The Culture of Copying in Japan

This book challenges the perception of Japan as a 'copying culture' through a series of detailed ethnographic and
historical case studies. It addresses the question about why the West has had such a fascination for the adeptness
with which the Japanese apparently assimilate all things foreign and at the same time a fear of their skill at
artificially remaking and automating the world around them. Countering the idea of a Japan that deviously or
ingenuously copies others, it elucidates the history of creative exchanges with the outside world and the
particular myths, philosophies and concepts which are emblematic of the origins and originality of copying in
Japan. It demonstrates the diversity and creativity of copying in the Japanese context through the translation of a
series of otherwise loosely related ideas and concepts into objects, images, texts and practices of reproduction,
which include: shamanic theatre, puppetry, tea utensils, Kyoto town houses, architectural models, genres of
painting, calligraphy, poetry, 'sample' food displays, and the fashion and car industries.
Rupert Cox is Lecturer in Visual Anthropology, Director of the MA programme at the Granada Centre for Visual
Anthropology, University of Manchester, UK. He is the author of The Zen Arts: An anthropological study of the
culture of aesthetic form in Japan (Routledge, 2002).
 Japan Anthropology Workshop Series

Series editor:
Joy Hendry, Oxford Brookes University

Editorial Board:
Pamela Asquith, University of Alberta
Eyal Ben Ari, Hebrew University of Jerusalem
Hirochika Nakamaki, National Museum of Ethnology, Osaka
Kirsten Refsing, University of Copenhagen
Wendy Smith, Monash University

Founder Member of the Editorial Board:

Jan van Bremen, University of Leiden
A Japanese View of Nature
The world of living things
Kinji Imanishi
Translated by Pamela J. Asquith, Heita Kawakatsu, Shusuke Yagi and
Hiroyuki Takasaki
Edited and introduced by Pamela J. Asquith
Japan's Changing Generations
Are young people creating a new society?
Edited by Gordon Mathews and Bruce White
The Care of the Elderly in Japan
Yongmei Wu
Community Volunteers in Japan
Everyday stories of social change
Lynne Y. Nakano
Nature, Ritual and Society in Japan's Ryukyu Islands
Arne Røkkum
Psychotherapy and Religion in Japan
The Japanese introspection practice of Naikan
Chikako Ozawa-de Silva
Dismantling the East-West Dichotomy
Essays in Honour of Jan van Bremen
Edited by Joy Hendry and Heung Wah Wong
Pilgrimages and Spiritual Quests in Japan
Edited by Maria Rodriguez del Alisal, Peter Ackermann and Dolores Martinez
The Culture of Copying in Japan
Critical and historical perspectives
Edited by Rupert Cox
The Culture of Copying in Japan
Critical and historical perspectives

Edited by Rupert Cox

LONDON AND NEW YORK

 First published 2008
by Routledge
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Simultaneously published in the USA and Canada
by Routledge
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© 2008 editorial selection and matter, Rupert Cox; individual chapters, the contributors
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Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data
The culture of copying in Japan : critical and historical perspectives /
edited by Rupert Cox.
p. cm. – (Japan anthropology workshop series)
Includes bibliographical references and index.
1. Japan – Civilization – Foreign influences. 2. Material culture – Japan.
3. Technological innovations – Japan. I. Cox, Rupert A.
DS821.5.A1C85 2007
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 Contents

List of contributors
Series editor's preface
Acknowledgements
Introduction
RUPERT COX
PART I Original encounters
1 Body-to-body transmission: the copying tradition of Kagura
IRIT AVERBUCH
2 A spectrum of copies: ritual puppetry in Japan
JANE MARIE LAW
3 Copying in Japanese magazines: unashamed copiers
KEIKO CLARENCE-SMITH
PART II Arts of citation
4 The originality of the 'copy': mimesis and subversion in Hanegawa Tôei's Chôsenjin Ukie
RONALD P. TOBY
5 Copy to convert: Jesuits' missionary practice in Japan
ALEXANDRA CURVELO
6 Back to the fundamentals: 'reproducing' Rikyû and Chôjirô in Japanese tea culture
MORGAN PITELKA
7 An investigation of the conditions of literary borrowings in late Heian and early Kamakura Japan
REIN RAUD
8 Chinese calligraphic models in Heian Japan: copying practices and stylistic transmission
JOHN T. CARPENTER
PART III Modern exchanges
9 Beyond mimesis: Japanese architectural models at the Vienna Exhibition and 1910 Japan British
Exhibition
WILLIAM H. COALDRAKE
10 Copying Kyoto: the legitimacy of imitation in Kyoto's townscape debate
CHRISTOPH BRUMANN
11 Copying cars: forgotten licensing agreements
CHRISTOPHER MADELEY
12 Hungry visions: the material life of Japanese food samples
RUPERT COX
Index
 Contributors

Irit Averbuch is Lecturer in the Department of East Asian Studies at Tel Aviv University, Israel.
Christoph Brumann is Professor in the Institut für Voelkerkunde, Universität zu Köln, Germany.
John T. Carpenter is Head of the London Office of the Salisbury Institute for the Study of Japanese Arts and
Culture, SOAS, UK, where he is also the Donald Keene Lecturer in Japanese Art.
Keiko Clarence-Smith (formerly Tanaka) is Senior Research Fellow in the Europe-Japan Research Centre at
Oxford Brookes University, UK.
William H. Coaldrake is Foundation Professor of Japanese and Head of Japanese Studies at the University of
Melbourne, Australia.
Alexandra Curvelo works at the Portuguese Institute for Conservation and Restoration, Lisbon, Portugal.
Jane Marie Law is Director of the Religious Studies Program, H. Stanley Krusen Professor of World Religions
and Associate Professor of Japanese Religions at Cornell University, USA.
Christopher Madeley is IELTS Administrator at Chaucer College Canterbury, University of Kent, UK.
Morgan Pitelka is Luce Professor of Asian Studies at Occidental College, Los Angeles, USA.
Rein Raud is Professor in the Department of Asian Studies at the University of Helsinki, Finland.
Ronald P. Toby is Professor of History and East Asian Languages and Culture at the University of Illinois, USA.
 Series editor's preface

It is with particular pleasure that I write the preface to this volume for it brings to fruition a project I was
involved with from the early stages, and enables the dissemination of a collection of papers that, when presented,
formed one of most fascinating conferences I have attended. It was a small gathering, not this time an official
Japan Anthropology Workshop Series (JAWS) programme, and the contributors were invited personally by
Rupert Cox, the editor, for the work he knew they were doing. I think all of us who were there felt the buzz of
something exciting coming together, and although it has taken a few years to get the work safely into print, I am
confident that readers will be glad to have waited to be able to share the whole collection, polished and complete.
The aim of the project was from the start in keeping with one of the main aims of the JAWS series, namely to
inform and correct negative Western perceptions of things Japanese, and copying could hardly be a better theme
for the purpose. Not only do the papers provide a proper, historical context that belies the idea of a devious Japan
that mimics and exploits the best that others have invented, they also sideline the apparent bewitchment of
postmodern commentators with the blurring of lines of originality and authenticity. In the way we have come to
expect in the series, the writers draw on detailed research and readings to explain the positive value placed on
perfectly imitating a fine, sophisticated skill in Japan, and evaluate in each case the way that subsequent
innovation, or Japanisation in the case of foreign models, was introduced.
The collection addresses cases ranging from shamanic theatre that reproduces and elaborates a ritual claimed to
be the most ancient in Japan and the power and mystery of ritual activities that involve puppet replicas of human
figures, through the learning, perfection and reproduction of the arts of painting, poetry, pottery and architecture
across centuries of practice, to the complexities of copyright law in the contemporary world of fashion, food
models designed to draw customers into restaurants, and the establishment of a world winning motor industry.
The last case epitomises the important questions Cox sets out to address, namely 'why the West has had such a
fascination for the adeptness with which the Japanese apparently assimilate all things foreign and a fear of their
skill at artificially remaking and automating the world around them'. Cox is not just gunning for another version
of cultural particularism, however, and he skilfully brings the whole, great range of disparate material cases into
the neat theoretical framework originally laid out by Taussig. Originally? What can that mean? I anticipate that
this book will have readers rethinking a few more ideas than that one, a volume that truly achieves the purpose
we set out for the series.
Joy Hendry
 Acknowledgements

This book emerged from a conference, 'The History and Practice of Copying in Japan', held in September 2001 at
Oxford Brookes University. The six years which have passed since that event and the publication of this volume
have been longer than the contributors and the editor would have liked but time has at the very least permitted
the inclusion of two papers, by Cox and Coaldrake, which were not originally offered and allowed for a certain
maturity to develop in the reflections that constitute the introduction. Time has also been unkind and a central
figure at the conference and in the intellectual development of this project, Professor Jan Van Bremen of Leiden
University, sadly passed away in 2005. An enduring image from one of the events that accompanied the
conference was of an impassive Jan, face to face with a dancing performer from a visiting Yamabushi Kagura
troupe. This book is dedicated in memory of his contribution and friendship.
The conference was supported directly by grants from the Japan Foundation Endowment committee and the
'Japan 2001' festival. It was also one of the outcomes of a three-year Economic and Social Research Council
research grant held by Joy Hendry, Rupert Cox and Keiko Clarence-Smith (formerly Tanaka). Professor Hendry
oversaw this project and provided much of the direction that was needed in investigating a subject with such
diverse intellectual strands. Other persons involved in the conference whose papers were not included but whose
thoughts and comments informed the introduction to this volume were Lola Martinez, Daniel Gallimore,
Massimo Raveri, Leonor Leiria and Susanne Nishimura-Schermann. Another key contribution was from
Professor Masao Yamaguchi, who, while not being able to attend and take his role as the keynote speaker, did
send a paper which was read and formed a central part of the debate. In the preparation of this volume Ian Reader
offered comments emphasizing the importance of the historical origins of theories of copying in Japan and this
had a key bearing on the choice and ordering of the papers as well as the selection of the image that illustrates
the front cover.
The preparation of the manuscript, which has been a slow and at times piecemeal process, has been encouraged
throughout by the editor at Routledge, Peter Sowden. I am extremely grateful for his staunch support. Finally, on
a personal note I would like to acknowledge the support and forbearance of my family, Shana Cohen, and
Raphael and Mori Cox who patiently endured the late nights and absences that this book has required.
 Introduction

