88986
The following is text from the opening of the game Fire Emblem Monshou no
Nazo:

> おお！ 我らが母なる大地
>
> **７つを１０００も重ねた間**
>
> 絶望という時代あり
>
> 我らが 天に救いを求める事
>
> ７年と７月と７日の間

If I understand correctly, the highlighted phrase says that there was a period
where 7 "somethings" were repeated 1000 times. Does this refer to years? It is
not necessarily clear from the context since this is what the game opens with.
CC BY-SA 4.0
2021-08-21T03:10:58.297
88982
2021-08-21T14:48:27.183
2021-08-21T04:10:26.260
5010
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question
meaning interpretation
What is ７つ referring to in this sentence?
> ７つを１０００も重ねた間

Probably it corresponds to
[千重{ちえ}](https://kotobank.jp/word/%E5%8D%83%E9%87%8D-565043) which implies a
huge accumulations.

According to デジタル大辞泉,

> ち‐え〔‐へ〕【千重】 たくさん重なること。

> 「ま幸(さき)くて妹が斎(いは)はば沖つ波―に立つとも障(さは)りあらめやも」〈万・三五八三〉

I believe [八重{やえ}](https://kotobank.jp/word/%E5%8D%83%E9%87%8D-565043) has
also a similar nuance in Japanese culture and more common.

> や‐え〔‐へ〕【八重】

> １ 八つ重なっていること。転じて、数多く重なっていること。また、そのもの。「七重の膝(ひざ)を八重に折る」

Also, [7](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Symbolism_of_the_number_7) is regarded
as a symbolic number which has a great importance in many cultures.

All in all, the phrase might be a metaphor of "very long period" which is
similar to the concept of [刧{こう}](https://kotobank.jp/word/%E5%8A%AB-61344).
Probably this kind of a metaphor for the time is seen in many folklore or myth
in many cultures of human beings.
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2021-08-21T07:51:06.303
88983
2021-08-21T07:51:06.303
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answer
Nothing indicates it's specifically 7000 "years", so this should be taken as a
myth-esque, archaic-sounding way of saying "very long time too long to measure
precisely". In other words, it appears to me that it's a fancy way of saying
"countless ages", not "7000 years".

This odd-looking expression should be loosely related to the fact that old
Japanese (yamato kotoba) was poor at counting large numbers systematically and
the fact that 8 was treated as a [pronoun for large
numbers](https://japanese.stackexchange.com/q/51673/5010) (cf.
[八千代](https://jisho.org/word/%E5%85%AB%E5%8D%83%E4%BB%A3)). _Fire Emblem_ is
not set in Japan, but when Japanese people see an expression like this, they
feel it looks like an old myth or a legend.
CC BY-SA 4.0
2021-08-21T10:13:34.830
88986
2021-08-21T14:48:27.183
2021-08-21T14:48:27.183
5010
5010
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answer