokō-no Surikire Kaijarisuigyo-no Suigyōmatsu Unraimatsu Fūraimatsu Kūnerutokoro-ni Sumutokoro Yaburakōji-no Burakōji Paipopaipo Paipo-no Shūringan Shūringan-no Gūrindai Gūrindai-no Ponpokopii-no Ponpokonā-no Chōkyūmei-no Chōsuke

As long as it appears and sounds, it is still an iconic and memorable name, which brings us to this question. What does this name actually mean, and where did this come from?

For purposes of this introduction, we will refer to this name by Jugemu Jugemu, though others may shorten it further to Jugemu. Jugemu Jugemu comes from a Japanese rakugo (落語), which is a kind of comedy that is traditionally performed in theaters called yose (寄席). The word rakugo literally translates to “tale with a drop”, with this drop, or ochi (落ち), being paralleled with some form of punch line in comedy as we are often familiar with.

This rakugo tale about Jugemu Jugemu tells of a couple who were unsure of how to name their newborn child. As one would do traditionally, they consulted the chief priest in a temple for help in choosing an auspicious name. The priest then suggested several names that were thought to be auspicious, with Jugemu being one of them. Still unable to decide, the father decided to accept all the names suggested by the priest, and hence the name of the child who would grow to become Jugemu Jugemu.

These auspicious names suggested by the priest may be interpreted as:

• 寿限無 Jugemu – literally ‘limitless life’
• 五劫のすりきれ Gokō-no Surikire – blessed for eternity, with reference to Japanese Buddhism
• 海砂利水魚の Kaijarisuigyo-no – literally ‘gravel in the sea and fish in the water’, alluding to a child’s bountiful life in luck and fortune
• 水行末・雲来末・風来末 Suigyōmatsu Unraimatsu Fūraimatsu – literally ‘where water eventually flows’, ‘where clouds ultimately come from’, ‘where wind ultimately comes from’, alluding to the child being blessed wherever he goes
• 食う寝るところに住むところ Kūnerutokoro-ni Sumutokoro – literally ‘places to eat and sleep, places to live’, alluding to the child’s needs being continually met
• やぶらこうじのぶらこうじ Yaburakōji-no Burakōji – the marlberry bushes, Ardisia japonica, thought to be lively all year round, hinting to the child’s life continually filled with energy.
• パイポ・パイポ・パイポのシューリンガン Paipopaipo Paipo-no Shūringan – These fictional names are thought to belong to some royal family and estate in Ancient China. Paipo is the name of this kingdom.
• シューリンガンのグーリンダイ Shūringan-no Gūrindai – Shūringan and Gūrindai are the royal couple of this kingdom
• グーリンダイのポンポコピーのポンポコナの Gūrindai-no Ponpokopii-no Ponpokonā-no – Ponpokopii and Ponpokonā are the children of this royal couple. All family members went on to live in longevity
• 長久命の長助 Chōkyūmei-no Chōsuke – literally ‘long lasting life’, ‘blessed for a long time’

And so, as we can infer, the common themes of the names suggested by the priest, and taken up by the father generally include those of longevity, fortune, blessing, and vitality, themes that are related to auspiciousness. But of course, such a long name comes with challenges, especially for those who would recite it. A 1912 publication mentioned more about the life of Jugemu Jugemu, making fun of the immense amount of time needed to recite his name. A more morbid one also told of his death by drowning, and news about his death took quite some time to spread due to the length of his name.

Some of the first published appearances of the name Jugemu Jugemu were recorded as early as 1884, with one mention being interestingly, in an economics magazine called the Tokyo Keizai Zasshi, although it appears entirely in katakana, with some deviations from what we see today. The aforementioned publication tells of Jugemu Jugemu in 1912 as well. Thus, it is possible that Jugemu Jugemu originated in the Meiji era (1868 – 1912) or even earlier, such as during the reign of Emperor Kōmei towards the end of the Edo period (1603 – 1868).

It turns out that the tale of Jugemu Jugemu is not particularly unique, and it actually belongs to a wider genre of rakugo called nagaina-no ko (長い名の子), or ‘The Child with a Long Name’, which essentially does comedy on people with ridiculously long names. First mentions of this type of rakugo date back as early as 1703, with 欲からしづむ淵, or Yoku kara shizumu fuchi (Sunk down the waters for greed). However, what led to this genre actually stemmed from Buddhist fables or teachings that warned against greed. A 1966 publication puts the earliest known fable to date back as far as 1283, though the oldest known written manuscript is dated at 1490, and can be found in Further Reading below.

But of course, examples of ridiculously long names are not exclusive to the Japanese language. After all, the renowned Spanish painter, Pablo Picasso, is also known for his long full name, Pablo Diego José Francisco de Paula Juan Nepomuceno María de los Remedios Cipriano de la Santísima Trinidad Ruiz y Picasso, though this would pale in comparison to other ridiculously long names, such as that of a typesetter born in Germany, who is known not just for his 26 given names, but also his 666-character-long surname. While his name may be shortened to Hubert Blaine Wolfe­schlegel­stein­hausen­berger­dorff Sr., the 1965 book Language on Vacation: An Olio of Orthographical Oddities by Dmitri A. Borgmann presents the full name as such:

Borgmann mentioned in his book that there were numerous grammatical errors in the unusually long surname, and that he had to try to paraphrase to infer what this surname could have meant. This gives the following proposed translation:

Ages ago, there were conscientious shepherds whose sheep were well tended and carefully protected against attack by their rapacious enemies. Twelve hundred thousand years ago there appeared before these first earthmen, at night, a spaceship powered by seven stone and iridium electric motors. It had originally been launched on its long trip into stellar space in the search for neighboring stars that might have planets revolving about them that were inhabitable and on which planets a new race of intelligent humanity might propagate itself and rejoice for life, without fear of attack by other intelligent beings from interstellar space.

Circling back to Japanese, Jugemu Jugemu has had numerous examples of influences on its pop culture, from appearing in song lyrics, anime, and manga, with some of the more notable ones being the ending song of the rakugo anime series Joshiraku, Nippon Egao Hyakkei. Other appearances may feature this very name in part or in full as well. So this has been a little lore dive into the meaning and history behind an unusually long but memorable Japanese name. Are there any other unusually long names that you have come across one way or another? Let us know in the comments.

Further reading (Japanese)

米沢 彦八 著「軽口御前男 巻之二 欲からしづむ淵」、小高, 敏郎 編『江戸笑話集』 100巻、岩波書店、東京〈日本古典文学大系〉、1966年7月5日（原著1703年）、313頁。

渡邊 綱也 編「解説」『沙石集』 85巻、岩波書店、東京〈日本古典文学大系〉、1966年5月6日、21-38頁。

無住 道暁 「巻八（六）『佛鼻薫事』内の三番目の逸話『或女人出家ノ為ニ～』」『沙石集』快秀による写本（長享3年本）、1490年（原著1283年）、画像333枚中242-243枚目頁。 京都大学蔵。長享3-4年に書写