Rupert Cox

In Wim Wender's diary film, Tokyo Ga (1985), the filmmaker searches the city for the cinematic visions that he
found so compelling in watching Yasuhiro Ozu's classic of Japanese post-war cinema, Tokyo Story (1953).
Towards the end of the film and somewhat despairing of his search he locates the camera man from Ozu's last
films and asks him to set up a shot with the very same Browning camera that was used in these productions. The
long sequence that ensues shows the camera man carefully and lovingly recreating the position of the camera, so
that it is just as Ozu would have meant it to be before a shot. It is a touching but ironic sequence because, besides
the act of homage, it shows a faith in the capacity of the camera, as a mechanism to accurately re-capture an
image of Tokyo and with it Ozu's own vision.1 The imitative possibilities inherent in Ozu's camera seem to
enchant Wenders and Yuhara Atsuta, for through the functions of its mimetic technology an aesthetic vision of
Japan was made visible to the world; a vision that for many is encapsulated in the paradigmatic concept of ma
('interval', in time and space).2 Some interpreters of Japan have found in ma an essential cultural category which
is reproduced continuously through forms as diverse as architecture, garden design, dance, music and in Ozu's
case the structure of film editing. It is a transferable quality of visual and material expression which those who
choose to work in any of these diverse media must invariably learn through a singular educational system based
on observation, imitation and constant repetition (Singleton 1998).
More circumspect investigators of Japan, such as Wenders, find such purity of form elusive and are distracted
and frustrated by the contemporary image world of Tokyo, with its plethora of video screens and brash
commercialism. It is illustrative of the power of the copy that, surrounded by this world of simulation and
commoditization, Wenders should turn to a mimetic technology and engage in an act of recreation so as to
reclaim an aesthetic vision which is described as authentically 'Japanese' because it is made and reproduced
through a system of learning based on imitation.
The power in question here has a magical quality, making it possible to conjure up fantasies and fears, to
manifest and reproduce myths and traditions, and potentially to confuse and confound the observer.3 I describe
this episode in detail because it is a prescient metaphor for the work that follows where the investigation of the
acts and technologies of copying and the copies that result from these processes must constantly distinguish
between, on the one hand, the idea of copying as a peculiarly Japanese cultural tradition, identifiable by a rich
vocabulary of terms and complex practices and, on the other hand, an awareness that what we are dealing with is
also a shared human faculty that is: 'to copy, to imitate, to yield into and to become other in such a way that the
copy draws power and influences the original' (Taussig 1993: xiii).
Therefore, there is a tendency in dealing with this subject towards generalisation and on occasion to
obscurantism, for it is a field within which it is easy to get lost among the ambiguities and ironies of copying,
particularly when they involve the processes of simulation that postmodern commentators of Japan find so
beguiling.4 It is the purpose of this book to avoid such obfuscation and to deal with concrete examples of
'copying' in Japan, using case studies to create a context and therefore to deal with each instance in its own
terms. In this way, all of the chapters here deal with examples that address the details and nuances of copying in
Japan, but are also distinguishable by a degree of intentionality for the copies in question are made deliberately
even if the nature of the copy itself and the gradations of meaning in that concept are open to interpretation.
The kind of generalisations that this collection is directed towards and aims to counter is well represented by
explanations of the period of the late nineteenth century when Japan was frequently identified by the West as a
nation of copiers. Western explanations suggest that in this period Japan's openness to technology, rapid
industrialisation and economic advancement are evidence of a cultural tradition in copying (Tatsuno 1991). This
account of the transformation of Japanese technology and industry since the nineteenth century conflates
institutional and cultural factors so that copying becomes the result of the following: a Confucianinspired
subordination of the self to the group, used to promote loyalty to the corporation and the nation; the ideology of
the 'company as family' which transfers family hierarchies to the workplace; and institutional parameters such
that the Meiji government supports the copying of technology. Within the logic of this model, Japan becomes a
nation of imitators who only recently, as they have reached economic maturity, have begun to be creative.
Attempts to counter this perception – that copying (particularly copying of foreign technology) is a Japanese
cultural tradition – have tended to replace one stereotype with another. In the book Created in Japan: from
Imitators to World Class Innovators, the author Sheridan Tatsuno (1991) locates creativity within a distinctly
'Japanese' mode of thought. Western thinking is characterised as linear, rational and individualistic. Japanese
thinking is adaptive, holistic and cyclical.5 Ultimately, Tatsuno locates the origins of this Japanese mode of
creative thought in a Zen-inspired cultural tradition.
I want to suggest that it may not be wholly accurate to reduce copying or creativity in Japan simply to a principle
of Confucian or Zen thought or to a function of social and institutional structures. The point, after all, is not to
counter the notion of a cultural tradition in Japanese copying with a cultural tradition in Japanese creativity but –
as I believe this book has done – to examine particular instances of practices of copying in time and space and to
examine the whole concept of copying itself. The aim therefore is to identify and critically evaluate negative
Western perceptions of copying in Japan and Japanese theories that emphasise the positive 'cultural' value of
imitation. The idea of a Japan that deviously or ingeniously copies others needs to be amended by perspectives
that address the history of creative exchanges with the outside world and the particular myths, philosophies and
concepts which are emblematic of the origins and originality of copying in Japan. The nature of and changes in
these differences in perception are an important subject for investigation because they often prevent a proper
understanding both of the distinctive aspects of Japanese culture and of its complex historical relationship with
foreigners. The history of transcultural and intercultural exchanges, from the twelfth century to the present day,
are reconsidered here by examining the making and remaking of particular ideas and practices, including
shamanic theatre, puppetry, fashion, painting, poetry, pottery, architecture, cars and food. The symbolic
representation of such exchanges as forms of copying has often led to essentialised ideas about culture,
technology and the nation. This work is a rethinking of such ideas, drawing upon a wide variety of examples to
open up the metaphor of copying and thus, it is hoped, to reveal new possibilities for approaching these topics.
The purpose of this book in focusing on Japanese copying is to make possible the translation of a series of
otherwise loosely related ideas and concepts (such as kata, mitate and utsushî) into objects, images, texts,
practices and spaces of reproduction that may become vehicles for the expression of personal qualities as well as
organisational and national identities. This interpretive framework demonstrates the social, political and
economic conditions that have constituted copying as an idea for and about the Japanese. The emphasis is
different from one of the few English language works, dedicated to the subject Learning in Likely Places:
Varieties of Apprenticeship in Japan (Singleton 1998), in which Japanese copying is analysed as a regionally
bounded form of learning through practice or as a technical matter of reproduction. The shift made here is in
considering copying as part of a series of emblematic and material exchanges among people within Japan and
between Japan and the outside world. For it is through paying specific attention to a series of historical examples
of such exchanges that the meaning of copying, even as a method for the universalisation of knowledge and
culture, can be understood as always particular and contingent.
In this introduction I suggest that to understand the perception of Japan as a copying culture, we have first to
explore Western intellectual and imaginary preconceptions about copying as they relate to ideas and practices in
Japan. My argument is not so much concerned with the validity of Western ideas, for most of the chapters focus
on the different aspects of the culture of copying in Japan. The question to be addressed is why the West has had
such a fascination for the adeptness with which the Japanese apparently assimilate all things foreign and a fear of
their skill at artificially remaking and automating the world around them.
The anthropologist Michael Taussig has posed a similar kind of question in his book Mimesis and Alterity
(1993). He asks how and why the mimetic faculty (the faculty to copy, absorb and become other) is something
associated with primitiveness in the Western imagination. Taussig argues that this association is the consequence
of distinctive modes of copying – acts of copying, copying machines and copies – converging with nineteenth-
century social-Darwinist constructions of the 'primitive'. I extend that argument in a new direction by proposing
that the same kind of association between copying and the 'primitive' is also fundamental to the historical
construction of Western ideas of Japanese difference.
The instance of mimicry that Taussig actually refers to in his book is the first contact in 1832 between the crew
members of Charles Darwins' ship, the Beagle, and the native peoples of Tierra del Fuego. Darwin is careful to
record what he calls the 'power of mimicry' that these peoples possessed 'to an uncommon degree', and makes a
connection between acts of copying and a lesser, 'savage' stage of civilization (Taussig 1993:75). In the case of
Japan, acts of copying must be understood in different contexts: of European and American imperial ambitions,
rather than colonialism and against the background of what may, with some reservations, be called 'Orientalism'
rather than 'Primitivism'. However, in saying that, there is an interesting history of associations between
Japanese acts of copying and the behavior of monkeys and apes. In one notable example, Professor Charles
Richet, Nobel prize winner in 1913, describes the Japanese as 'Japanzees', or 'Mockmen', because of their
position as intermediaries between monkeys and human beings (Schwartz 1996:368). This Darwinian insult has
become in the context of modern primatology a complement and even a template for human culture. In a book
The Ape and the Sushi Master, written by the physical anthropologist Frans de Waal (2001), a connection is made
between the training by observation, imitation and repetition of a sushi chef and the behaviour of apes, to argue
that, in effect, the learning of a Japanese cultural tradition like making sushi, is evidence of a more fundamental
learning process for all human/primate culture.6
The first encounter between Japan and the West, with the accidental arrival of a Portuguese trading vessel on the
island of Tanegashima in 1543, is also accompanied by an act of copying – the copying of gun technology. We
know of this first encounter from two accounts: Mendes Pinto's Peregrinations, written in 1548, and the Teppo
Ki, a Japanese document written by a historian monk in 1607. Both accounts are very similar and focus on the
fascination of the Japanese islanders for the guns that the Portuguese visitors had brought with them (Lidin
2002). According to both accounts, the technology for reproducing the gun spread rapidly and by 1556 (thirteen
years after the first contact) there are reportedly 300,000 guns in Japan.7
The emphases in the account by Mendes Pinto are interesting for our understanding of European perceptions of
copying by non-Western peoples. Early Portuguese accounts from Japan, written by Jesuit missionaries, are
usually dominated by descriptions of religious behaviour, physical appearance and social custom, which are
contrasted with European norms. Mendes Pinto's account, in reporting on matters of technology in this way, is
different from these accounts, but similar to other European reports from Asia in the sixteenth century, which, if
they mention acts of copying at all, do so in the context of technology and material culture but rarely as a means
of passing judgment on the differences between peoples. It is only later, from the seventeenth century onwards
that machines and particularly firearms, became a measure of European superiority over others and indicators of
their powers of invention and industry. Only then did acts of copying technology by non-Western others become
matters for debate and censure (Adas 1989).
The successful reproduction of Portuguese firearms by the Japanese on the island of Tanegashima became in
