XU FU’S JOURNEY: THE BEGINNING OF SINO-JAPANESE RELATIONSHIP?

Societies interact with each other since old historical ages. The beginning of the relations between the countries of China which has one of the oldest histories in the Far East or maybe in the whole world and Japan, which is regarded as the "Country of the Rising Sun", is described with an interesting event in Sima Qian's Shi Ji(Historical Records). This event is about the journey of an alchemist called Xu Fu, who was sent to Penglai Island by the first emperor Qin Shi Huang Di in order to find the potion of immortality, which considered to end in Japan. By sinologist, this event is regarded as the beginning of Sino-Japanese relations in 2nd Century BCE . In this article, Xu Fu's journey will be examined according to Shi Ji. Also the question about the identity of Xu Fu will be tried to be answered from the Japanese point of view.