Quote:
Originally Posted by Sumeragi
By law, the Imperial Family had been restricted to the Showa Tenno's immediate family, Empress Teimei, and the families of Showa Tenno's three brothers (Prince Chichibu, Takamatsu, Mikasa). All the members of the eleven cadet branches were removed from the family. Nevertheless, connections still exist from the old relations, although given how most of the records of the branching families (especially when it comes to brides) were destroyed, it's hard to keep track of the absolule record except for the direct Imperial linage and the branch families. An indication of this is the existence of the Sumeragis.
Of course, no family in Japan has as good records as the Koreans, who tend to maintain centuries-old genealogy books. In the case of my second cousin, there are a registered membership of over 120,000 in the clan. Here's what the books look like:
And final note: I changed to Korean citizenship. |
Quite interesting there.
Another thing. I heard that the Imperial family does not have last name, and have only started to adopt last name when they stepped away from Imperial family. So does it mean if someone don't have last name, it's likely that they are a member of the Sumeragi? Furthermore, Do branch family members have last name? If they do, then wouldn't it be kinda....amusing if the whole family just sit down one day, and decide what they would be known from now on in public?