time a national emblem for a tradition in technological innovation, so that today it is home to Japan's space and
rocket centre.8 In the period of isolation that followed the expulsion of the Portuguese, Japanese copying of
technology through reverse engineering or the translation of foreign manuals, as part of the learning of 'foreign
science' (Rangaku), is popularly characterised as a necessary first step in the development of new technologies,
which would proceed with adaptation and end up by improving upon the original (Morris-Suzuki 1994).
There are two major concerns about Japanese copying that emerge from Western discourses during the period
when it opened up to the international community in the nineteenth century. They are first, its potential challenge
to Western ideas of science and technology and second, its challenge to Western economic power and imperial
ambition. The rapid industrialisation of Japan, with its acquisition and improvement of machines from the West,
defied the widespread assumption that the so-called 'Lower Races' were incapable of matching European
inventiveness and material prowess. Measurement of these differences was only really possible in the period just
before the eighteenth century, when technology and science in Europe came together so that the development and
utilisation of tools and instruments could be a way of ordering differences between peoples. The so-called
'cluster of innovations', central to the Industrial Revolution, provided a kind of proof of Western superiority.
The most striking example of this proof was the introduction of clocks in Asia (Pagani 2001). It is with clocks
that notions of difference in thought (that is, a difference in perceptions of time) and not just in behaviour or
appearance – between Europeans and other peoples – begins to take hold. It is also with clocks that there is a link
to the development of engineering science in Japan as applied to the technology, first to the construction of
'mechanical dolls' (karakuri ningyô) and thereafter to various industrial applications (Morris-Suzuki 1994).9 The
enthusiasm in Japan for applying this foreign technology to the mechanisation of labour and even in the post-war
period to mechanised humans, as robots, is well known and much commented upon.10 Less analysed is the
possible relationship between the frequent accusations of copying from Western sources that have accompanied
these technological developments and Japanese society's fascination for artificial humanity.
Taussig has argued that machines which copy human faculties, such as the phonograph and the camera, have all
been used in the past by Western explorers and anthropologists to reflect upon the differences of the native
'other' and in many instances to confirm their primitiveness (Taussig 1993). The construction of particular kinds
of machines, such as automata and robots, which copy the actions of the body to the point of attributing it an
intelligent design go a step further. They threaten the Victorian sense of man's place in an ordered universe.
In the European imagination, imitative devices such as automata were often discussed and represented in
metaphysical terms. The idea of the 'Monster in the Machine' has a long history in Europe and, as Mary Shelley's
Frankenstein demonstrated, Western culture is by turns fascinated and appalled by the creation of an artificial
man (Bann 1994 and Hanafi 2000).11
The fear which artificial humans like Frankenstein inspire is the fear of being controlled or of being denied
liberty. It is the fear of copying machines in general, which may obscure or break down our relationship with
others, even our relationship with our own bodies. The fear and fascination of human automata are linked not by
the inhuman ugliness of the copy, but by their muddling and often seductive likeness. The problem is one of
authentication – of defining the real human being and their distinguishing characteristics, such as intelligence.
European automata makers have famously exploited the notion of an intelligent machine, embellishing their
creations with Orientalist associations so that it might be supposed that a foreign mind is at work.12 The power
of the copy which is exploited in such machines is noted by Simon Schaffer, who has suggested that:
In many Western myths of mechanical intelligence, with Chinese or Japanese, Turks or Nazis as their protagonists, aliens are automata, mindless
subjects of tyranny; they build automata, because they possess fiendish cunning; and they conceal what they have done, because they desire to
master us.
(Schaffer 1996:79)
There may be (and this would be a subject for further investigation) a long-term political and aesthetic
relationship in the Western imagination between intelligent automata and Orientalist constructions of the
Victorian empire's others (such as the Japanese) as devious artificers. These ideas about artificial forms –
mechanical or biological – persist today in Western popular culture and continue to associate Japan with dark
imaginings about alien intelligence. This can be seen, for example, in the fictional works of William Gibson and
the Neuromancer trilogy, as well as in the Tetsuo ('Iron Man') films of Tsukamoto Shinya, who imagines a future
Tokyo as a dystopian world where man and machine become literally welded to each other (Russell 2002:220).
The 'cyberpunk' films of Tsukamoto, like the cartoon world of the immensely popular anime figure Atomu show
that the preoccupations with artificial intelligence and mechanised humanity are not the sole preserve of Western
Orientialist discourses, but part of an exchange of ideas that has fed into the Japanese imagination.13
There is a problem with using the Orientalism model for understanding Western perceptions of copying by
Japan, because it too proposes a deterministic model of imperial/colonial power relations that obscure the
historical flow of ideas in both directions. In matters of technology, as in other matters such as the arts, the
history of relations between Japan and the West has been characterised by an exchange with copying on both
sides. Indeed, Western attitudes to copying of the East and copying in the East have always been ambiguous.
At the end of the nineteenth century attitudes in Europe to the benefits of industrialisation and technology had
shifted to the point where the French poet Paul Valery could unfavourably compare Japanese successes in the
Sino-Japanese war with Chinese military strength, because the Japanese had imitated the Western 'disease of
invention' and were suffering a loss of moral and spiritual values with their 'debauchery of confused ideas' (Adas
1989:350).
Many other European writers and intellectuals, also overtaken by a romantic anti-modern aestheticism, found in
Japan cause for concern over the dangers of emulating the modern materialistic West. Lafcadio Hearn famously
saw in late nineteenth-century Japan's copying of the West the erosion of a tradition made all the more poignant
because he associated it with the classical virtues of his native Greece (Schwartz 1996:367).
The Western embarrassment at the external imitation of Western things in Japan had fostered a new paradoxical
attitude, which is well represented in the comments by Alexander Innes Shand on his report of the Japanese
participation in the Vienna exhibition of 1873. Observing the Japanese men in Western garb, Shand writes that:
'There was something about them that told you they were masquerading cleverly… The imitation of externals
came naturally to them, they were learning from everything around them, without an appearance of effort.' But
this admiration is limited, for while the Japanese were 'doing their best to denationalise themselves with
astounding success. We Europeans were servilely copying their arts and humbly confessing that our attempts at
imitation were failures' (Yokoyama 1987:136).
These comments need to be understood within the context of a widespread ambivalence in Victorian society
which embraced the innovations and inventions of the industrial revolution and post-enlightenment scientific
discovery and at the same time celebrated and romanticised the past and the exoticism of other countries
(Lowenthall 1988).14 The Victorians had inherited conflicting traditions about the morality and efficacy of the
copy, stressing devotion to the precise reproduction of copies of the past and of other cultures, but in ways that
were both innovative and profitable (Lowenthall 1998:301–9).
We can understand this attitude better if we look at the importance of international fairs and exhibitions in the
late nineteenth century and early twentieth century. At these events, objects and images of all cultures and all
periods could be displayed alongside each other and next to those from Japan. These objects and images could be
viewed and borrowed as exemplars of a national tradition and at the same time they could in many instances be
owned as commodities, by members of the general public. The possibility for more than a select elite to own and
possess aspects of the past and other cultures was made possible because copies could now be mechanically
reproduced by industrial, factory methods and transferred into other media by new innovative technologies such
as the camera. This spectacle of commodification at international fairs and exhibitions is the establishment of
what has been called a 'culture of imitation', where copies of Japanese art and culture acquired commercial and
aesthetic value.
The nineteenth-century commercial aesthetic of what Miles Orvell calls 'the culture of imitation' is born of new
technologies of copying and makes the copy an object or image to be mixed up with other styles and periods in
the way that displays of goods in department stores would do later (Orvell 1989). As this excerpt from a volume
about home interior decorations, published alongside the 1893 Chicago Fair, makes clear, such modes of display
could address individual desires as much as national identities:
The Japanese Eastlake Morris Cook influence has made women think for themselves and moved the more cultivated and self-reliant among them to
act upon the principle that their home is as individual a possession as their wardrobe, and may as honestly express their personal taste and
convictions.
(Orvell 1989:50)
The point here is that the creation of commodities and identities through copies has the potential to break down
the association of national identity and culture with the manufacture of things, as the sheer accumulation of
things becomes a means of personal expression. This development is accentuated in the twentieth century with
new technologies of copying and a greater proliferation of commodities, so that copies become opportunities for
a more 'authentic' experience. It is a shift from the 'culture of imitation' to the 'culture of authenticity' and what
appears to have disturbed some commentators is that Japan never appears to have made this shift or to have
recognised a distinction.
From postmodern perspectives, even before the modern period, Japan had realised, in its approach to copying
technology and to the production of copies that quality of authenticity which the West might call 'The Real
Thing', which is to say a quality of experience that does not duplicate reality but exceeds it (Orvell 1989). There
are fundamental questions to be posed here, first posed by industrial and imitative technology in the nineteenth
century.
How has the machine, with the power to copy and to produce replicas and reproductions, altered our own
attitudes towards the copy and our attitudes towards the copying in and the copying of other cultures like Japan?
Have, for example, industrial and imitative technologies degraded the quality of our civilisation, our relation to
the past, to others around us, to our selves and, of course, our relationship to copying in Japan? To ask the
question most famously and cogently posed by Walter Benjamin (1969) degraded the 'aura' of the original, or
have they enlarged the base of culture, opening up new ways of being and knowing in the world and
democratising our view of copying by other cultures such as Japan? To put it more simply, can copying machines
and the copies they produce support the value of tradition as appears to be the case in Japan, or will they, as is the
fear in the West, utterly destroy it?
To understand attitudes to copying in Japan since the nineteenth century means appreciating the impact of
industrial and imitative technology and practices of commodification on our notions of what is real and what is
artificial.
For postmodern commentators, there is little or no distinction in Japanese culture between the real and the
artificial and the mechanical reproduction of copies, and their contemporary proliferation confirms that the act
of copying in Japan, mechanically aided or by hand, is above all a cultural act and that to copy is to affirm
qualities of being or becoming Japanese. But with the ubiquity of copies through commodification and the
attraction of new sensory experiences made possible through copying machines, the copy may speak much more
to personal desires and feelings than to national qualities.
In this brief introduction to some of the assumptions and historical conditions behind the Western idea of
Japanese copying I have not asked what individual Japanese may understand by the act of copying, the copying
machine, or the copy. I have been addressing these issues at a different level, at the level of representations. In
order to explore Japanese ideas about copying, as the essays in this volume will do, the range of meanings of the
