Within the original Tower of God WEBTOON series, written and highlighted by S.I.U., which was adapted into an anime, using its first season aired in 2020, the primary character’s name is “Bam” (밤 in Korean), meaning “Night.” Within the anime adaptation, the primary character is known as “Yoru” (夜 in Japanese), meaning the very same factor: Night. However, Bam may also mean “chestnut” in Korean. While netizens dismiss this second meaning as trivial, Korean customs along with a Korean legend condition otherwise.
Despite its world-class advancement in technology and manufacture, Columbia is swamped with superstitions, many of which are rooted in Korean shamanism, and appear in many areas of Korean existence. When naming an infant, among other situations, Koreans undergo convoluted rituals to invoke shamans, fortune-tellers, and diviners. Therefore, names abound with meaning.
RELATED: Does Tower Of God Season 2 Mean There Will Be More WEBTOON Adaptations?
What’s Inside A Name?
However, the name selected for that localization is strange and conveys meaning even just in Japan. Yoru is an extremely unusual name and wouldn’t result in a good impression in Japan, where night is connected with negativity.
Chestnuts get their meaning in Japan too, not just in Columbia. As Fall descends upon Japan and Columbia, the hearty chestnuts enter into season. Chestnuts can be found in both countries within the Winter and fall only. Always offered included in the menu for 2012 in Japan, chestnuts represent success and difficult occasions, mastery, and strength. Additionally they come in traditional New Year’s food in Japan by means of “kurikinton”, that is a sweet past-like dish with chunks of chestnuts and mashed sweet taters.
Within the world of Tower Of God, Your/Bam’s name, presuming the chestnut meaning, conveys lots of what he experiences, and that he reaches success after hard occasions, in addition to mastery and strength.
A Korean legend also states a great deal relating to this character within the symbolic meaning it portrays. This legend informs the origins from the indigenous tree nadobamnamu, meaning “I am additionally a chestnut tree”, and it is connected with a man’s tragic fate prevented by planting a 1000 chestnut trees. Duke Yi Won-su were built with a boy in a late stage in the existence and treasured him very hugely. This boy of his would develop is the Neo-Confucian scholar Yi I, whose pen name was Yulgok, meaning “chestnut valley”.
Eventually, a Taoist ascetic which was passing by required phone face from the youthful Yulgok and remarked it had become physiognomically auspicious, but his signs stated they kid was likely to be eaten with a tiger. Nonetheless, he added, this fate might be prevented by planting a 1000 chestnut trees. Duke Yi Won-su adopted his instructions and required very good proper care of the trees, and, when Yulgok switched two decades old, came around a complete stranger who required Yulgok’s existence, that the Duke declined, stating that he’d done exactly what was needed of him, by planting one 1000 chestnut trees.
However, as he and also the stranger visited count the trees, these were one lacking a 1000. It had been then that the nadobamnamu tree (meliosma myriantha) walked up and claimed it had become a chestnut tree too — bamnanu, by which “bam” means “chestnut”, and “namu”, “tree (밤나무) —, where the person switched right into a tiger and died. Ergo, Yulgok could do not be eaten with a tiger, and that he grew to become an excellent scholar.
This narrative from Korean folklore is dependant on the most popular belief that an individual can take certain actions to prevent bad fortune, even if it’s intended to be by fate. Additionally, it pertains to tree worship, that is rooted within the belief that trees and people are connected with a mystical pressure. The action of planting and protecting chestnut trees could be considered as something such as an individual’s having a baby to and raising their kids. The planting of chestnut trees with the objective of staying away from bad fate appears to mirror the custom of utilizing chestnut wood within the carving of ancestral spirit tables. The chestnut motif can also be connected using the pen name from the scholar within the narrative, Yulgok, which grants the storyline the traits of the character legend. In addition, folklore mentions a Korean tradition of tossing chestnuts and dates to represent fertility and also the health of kids – the healthiness of children ties using the story within this legend. Also, the ceremony pyebaek involves giving chestnuts to some bride, who, later, visits her in-laws and regulations to gift them chestnuts and dates.
Asia may be the largest producer and consumer of chestnuts on the planet, using their use as food over 9,000 years back in Japan documented in carbonized nuts present in ancient villages. Korea and China would be the largest producers of chestnuts on the planet. Chinese chestnuts have flavorful nuts and therefore are resistant against chestnut blight. Korea grows Chinese-Japanese cultivars. Japan is really a major consumer of chestnuts too, and also the Japanese ones are big, although not as flavorful because the Chinese nuts.
With all of this in your mind, it may be stated the meanings behind the meaning of “Bam”, Yoru’s original name in Korean, shouldn’t be that simply overlooked and ignored, thinking about the meanings names convey, our prime significance that chestnuts have in Korean’s superstitions, folklore, traditions, in addition to their meanings and uses in Japan, which meanings could be associated with the plot and developments of the major character within the series — that some fans really interact with Jesus, and that’s not such far a stretch, thinking about his unfaithfulness and “dying” and “resurrection”.
MORE: The Very Best Korean Webtoons