copy will be expanded and modified still further so that even the most basic assumptions about copying in the
West are examined. For example, a commonly cited definition of the copy in the Western tradition is that given
by Justice Bailey in 1822: 'A copy is that which comes so near to the original as to give every person seeing, the
idea created by the original.'
The question of the importance of an original is raised by the chapters, particularly in Part I, 'Original
encounters', which ask if in the Japanese context it is possible to talk about 'copying' without defining an
original. What is meant by an 'original' can differ widely. There is the Iwato Biraki creation myth from which the
shamanic Kagura theatre that Averbuch describes draws its cultural legitimacy and authority. The 'folk tradition'
(minzoku geinô) functions similarly in the analysis that Jane Marie Law makes in this volume of the re-invention
of contemporary puppet theatre on Awaji island. In Keiko Clarence-Smith's essay on fashion magazines the
concept of an original is an ideal of beauty that is presented as available for purchase, but ultimately is always
beyond reach, creating a repetitive endless desire for the next big thing.
There is a strong historical argument that at the root of the importance placed in an 'original' are Buddhist
notions, arising from the contact and exchanges with China, about the replication of particular archetypal forms,
as a means to get closer to essential truths.15 Practices of sutra copying (shakyô), of pilgrimage – through
mountain circumambulation at sites such as Ômine san and Hiei san – and of architecture – as with the
reproduction of the space of Chang'a in China at the site of Heian-Kyô in Kyoto – are all examples of the
importance of an originary form upon which a tradition can be built.16 In the Buddhist context, the precise
replication of materials and spaces and the repetition of prescribed actions – as, for example, with mudra – are
the means by which collections of texts are built and ultimately spiritual power and knowledge are transferred.
These ideas and practices underpin the philosopher Dôgen's replication in Sotô Zen at Eihei-ji, of the forms of
Buddhism seen at Ch'an temples in China. In these ways, the archetypal form may shift location and between
media, but remains essentially the same, acting as a vessel for enlightenment or for spirits, as in the case of
Averbuch's and Law's essays.
The vessel in question for Law is the 'puppet' (ningyô), which acts as a ritual copy, to incorporate the spirits of
the dead and mediate between the human world and the world of the divine. Like the bodies of the dancers
described by Averbuch, the ritual purpose to which the puppet is put demonstrates an essential longing for return
to an authentic original condition. This longing is enabled by the repetitive character of ritual performance, but
at the same time, in the search for ever higher levels of fidelity in copying by using new technologies such as
video, is also frustrated by it. The desire for beauty created by the magazines that Clarence-Smith describes also
demands a continual return and close inspection by the reader of the pages and pictures of each new edition of
the magazine.
The chapters in this volume suggest that there may be a compulsive character to the concept of replication in
Japan. This was certainly in evidence when I visited the Amanô Yasugawara cave near the shrine (Amano Iwatô
Jinja) where the Kagura dances that Averbuch describes take place.17 All over the ground leading to the entrance
way and covering most of the path there are hundreds of small, sometimes miniature stupa, built simply by
placing a few rocks upon each other and left by visitors. It is an act of copying that speaks as much perhaps to
the whimsy of tourists as it does to religious devotion, but at such a location, where Japan's creation is said to
have taken place, it is an apt evocation of the power of the copy.
The arguments within and dialogue between these essays suggest that it is necessary not only to identify an
'original' to talk about copying in Japan, but also originality. Originality is contingent on different historical
conditions such as a particular relationship with China in the twelfth century, represented through calligraphy
(John Carpenter) and poetry (Rein Raud) and tea utensils (Pitelka), and with Portugal in the sixteenth century,
expressed through folding screens and mappa mundi (Alexandra Curvelo), and with Korea in the mid-
seventeenth century, expressed through extant versions of a single painting (Ronald Toby).
All the chapters in Part II, 'Arts of citation', demonstrate the originality and creativity of the copy by identifying
a process and particular persons by which the copy is made. Pitelka discusses the material reproduction of tea
ceremony utensils and how originality is ultimately located in the historical personage of Sen No Rikyu.
Carpenter makes a close examination of the scriptorial practices of calligraphers to demonstrate that, while proof
of authorship validates a work, in the case of calligraphy it may rarely be distinctive enough to attribute to a
historic individual. For Raud, the practices of allusory borrowing in the late Heian period Waka poetry by the
scholar Teika introduced the idea of 'words with owners' (nishi aru kotoba) and gave rise to a technique for
building a new poem onto the lexicosyntactical structure taken from another text. In Toby's essay, the playfulness
in evidence through the creation of multiple layers or 'reiterations' in a single painting by Hanegawa Tôei is a
serious game that raises questions about the source(s), subject and authorship of the work. Finally, in the essay
by Curvelo, the use of European paintings as models for copying in sixteenth-century Japanese seminaries is
shown to be based on Western maps, but to have led to the development of new hybrid art forms. In all cases, it
is shown that creativity in the process of copying resides in the character of the individuals concerned and in the
nature of the materials and techniques employed.
What the process of copying means changes very significantly with each of the media dealt with in this section –
text, painting and ceramics – and is unclear even within the terms of each media. To take two examples: the
literary composition of waka poetry is described as a process of 'playing' (not 'copying') with words by Raud, so
as to confirm the elite status of connoisseurs, and in the case of the term yûgen, to allude to a level of
'profundity' which lies beyond expression. Similarly, it is argued by Pitelka that through the making, using and
appreciation of raku tea objects, it is possible to manifest and perpetuate a family tradition and at the same time
to realise an experiential quality of 'spontaneity'. What we are faced with in these examples is the slipperiness
and ambiguity of copying in Japan, such that it may not be 'copying' at all in any singular, finite sense of the
term.
The multiple uses and subtle nuances of the concept of copying in Japan is evident at a semantic level through
the extensive roster of terms that are used in the essays throughout this book. Clarence-Smith introduces us to a
good number of these terms – kata, mitate, fukusei and utsushî – and makes distinctions between them on the
basis of their applicability to modern notions of copyright. For Pitelka in discussing ceramics, utsushî is a useful
term, although his analysis is more concerned with material(ist) and immaterial 'reproduction' than the 'copy'.
Toby, in dealing with painting finds that equating utsushî with 'copy' has pejorative connotations, implying the
movement or transference of some subject or object from one material or metaphorical location to another, and
he prefers to translate the term as 'drew on' or 'incorporated' rather than 'copied'. From the perspective of art
theory it is, of course, possible to identify a complexity of layers of 'copying', which, according to Elkins, should
be treated as a historically determined 'looped' sequence, from original to copy and back to original again (Elkins
1993:114).
Carpenter introduces us to the concept coined by the literary critic Konishi Jin'ichi of Kôsokusei or Kihansei
meaning 'conforming ethic', in which freedom is achieved through the restriction of individual expression.
He also refers to the term môsha, meaning the 'tracing' over of an original, a technique that allows for a level of
exactitude to be achieved so that it may be difficult to distinguish the copy from the original. These subtle
differences in what may be meant by 'copy' show the difficulty of defining 'fakery', as well as raise the question
about what we are to understand by these terms when it is not drawing but modern processes such as the
machinery used to construct cars, dealt with by Madeley, or, in the case of sample foods (see Cox, Chapter 12),
the creation of wax and silicon molds that is at issue.
The chapters in Part III, 'Modern exchanges', address this matter, and Coaldrake identifies in the case of the
Japanese architectural models used in the Vienna and London international exhibitions the shift in usage from
the term hinagata, meaning an ideal type or archetype, to the term mokei, meaning 'copy' or 'shape', referring to a
scaled model building that was scientifically accurate. Brumann describes the same kind of shift, although it is
much more numerous and constitutes a discourse in effect, in the recurrent attempts in Kyoto to draw up official
criteria for the protection and preservation of particular buildings and zones. In this case, as with the transfer of
car technology from the Wolseley to Ishikawajima factories that Madeley details, it is in the nature of official
criteria and licence agreements rather than individual words on which the right to copy and the legitimacy of the
result is decided.
The chapters suggest that what may or may not count as a 'copy' can be better understood by asking who or what
it is for – that is, for the individual who seeks 'profundity' or 'spontaneity', or for the perpetuation of certain
social political and economic formations. This becomes clear from the level of interpretation and context –
political, economic and social – of the analysis. The final part of the book illustrates this in the modern context
of extensive institutional artistic and professional exchanges within the fields of international exhibitions, car
manufacture, conservation of cultural heritage and 'sample' food displays. All of these may define and redefine
the idea of the 'original', of 'tradition' and of the process of reproduction. For example, in Chapter 10, Christoph
Brumann locates the conservation of Kyoto machiya town houses within modern debates about cultural property
and the definition of an 'original', and demonstrates how copying and the copy could mean different things to the
conservator, to the connoisseur and to the home owner. The concern here with forces and relations of production
echoes Pitelka's analysis of the utensils used in the tea ceremony and focuses attention on the material substance
of the copy, whether or not it is an object that may be defined (in a materialist fashion) by its ends. Therefore,
this is not just a matter of context and identifying the particular network of relations that characterises
modernity. Nor, more generally, is this about the political utility of the copy, something which Carpenter refers to
in talking about a 'national style' of calligraphy and which at a local level of debate is much of what Brumann's
and Law's chapters are involved with.
The theme here is materiality, something which I focus on in Chapter 12, but that is also apparent in a number of
chapters throughout the book, particularly so in the interplay between what Toby describes in his essay as
'surface' and 'depth'. This is a distinction between visual appearance and material substance, which Carpenter
points towards when he distinguishes the 'trace' element left with 'excessive deliberation and hesitancy' on the
scroll by the bodily effort of a scribe, who therefore could be either a very young calligrapher or a very old frail
calligrapher, or someone unfamiliar with the calligraphy they are copying.18 This confusion is part of the
fascination and the bewilderment that the world of copies represent, presenting us with the means to reach into
the past and lay claim to tradition and to look forward into a future of limitless (commodity filled) desire. That
both possibilities seem to co-exist in Japan is not an indication of a latent postmodernism in its traditional
culture, nor is it because Japan is in thrall to a global economy where art and the past can be manipulated and re-
presented as forms of edification, education and entertainment.
I have argued that if we want to understand how Japan is perceived in the West as a 'copying culture', we need to
look at the relations between historically situated instances of acts of copying, which raise questions about the
relationship of tradition and innovation. These questions are intensified in copying machines, which raise
fundamental questions about the relationship of man and nature, and through copies, raise questions about
authorship, ownership and appropriation, as copies can be used to create self-identities. The chapters which
follow provide a series of contexts and a historical framework, in order to focus upon what 'copying' and the
'copy' may mean and shift the emphasis to particular examples of the history and practice of copying in Japan.

Notes

1 It is an image which as film historians now know never existed, for Ozu shot all his films about Tokyo using specially made sets (Richie
1986:74).
2 This is a transferable concept which ambitious interpreters of Japan have used to talk about the structures inherent in various objects, images,
texts, sounds and landscapes (Pilgrim 1993). It is not a concept which Ozu ever publicly made claim to.
3 The magic in question is first described by James Frazer and is of two kinds, 'sympathetic' and 'contagious'. For a fuller discussion and analyses,
see Michael Taussig's work Mimesis and Alterity (1993).
4 Perhaps the most well-known example of this kind of interpretation is Roland Barthes' Empire of Signs (1982) within which Japan is interpreted
as a kaleidoscope of empty signs, signifying nothing but themselves.
5 It is also interesting that Tatsuno uses mechanistic metaphors, such as 'fission' and 'fusion', to illustrate the differences between Japan and the
West.
6 There is a long tradition of Japanese primatology research which attributes to the macaque emotion and social organisation. This approach is
most strongly represented in the work of Kinji Imanishi.
7 There was a very pragmatic rationale behind this fascination of the Japanese for a new destructive technology, given its political importance in
the context of the ongoing civil war.
8 The precise title of the centre is the Tanegashima Space Centre, part of the National Space Development Agency of Japan (NASDA).
9 Edo period authorities disallowed most practical applications of foreign science with the notable exception of the construction of automata.
10 See Madeley, Chapter 11, for more detail on the sources and natures of these criticisms.
11 In America, there was a more optimistic, utopian view of the sciences which duplicate nature and instead of Frankenstein, the 'Artificial Man',
we have the 'Self-Made Man', the epitome of whom in the nineteenth century was the inventor Thomas Edison, who interestingly was the producer
of the first Frankenstein Film (Dadley 1996).
12 The most well-known examples of these 'Orientalist' automata are Von Kempelen's chess-playing Turk (Standage 2002) and the British
magician John Maskelyne's whist-playing Oriental, 'Psycho'.
13 The inspiration for the character Atomu is attributed by its creator Osamu Tezuka to the Czech author Karel Capek's work RUR.
14 Lowenthall also describes how there were successive passions in the Victorian period for all things – Roman, Greek, Egyptian, early English,
Chinese and Japanese – all as antidotes to the dreadful present.
15 This is an observation made by Ian Reader (1998), who, as a specialist in Japanese religion, has made a number of studies of pilgrimage in
Japan.
16 Carmen Blacker in her study of mountain asceticism among the shugensha practitioners connected to Shingon Buddhism describes the
circumambulation as a form of 'symbolic mimesis' (1999).
17 The visit took place during fieldwork, carried out together with Joy Hendry in 2001.
18 Brumann describes a similar difficulty in a debate about the 'hard' (hâdo) physical structure of the building's substance – that which can be seen
or touched and imitated – and the 'soft' (softo) or 'lifestyle' that imbues the structure with a feeling of authenticity for its occupants and observers.

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 Part I
Original encounters
 1
Body-to-body transmission

The copying tradition of Kagura

Irit Averbuch

Introduction

Among the various aspects and forms of Japan's copying traditions, one especially worthy of consideration is
kagura. Considered to be the oldest form of ritual, theater and dance in Japan, kagura performances can illustrate
for us the characteristics of traditional performances as 'sacred repetitions' or 'sacred copies'.
When talking about performance of any kind, either a performance of ritual or of a performing art form, one can
claim that the performance itself is a copy, a duplication, a reproduction, and that to perform it is to reproduce-
as-before, to repeat. The theater scholar Richard Schechner has dealt with this idea in his extensive work on
performance, ritual and theater (Schechner 1976, 1985, 1988; see also Turner 1982, 1987/88). Schechner
observed that performance is 'restored behavior' or 'twice-behaved behavior':
Restored behavior is used in all kinds of performances from shamanism to exorcism to trance, from ritual to aesthetic dance and theatre, from
initiation rites to social dramas…. In fact, restored behavior is the main characteristic of performance…The practitioners of all these arts, rites and
healings assume that some behaviors…exist separate from the performers who' do these' behaviors. Because the behavior is separate from those
who are behaving, the behavior can be stored, transmitted, transformed. The performers get in touch with, recover, remember, or even invent those
strips of behavior and then rebehave according to these strips…. Performance means: never for the first time. It means: for the second to the n th
time. Performance is 'twice-behaved behavior.'
(1985:35–6; my emphasis)
Thus, Schechner emphasizes this essential character of ritual or theatrical performance as being repetitive in
nature.
However, Schechner also agrees (for example, 1985:50) that every performance has its variations (not to
mention 'bloopers', mistakes and incompetent displays). It is common knowledge that performances tend to
come out a little differently each time they occur. This trait distinguishes the intangible performing arts from the
tangible fine arts. For example, when a forger makes a copy of a painting, he strives to achieve one where no
variation can be discerned. Or, in this 'age of mechanical reproduction' (Benjamin 1973), when museums sell art
reproductions, they like them to be clones of the original. However, in performance, variations are the rule: each
performance differs from its predecessors and always depends on the condition of the performers. The actor
might have a bad day, the priest might have insomnia, the dancer might lose her muscle tone, or the musician
might suffer elbow pains. Or, indeed, they might all shine on that day. The performing arts, even when repeated
faithfully, are different every single time they are staged. While this fact might appear to render performances
impossible to copy faithfully, it has never affected their popularity. On the contrary, a 'live' performance is
usually much prized and sought after over and above a 'lifeless' video or audio recording, precisely because it is
a newly made reproduction every single time.
This chapter, then, discusses the 'live' performances of kagura as representative of Japanese copying wisdom,
which preserves its culture through its religious traditions, thought, praxis and history. The paper will explore
kagura's mechanisms of copying, their successes, variations and inner purpose. It will also discuss the
problematic transmission of a performing art, and its 'creative copying' – that is, the attempt to preserve a fluid
art form within the strictures of traditional script. This exploration will lead us further to conclude that a
performing art can never be duplicated as a pure form, and that its authenticity will forever be a 'copy of a copy',
transmitted intra- and inter-generationally through masters (Schechner 1985:50).
The act of transmission itself entails the longing for the 'eternal return' to the authentic original. It can be
illustrated by a verse of kami uta – a sacred tanka poem – taken from the repertoire of Hayachine Kagura:
Gokitô ni As a ritual prayer
chiyo no mikagura We dance the sacred kagura
mairasuru Of the thousand ages
mairasetariya And we go on piling up
kasane gasane ni Dancing upon dancing 1
This poem is sung with every Hayachine Kagura performance and during every naorai – the communal meal at
the end of each kagura event. It presents the kagura as a ritual for bringing good luck and blessings to the
community. As this kami uta demonstrates, repeating the kagura performance is the purpose of the kagura
tradition, as well as its raison d'être. Kagura itself is thus 'sacred repetition'.
Indeed, even today, most kagura forms are performed in their own ritual context and time. Most take place
annually, but some kagura schools are also performed on longer cycles, for example every three or seven years
(such as Ômoto Kagura) or every thirteen years (such as Kôjin Kagura). In either case, being a repetitive ritual
event, the kagura tradition informs and is informed by the 'copying tradition' in Japan.

What is kagura?

Kagura is itself the 'great copy', a physical reproduction of the original ritual described in the myth of Opening
the Rock-Cave Door (iwatobiraki), recorded in both the Kôjiki and the Nihon shôki.2 The myth describes a
complex ritual on a cosmic scale, conducted in front of the Heavenly Cave, where the Sun Goddess, Amaterasu
Ômikami, has hidden herself in anger. The ritual climax is the shamanic possession-dance of the goddess Ame
no Uzume. Her frenzied dance stirs the multitude of kami gathered in front of the cave, and finally causes the
Sun Goddess to let herself be pulled out of hiding and shine on the world again, thus preventing its destruction.
In essence, the iwatobiraki myth describes a ritual to bring the dead back to life. It became the prototype of
native rituals and festivals (kami matsuri) that to this day share the basic aim of renewal of life forces of the
village or the world (Iwata 1992:427–9 and Yamaji 1987:222). At the same time, this myth also became the
prototypical origin of all traditional Japanese performing arts, and first among them is kagura.3
The word kagura itself is apparently a later appellation for the ancient rite of chinkon, a rite of spirit pacification
that had been performed in the imperial court since the ninth century to rejuvenate the spirit of the sun and her
descendants, the emperors. The characters forming the word kagura can be translated as 'kami pleasure' or 'kami
music', but most agree that kagura is a contracted form of 'seat of the kami' (kami no kura), implying the
presence of kami in the performance.
Today, the word 'kagura' refers to the special staged performances of music, dance and play, which form part of
shrine festivals or themselves function as a matsuri. Various genres of folk kagura have spread around Japan's
countryside since the Middle Ages. Most folk kagura today relate themselves to the iwatobiraki myth; most
include at least one piece in their repertoire (often more) that present this myth, and are often referred to as
'iwato kagura'.4
The annual performance of kagura at court and in the countryside, with its re-enactment of the original myth,
highlights its role as a ritual of rejuvenation and revitalization, which would perpetuate in Eliadean terms (1954)
the 'eternal return' of the sun and of life. It is for this reason that most folk kagura performances in Japan take
place around the New Year period. The regeneration of life forces is achieved by the active presence of kami,
who are the life energies of the world, in the kagura, the 'seat of the kami'.
The iwatobiraki myth indeed describes a shamanic rite, and the dance of the goddess Ame no Uzume in front of
the cave is understood as a dance of possession. Many shamanic elements have been incorporated into kagura as
into the common kami matsuri, for example, the use of torimono or props – branches, swords, fans bells and
gohei – that serve as 'channeling devices' for the kami to enter and possess the shamanness or the dancer. Dance
itself was a shamanic device which served both to induce trance and as its manifestation, that is, the possession
of the dancer by the kami (Takatori 1969; Nishitsunoi 1979:98; Averbuch 1998).
Yamaguchi has outlined5 two aspects of ritual in Japan: the repetitive – that is, the 'copy' part, performed in the
same way each time; and the flexible part, what he called the 'orgic banquet' of songs and dances. Though kagura
is in itself all songs and dances, it is performed mainly as a 'copy', in the repetitive mode. The 'unpredictable'
aspect of kagura could be seen in the variations woven into the very fabric of performance itself. Or it may
rather be seen in kagura's very nature and origin as a shamanic performance. Thus, following this second
interpretation of Professor Yamaguchi's division, the repetitive, 'copy' part of the ritual could be taken to be the
rehearsed part of the performance; and the 'flexible' or 'unpredictable' part could be the spontaneous eruption of
kamigakari, possession trance. I should remark that genuine cases of kamigakari during kagura are still extant in
Japan,6 though they are very rare.
Although most kagura forms today have unfortunately lost their genuine shamanic trance aspects and are
performed as an offering to the kami, kagura performances still display shamanic behavior. They incorporate
choreography of trance, or performance of possession of some kind. This 'showing' of trance, or the performance
of the appearance of trance, strives to retain the authentic, ancient religious behavior even where it naturally died
out, or was banned by the law (in the edict of 1873; see Yamaji 1987:214–5 and Hayakawa 1994, vol. 1:117).
Furthermore, trance behavior is displayed even in kagura forms that had never actually had shamanic trance as
part of their performance, as it does in the aforementioned Hayachine Kagura. This artificial 'display of trance' is
meant to show the kagura as the 'seat of the kami', even if only in stylized form (Averbuch 1998:310–312). Thus,
the performance of kagura always involve a kind of 'copying of intention', representing the lost possession trance
which was its original intent. Here, however, I will look for the unpredictable element of the kagura only in the
changes and variations that occur within the rigid framework of reproduction, in its aspects as a 'copy'. Let us
now turn to the reproduction techniques of a kagura performance.

Reproducing a kagura performance

Staging and conducting a kagura performance is usually quite a considerable undertaking. First, as was
mentioned above, every kagura performance is, in fact, a matsuri, which involves the rite of inviting the kami
(kami oroshi), sending off the kami (kami okuri) and naorai, the concluding communal meal. Large-scale
operations are often needed to prepare the offerings and the feast, as well as the stage, decorations and special
kagura constructions – for example, a large straw dragon or a long straw snake, as in Kôjin and Ômoto Kagura,
respectively, or special polls constructions as in Shiiba or Shiromi kagura (see Figure 1.1).7 Thus, we find not
only the kagura group members, but also the men and women of the village participating in the preparation of
the kagura event – the present 'copy' of it. This general participation is an integral part of the reproduction of the
whole kagura ritual event.
Here we focus on the stage performance itself, and on what we can identify as repetitive in its complex nature.
We can generally divide the repetitive elements in the kagura to both tangible and intangible elements.
The tangible elements include everything from stage to props, costumes, headdresses, masks and musical
instruments. It should be noted that most of those tangible kagura components are not reproduced each time,
before every new performance. For example, the masks, costumes, musical instruments, the kagura screen, some
torimono such as the swords, shakujô, bells and fans, are only made or purchased once. They are usually stored
away in a purified place between performances, and taken out when needed.
Many of the tangible objects of the kagura, however, are reproduced afresh each time. Most notably, the stage –
the sacred enclosure to which the kami are summoned and in which the kagura is performed – is recreated each
time. Either on the shrine's special stage, or in somebody's home, the sacred space must be re-consecrated anew
for the kami to descend to it. It might involve actual rebuilding of the stage, or it may be just marking off a
sacred space by shimenawa and gohei (Figure 1.2). Some props such as the gohei and the green branches are also
freshly prepared before each performance (Figure 1.3).
In many kagura traditions, constructing the stage is an extremely complex procedure: the ceiling above the stage
is built in a special manner to create a path for the kami to descend onto the stage: it is sometimes called kami no
michi (or 'kami path' – for example, in Hana Matsuri (Hayakawa 1994:70–82)). In other kagura schools, a
movable canopy is constructed, involving elaborate paper cuttings or paper constructions (as in Shiiba Kagura
and Ômoto Kagura). See Honda (1996), Ushio (1985:52–73) and Watanabe (1996:140–7). Elaborate cuttings are
also hung on the shimenawa. In many cases these paper cuttings, or gohei, come in five colors, and are
sometimes made to prance above the stage and to 'shake the spirit' of the kami who descend through them
(Figure 1.4).
Thus, reconstructing the kagura stage always symbolizes a renewal, with fresh paper cuttings, fresh gohei, fresh
shimenawa and fresh branches. In many places the cutting and preparation are accompanied by sacred chanting
of kami uta or by a prayer of kami oroshi. The cutting anew is, of course, a way to purify the kami path, as in any
matsuri. And, as in any matsuri, it is imperative that the prepared copy be precise. No mistake, meaning no
defilement or pollution, is tolerated here.8 Thus, the tangible elements of the kagura are usually exact copies,
precise reproductions, of former kagura settings.
By contrast, the intangible facets of the kagura, though faithfully reproduced, by their nature can never be
precise copies of their former appearances, for they involve the performing arts – dance and music. Copying
dance or music is much more demanding than reproducing the pattern of a paper cutting: it takes years of
practice.
The dancers and musicians of the kagura reproduce the performance each time anew, while trying to copy not
their former performance, but an ideal original (Schechner 1985:50). And here, memory cannot go too far back
without modern aids. For example, my kagura master, Mr Ichinokura (the master of Ishihatooka Kagura of the
Take School of Hayachine Kagura), who is acknowledged as the best practicing drummer today, prides himself
on being the 'copy' of a former master of the Take school, Mr Itô Mitarô. The sound of Mr Itô's drumming was
said to be 'the right sound of the Take school'. Mr Ichinokura himself has already become that ideal master of the
'right sound', just as the late Take master, Mr Oguni, was considered the ideal dancer to be emulated.9 Therefore,
though the kagura dancers strive for an 'ideal original', they can only copy the best in their generation, and this
transmission along the line of skillful masters is actually a 'copy of a copy', and not the copy of an authentic
original. Such an original ideal remains eternally to be strived for and to reminisce about.
To discuss in further detail the transmission of dance and music in kagura, let me introduce the Take school of
Hayachine Kagura, with which I am fortunate to be closely familiar.10

Hayachine Kagura

Hayachine Kagura is a collective name for the two rival (or sister) kagura schools that operate around Mt
Hayachine, in Iwate Prefecture: Take and Ôtsukunai. The two schools of Hayachine Kagura are itinerant in nature
and are famous for their high artistic achievements. Our interest here lies mainly with the Take school.
The group of Take Kagura used to spend the early two or three months of every year circling the villages at the
foot of Mt Hayachine, performing their dances and rites, and collecting rice as payment. Take Kagura is
considered to be a magically potent kagura and is greatly revered. In their dances, the kagura members perform
rites of purification, of fire prevention, of healing, and of the blessing of fertility, prosperity and good luck.
Hayachine Kagura is self-consciously repetitive, self-acknowledged as a copying tradition. It accentuates the
idea of reproduction and regeneration. We have already seen an indication of this in their motto kami uta and its
oft-used refrain: 'and we go on piling up/dancing upon dancing'. Hayachine Kagura also acknowledges itself as
Iwato kagura – that is, kagura that originated in the mythical ritual of Opening the Rock-Cave Door.
Furthermore, it enacts the process of the creation of the world in the beginning of each performance.
Hayachine Kagura boasts a repertoire of some forty-eight pieces, divided into five traditional categories. The
first is the category of Shiki mai: the six 'ceremonial dances' always danced in a fixed sequence which describes
the origin and creation of the world, while alluding to the creation myths of the Kôjiki and Nihon shôki. The first
is the Chicken Dance (Tori mai), which depicts the creator gods Izanagi and Izanami in a purification and
preparation dance signifying the dawn of the world. Next is the Dance of Okina, the old white heavenly king, the
ancestor who symbolizes long life, heavenly blessings and the creation of heaven. The third is Sambasô, 'Old
man No. 3', who is black and symbolizes the creation of the earth. Fourth is the dance of god Hachiman, a dance
of purification and exorcism that follows the creation of the world. Fifth is Yama no kami mai, the Dance of the
Mountain God, the dance of maintenance of the world, of fertility and protection from calamities (Figure 1.5).
Last is the dance of Iwato biraki, or Opening the Rock-Cave Door, that shows the origins of kagura itself and
recounts the mythical story of bringing forth the sun from the cave (Figure 1.6) (Sugawara 1979:184–7;
Averbuch 1995:125–68).
The other categories include additional mythical stories, epic stories from medieval times and folk tales (some
akin to pieces from the Nô theater), Kyôgen pieces (played in local dialect), and the most sacred category of
Gongen mai: the dances of the gongen sama: the embodied mountain god in the form of a black-headed shishi.
Thus, the Hayachine Kagura tradition can be seen as a storehouse of Japanese culture. It contains mythology,
epics, folklore, and preserves the traditional world-view, religious practice and lore – both of the tradition of
kami worship and of Buddhism – as well as sword routines, arts and crafts, poetry, narration, music and dance. In
these respects Hayachine Kagura is a faithful representative of the kagura tradition in general. This rich heritage
is perpetuated through the ages, through various mechanisms of the copying tradition. Let us now turn to the
mechanism of transmission of the intangible element of dance, through 'body-to-body transmission'.

Body-to-body transmission

The most difficult aspect to learn in Hayachine Kagura is to perform its now-famous complex and energetic
dances, and to play its special powerful-and-gentle drum. Our focus here will be on the dances.
Speaking from my own experiences and observations, the training of the dancer is done, at least at first, in the
'copying' or 'imitation' style, that is a traditionally Japanese learning process.11 In the first dancing lesson one
encounters, no explanation is offered, and no foot instruction given. The dance is shown, and you are expected to
follow it. You follow literally in the steps of the master. You might lose your bearing when he spins, you might
miss the tempo, but you just carry on following the master's steps and gestures, over and over again, until you
get it right. You follow enough times, until the rhythm of the drum is absorbed as it were into your veins. This is
kata kara hairu or 'entering through form'. This way you learn the dance not through your mind, but though your
legs and stomach, your body center. It is, literally, body-to-body transmission.
There is, however, a limitation to the study through imitation. Even if one follows one's master faithfully, one
will never look the same or move the same as they do – or, for that matter, play the flute or drum as they can.12
Style variations may be caused even by the different shapes of the dancers' bodies, by the length of their arms
and thighs, the way they move their heads, and so forth (Figures 1.7 and 1.8). There is no escaping this, in any
kind of performance. These style variations can generate mistakes or distortions of the original dance, which are
then perpetuated, and deviate further from generation to generation. Changes in style, or changes in the dance
itself, are the rule rather than the exception in kagura. These changes gave rise in time to the rich variety of
kagura genres in Japan in general, and to the multitude of kagura schools within each genre, as, for example, is
the case of the yamabushi kagura in northeastern Japan.13 In Schechner's words, 'that's what theater directors…
master performers, and great shamans do: change performance scores' (1985:37).
Most variations in the dances occur unconsciously and unintentionally but sometimes the changes are even made
consciously, when a performer is tempted to add a personal flourish here or there to look better on stage. This,
however, can still be considered as an innocent variation. However, often it is the case that such deviations and
variations may have more calculated ends – for example, when a master intentionally fails to fully transmit his
art to his disciple. My understanding is that this is actually a common practice in the transmission of kagura
between master and disciple groups, and there is a historical reason for that.
During the Meiji Period (1868–1912), the Take school had about seventy deshi or disciples groups around the
foot of Mt Hayachine. This large number of deshi groups was the result of the infamous Tempô era (1830–43),
when many starving villages in the area asked the kagura schools of Mt Hayachine, which they used to sponsor,
to initiate them into the dances so that they could themselves appease their kami and ask for their help (Honda
(1971[1942]: 4–6, 516–18, and Sugawara 1979:190–6). Of the seventy groups of the Meiji era, only one group
today still acts as an active deshi, a disciple of Take school: the aforementioned Ishihatooka Kagura (where I
have trained). Ishihatooka Kagura group had itself initiated another new group in 1985, Ayauchi Kagura, which is
now a 'granddaughter' of Take. Thus, Ishihatooka itself is both deshi and shishô, both disciple and master group.
In principle, the transmission of the tradition should require the master group to accompany the deshi through
the whole production of a new kagura – that is, from the carving of masks and the construction of tools, to
weaving the screen, purchasing the drum and instructing the deshi group members in the dances and music.
However, according to my kagura master, Mr Ichinokura, who initiated the new Ayauchi Kagura, there is never a
case of complete transmission.14 Due to the long-standing competition between the Take and Ôtsukunai groups,
and between each of those and their own disciple groups, the master schools learned always to omit something in
transmission. Some secret, a clever stage device, a particularly attractive step, gesture or acrobatic stunt, was
always neglected. Indeed, even a dance or two may be left out. Some aspect of style and artistic excellence
should always be omitted during instruction. If not, the master school may be in danger of being surpassed by
their disciples, lose their supremacy, and therefore their income. In the starvation years and hard times since the
Tempô era, this was not just a trifling matter of artistic pride; it could be a matter of life and death for the
village.
Considering this whole spectrum of intentional and unintentional deviation, it seems miraculous that the kagura
have survived as a continuing art form over those hundreds of years.15 Hayachine Kagura must have surely
changed through time, but no such changes are acknowledged in living memory. Take Kagura's self-image is that
of a kagura tradition transmitted intact through the last generations, and it prides itself on this fact. Take Kagura
masters are very precise about how they teach, and somehow, even with individual variations, they fanatically
preserve the 'Take Kagura style'.
There is a good reason for emphasizing this precision in the dances, for these are magically potent dances, and
their accuracy is all-important. When one performs magical steps, a mistake could be dangerous. For example, in
performing the magical step called roku-san in the middle of the Dance of the Mountain God (Yama no kami
mai), a mistake can cause the dancer to break a leg or suffer a personal calamity. Thus, the correct transmission
of such sacred steps is always emphasized, and taught at a '100 percent rate'.16

Modern times: the trouble with video recording

Modern times have introduced some new devices for the preservation of the folk performing arts, particularly
with the invention of audio and video recordings. These, however, have proven to bestow a mixed blessing:
alongside their positive benefits, recordings have also brought new problems, in some cases even worsening the
process of transmission. There are several reasons for this: one is that the dynamic of performance is lost with
the fixed recording. Furthermore, recordings can mislead and distort the right performance, because the freezing
of the fluid movement can sometimes cause a gesture that is not essential to seem so. Without seeing the same
dance many times, it is difficult to understand which gesture is important, and which is not. A non-essential
gesture might then be over-exaggerated, or a dancer might concentrate on a passing gesture they pick up from
their master, exaggerate it, and make it the center of their style. If the dancer were to rely only on one video
recording, the result would be that their style will drift away from their master's, and they may never realize they
are dancing the wrong way.
A greater problem can be caused by learning a mistake from a video recording, and then to go on perpetuating it.
I can cite an example of this from my own experience, from the time I was training in the Dance of the Mountain
God (Yama no kami mai.)17 At that time I watched a recording of the late Take's master, Mr Oguni Seikichi, the
master dancer, in order to apprehend and absorb his style, and witness the dance in its 'correct' form. In that
video recording, the master's kata (routine) of the sword differed from that which I had been taught. In this kata
the sword should 'cut' to the four compass directions, since this is a dance of purification and magical protection.
But in the video, the great master Oguni only 'cut' to three directions. That left me confused, not knowing which
form should be followed. Fortunately, I was able to talk with Master Oguni himself and to ask him about this. He
said that the correct form should, of course, have been to 'cut' to the four directions. So why, I asked, did he
dance only toward three? It turned out to be the drummer's mistake: the drummer stopped ahead of time, and
thus the master is recorded for all eternity as cutting the dance short.
The implications of such mistakes are not as trifling as might appear. The dancer in this sword dance is creating
a protective mandala on stage, a three-dimensional magical mandala, to ward off evil. When he covers only three
instead of the four directions, he breaks the mandala and impairs the magical effect. Luckily, Master Oguni was
still around then to instruct the dancers in the right dance. Now that the great Master Oguni is gone, the Take
Kagura dancers have to continue relying on their own skill and memory in order to perpetuate their dance
tradition, as they do, from generation to generation.
The cases above reveal the different possibilities of deviation from the 'right style'. They demonstrate how
complicated it is to 'copy' and 'duplicate' a dance tradition, and how even the aid of modern recording technology
could turn out to be misleading. Learning just from a video recording might be likened to learning a language by
reading a dictionary: the syntax is missing.18 A performative dance tradition such as kagura could not be kept
intact when there is no living original to emulate. The performer needs a living form of instruction which is
continuously repetitive. For this repetitive continuity is what can preserve the essence, the 'right syntax' of the
dance.
It should be added, however, that there is also some blessing in the modern audio and video recordings and
instances when they have served both Hayachine Kagura schools as copying devices worthy of the name, for
there is a history of reciprocal 'unauthorized borrowing' of dances and music between the two schools. In one
example a certain drummer is thought to have improved his skill at the drum using another drummer's tape
recording, and did so because he was too proud to apprentice himself. Other examples are of those groups who
'stole' certain dances from their rivals by watching a videotape of their dance and then recreating it in their own
school's distinctive style. Both Hayachine Kagura schools are, in fact, responsible for such cross-'borrowing' or,
as it were, for copying by 'appropriation'.19 This 'cross-appropriation' using video recording is not strictly
speaking plagiarism, because both schools had those lost dances in their original repertoires. For various
historical reasons, some dances are better preserved in one school over the other, so a more accurate expression
might be to say that the respective kagura schools have only 'reminded themselves' of the lost dances.
These 'copying by borrowing' cases show us, again, the amount of effort, planning and ingenuity that goes into
the preservation and perpetuation of the complex tradition of kagura. The preservation of such a rich repertoire,
and the right performance of the complex dances themselves require skill, enthusiasm, resourcefulness and
dedication. It also shows us the relative advantages and disadvantages of modern technology for the salvaging of
ancient traditions of folk performing arts, particularly when various kagura genres and schools today are being
consigned to archives and museums across the country.20

Conclusion

This chapter has addressed the copying tradition in kagura on several levels. First, on the level of myth and ritual
we have seen that the copying tradition of kagura is integral to its very existence, and is even its raison d'être.
Every performance of this artistic-ritual form in fact recreates it anew, in the same way the rite of iwatobiraki
resurrects and revitalizes the world. The magic of kagura lies not only in its technical performance, but also in
its sacred (trans)mission.
The kagura tradition perpetuates cultural knowledge and practice, but never neglects its ritual purpose: the
bringing into being of the presence of the kami, refreshing them with offerings of dance and song, and appealing
to them for prosperity. At the same time, as we have noted, there are many obstacles to the reproduction of both
the tangible and intangible aspects of kagura performances. The production of a right 'copy' or correct
performance, which perpetuates the way to communicate with the gods, is essential, and we noted, given the
exigencies of the performer's body alone, how difficult it is to actually produce a faithful performance 'copy' on
every occasion.
In order to preserve a performative tradition such as the kagura, there is no substitute for the direct instruction
from a living master. If video is to become the only choice, then a great number of recordings may be needed, so
that the 'essence' of the dances can be extracted from them. Video 'copies' are limited in their scope and
pedagogic potential, however, while a person-to-person instruction is a dynamic never-ending process. Within
this process, the deviations and changes in the dances could be remedied by being multiplied and repeated. Only
through the multitude of dance variations produced during instruction and performances can the 'right style' – the
particular essence of the kagura tradition – be deduced. This intangible element is hard to define, but is
recognized as such by both the performers and their knowing audiences, and is transmitted by the succession of
masters who know the 'right sound' and the 'right dance' of the kagura. In this way, the essence of kagura is
preserved through continuous copying, through perpetual physical repetition – an 'eternal return' of kagura
performances, if you will – and through infinite repetitive variation.
The fact that kagura survives is perhaps due to this dynamic technique of 'creative copying'. The dancers copy
while repeating, repeat while variegating, but still maintain their essential style. Though dance variations are the
rule, the kagura members are charged with the production of as faithful a copy as they can of the kagura, a best
copy of the best copy they know. In their attempt to reconstruct the strived-for ideal performance, they have
developed this copying wisdom, and indeed become the masters of the 'creative copy', the 'dynamic copy', which
can preserve a constant, though repetitious variation.

Figure 1.1 Omoto Kagura: straw snake kami.

Figure 1.2 Hana Matsuri: preparing the canopy and shimenawa.

Figure 1.3 Ishihatooka Kagura: preparing gohei and branches.

Figure 1.4 Omoto Kagura: dancing canopy.

Figure 1.5 Ishihatooka Kagura: Yama no kami mai.

Figure 1.6 Kamozawa Kagura: Iwatobiraki no mai.

Figures 1.7 and 1.8 Ishihatooka Kagura: practicing the dance Yashima no mai.

Notes

1 Text recorded in Sugawara (1979:41).

2 See the Kojiki myth translated in Phillippi (1968:81–5) and the Nihon shoki myth in Aston (1972:44).
3 On the history and development of kagura, see Honda (1966; 1974) and Iwata1983, 1990, 1992).
4 See Orikuchi (1975: vol.17:250); Ishizuka (1984:272–3) and Nishitunoi (1979:99–102). On kagura as chinkon, see also Iwata (1990:32–50;
1992:129–30).
5 Folk kagura is divided into various genres. Among the various classifications, the traditionally accepted one is Honda's broad division into four
main streams or genres: Miko kagura, female kagura, the oldest and rarest type; Ise kagura and Izumo kagura, both found across Japan and
include a variety of rites of Shugendô origin, masked and torimono dances, and elaborately constructed stages and altars; and the shishi or
yamabushi kagura of northeastern Japan, which combines kagura dances with Shugendô rites and includes a shishi dance as its center. See Honda
(1966); Hoff (1983) and Nishitsunoi (1979:65–9).
6 In a draft of the paper 'The concept of the copy in Japanese culture' presented at a conference held at Oxford Brookes University, 2–5 September
2001.
7 See Honda (1996). For a few examples, see also Suzuki (1979) on Kôjin Kagura; (1988); Ushio (1985) on Ômoto and Kôjin Kagura; and
Watanabe (1996) on Shiiba Kagura.
8 This idea of purification by renewal is reflected in the reconstruction of the Ise shrine every twenty years.
9 Mr Ichinokura Tamotsu, personal communication.
10 I trained with the Ishihatooka group under the guidance of Mr Ichinokura during 1985–6. I have mastered five of the dances and performed
with the group on numerous occasions. Ishihatooka Kagura is a deshi (disciple) group of the Take school of Hayachine Kagura.
11 This kind of apprenticeship process is not unique to Hayachine Kagura, and is even typical of other forms of performing arts. In the present
chapter, however, I will mainly rely on my own experiences during my training in the kagura dance at Ishihatooka Kagura of the Take school of
Hayachine Kagura (1995: x-xii).
12 In the yamabushi tradition, as in many performing art forms in Japan, the kagura members are traditionally all male. I thus use here the
masculine gender when referring to kagura members.
13 See Note 5. Among the kagura schools of this genre we find similar repertoires, similar dances and similar dance structures. Even among the
historical disciples of Hayachine Kagura there is much variation in dance and style. The similarities point to a common source to the schools, and
their differentiation must be due to natural local changes that occurred over time. See Honda (1971[1942]). The same must be true for other kagura
'families' in Japan. See also Honda's encompassing surveys of kagura schools across Japan (1934, 1954, 1966 and 1974).
14 Mr Ichinokura Tamotsu, personal communication.
15 Many kagura schools are hundreds of years old. Hayachine Kagura is dated at the latest to the fifteenth century, and even earlier to the
Kamakura period (twelfth to fourteenth centuries). See Sugawara (1979:174–7) and Averbuch (1995:48–50).
16 An example: Hayachine Kagura and Kuromori Kagura, both of Iwate prefecture, belong to the genre of yamabushi kagura. Both schools
perform the Dance of the Mountain God. In both schools the dances' structure is similar, but in movement and style the dances differ considerably.
However, in both dances, the specific sacred step of roku-san is identical. It shows that a specific step can be preserved intact if need be, and that
the more a dance is sacred and efficacious, the better it would be copied. See Averbuch (1995:175–7, 186–7) and Kanda (1984).
17 It was one of the five dances I trained in and performed during my fieldwork stay with Ishihatooka Kagura. See Averbuch (1995:169–212).
18 Not to mention its missing 'aura'. See Benjamin (1973).
19 At this point it is interesting to remember that the kami of Mt Hayachine, Seoritsuhime, is famed for being the goddess of thieves. See Ono
(1984:39, 51, 68).
20 For example, museums such as the Saitama Prefecture Folk Culture Center, or the Shiiba Museum of Folk Performing Arts in Shiiba, Miyazaki
Prefecture. See also Thornbury (1997).
 Bibliography

Aston, W. G., trans. (1972) Nihongi: Chronicles of Japan from the Earliest Times to A.D. 697. Rutland, VT and Tokyo: Charles E. Tuttle Co.
Averbuch, Irit (1995) The Gods Come Dancing: A Study of the Japanese Ritual Dance of Yamabushi Kagura. Ithaca, NY: Cornell East Asia Series.
–––– (1996) 'Performing Power: On the Nature of the Japanese Ritual Dance Performance of Yamabushi Kagura'. Journal of Ritual Studies, Vol.
10/2, pp. 1–40.
–––– (1998) 'Shamanic Dance in Japan: The Choreography of Possession in Kagura Performance'. Asian Folklore Studies, Vol. 57, pp. 293–329.
Benjamin, Walter (1973) 'The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction'. In Illuminations, London: Fontana.
Eliade, Mircea (1971) [1954] The Myth of the Eternal Return; or, Cosmos and History. Bollingen Series 46. NJ: Princeton University Press.
Hayakawa Kôtarô (1994) [1930] Hayakawa Kôtarô zenshû: minzoku geinô 1: Hana matsuri. Tokyo: Miraisha.
Hoff, Frank. (1983) 'Kagura'. In The Kodansha Encyclopedia of Japan, Vol. 4, pp. 106–8. Tokyo: Kodansha.
Honda Yasuji. (1934) Rikuzen hama no hôin kagura. Tokyo: Itô shorin.
–––– (1954) Shimotuki kagura no kenkyû. Tokyo: Meizendô Shoten.
–––– (1958) Okina sono hoka. Tokyo: Meizendô Shoten.
–––– (1971) [1942] Yamabushi kagura / bangaku. Tokyo: Iba Shoten.
–––– (1974) Nihon no matsuri to geinô. Tokyo: Kinseisha.
–––– (1996) Kagura. Nihon no minzoku geinô 1. Tokyo: Mokujisha.
Ishizuka Takatoshi (1984) 'Kagura to shamanizumu'. Nihon no shamanizumu to sono shûhen, ed. Katô Kyûzô, pp. 269–85. Tokyo: Nihon Hôsô
Shuppan Kyôkai.
Iwata Masaru (ed.) (1990) Kagura. Rekishi minzokugaku ronshû 1. Tokyo: Meichô Shuppan.
–––– (1983) Kagura genryû-kô. Tokyo: Meichô Shuppan.
–––– (1992) Kagura shinkô. Tokyo: Meichô Shuppan.
Kanda Yoriko (1984) Kuromori kagura. In Miyako chihôshi kenkyû. Miyako: Miyako Chihôshi Kenkyû-kai.
Nishitsunoi Masahiro (1979) Minzoku geinô nyûmon. Tokyo: Bunken Shuppan.
Ono Yoshiharu (1984) Ôhasama monogatari. Iwate-ken, Ôhasama: Ôhasama-chô kyôiku iinkai.
Orikuchi Shinobu (1975) Origuchi Shinobu zenshû. 32 vols. Tokyo: Chûkô Bunko.
Philippi, Donald, trans. (1968) Kojiki. Tokyo: University of Tokyo Press.
Schechner, Richard (1985) Between Theater and Anthropology. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press.
–––– (1988) [1977] Performance Theory. New York/ and London: Routledge.
–––– and Mady Schuman (eds) (1976) Ritual, Play, and Performance: Readings in the Social Sciences/Theatre. New York: Seabury.
Singleton, John (ed.) (1998) Learning in Likely Places: Varieties of Apprenticeship in Japan. Cambridge and NY: Cambridge University Press.
Sugawara Seiichirô (1979) [1969] Nihon no geinô: Hayachine-ryû yamabushi kagura. Iwate-ken, Tôwa-chô, Tsuchizawa: Tôwa-chô Kyôiku
Iinkai.
Suzuki Masataka (1979) Kôjin kagura ni miru shizen to ningen. Nihon no Minzokugaku 125, pp. 1–17.
–––– (1988) Kagura to chinkon: Kôjin saigi ni miru kami to hito. In Moriya Takeshi (ed.), Geinô to chinkon. Taikei: Bukkyô to nihonjin, No. 7, pp.
93–137. Tokyo: Shunjûsha.
Takatori Masao (1969) 'Torimono'. Kagura, eds Geinôshi Kenkyûkai, pp. 165–84. Nihon no koten geinô 1. Tokyo: Heibonsha.
Thornbury, Barbara (1997) Folk Performing Arts: Traditional Culture in Contemporary Japan. New York: SUNY Press.
Turner, Victor (1982) From Ritual to Theatre: The Human Seriousness of Play. New York: Performing Arts Journal Publications.
–––– (1987/88) The Anthropology of Performance. New York: Performing Arts Journal Publications.
Ushio Michio (1985) Kagura to kamigakari. Tokyo: Meichô Shuppan.
Watanabe Yoshimasa and Watanabe Nobuo (1996) Shiiba Kagura: Yama no min no inori to mai. Asian Folkways in Photographs 16. Tokyo:
Hirakawa shuppansha.
Yamaguchi, Masao (2001) 'The Concept of the Copy in Japanese Culture'. A draft of the paper presented at a conference held at Oxford Brookes
University, 2–5 September 2001.
Yamaji Kôzo (1987) 'Kamigakari kara geinô e: Minzoku gyôji ni okeru kami gakari no shosô'. Umesao Tadao and Moriya Takeshi (eds) Matsuri wa
kamigami no pafo–mansu. Tokyo: Rikitomi Shobô, pp. 213–49.
 2
A spectrum of copies

Ritual puppetry in Japan

Jane Marie Law

It is easy to understand how a discussion of copying in Japan should rightly include a discussion of puppets. The
Japanese word for puppet is usually ningyô, written with the two characters 'person' and 'shape'. The same
characters, read in another way are pronounced hitogata and this word was historically used to refer to small
sticks or bundles of grass offered as ritual substitutes for actual people in rites of purification.1 Today, the term
ningyô refers to what in English we would more commonly call a doll as opposed to a puppet, a distinction
determined not so much by the structure of the actual object (for they are often similar), but by the presence of a
performance before an audience. This chapter regarding puppets as a variety of a ritual 'copy' of the human form
looks at cases from Japanese puppetry traditions which enhance a discussion of what it means to create a 'copy'
of something.
I am particularly interested in asking how an examination of the extensive use of effigies/puppets in Japanese
ritual can shed light on Japanese understandings of the relationship between the object and its representation, the
real McCoy or its copy, and, as we shall see, the modes of accessing and influencing human-divine or material-
spiritual interrelationships.2 Herein lies the contribution a discussion of Japanese puppets can make to a larger
discussion of copying in Japan: puppets are necessary ritual objects so that the working out of spiritual concerns
can be conducted on the basis of a physical approximation to that which is the target of the ritual action.
We are inclined to think of copying as the creation of a falsehood, or a second-rate product, or to imply that
copying represents a failure of creativity and imagination. Conversely, the popular question from the early days
of mass market sound recording 'Is it live or is it Memorex?' always opens up the uncomfortable realisation that
perhaps the unique original is not so unique after all, or seen conversely yet again, that the copy is just that – a
copy and not the real thing. Copying matters. But it certainly does not always signify a breakdown in creativity
or even authenticity. In fact, as this volume amply demonstrates, copying as a mode of production opens broader
questions than simple inquiries about authenticity.
Japanese ritual puppetry cases provide us with another way to think about copies and replicas. Taken in a
religious context as these Japanese cases shall show, representations of the human form in effigy – copies, if you
will – ask us both to reflect on the limits of the human condition, and at the same time consider the efficacy of
ritual for transforming the spiritual realm and working out – in ritual code – some of our most compelling
spiritual problems. Effigies become spiritual equivalents of the objects they signify, and while they may not
transform the material world, they can help address issues in their own, separate but equal plane. A puppet
allows a ritual to magically do what it must, on a plane of existence that is once removed from the human realm.
Japan is noted globally for its advanced puppetry tradition, Bunraku, in which puppets are used instead of human
actors in a most realistic and sophisticated way to enact lengthy and complex dramas and tragedies. In this
discussion, however, we will see how ritual puppetry beyond the Bunraku stage presents us with a more nuanced
series of cases from which to think about the many meanings of copying. Consider, for example, the following
case of the ritual use of puppets, historically, geographically and stylistically far removed from the elegant
Bunraku stage.

Puppets in an appeasement rite: the case of the Usa Hachiman Hôjô-e

In the early eight century, the centralized government of Japan, struggling to extend its power along the Inland
Sea and the southern islands of the archipelago encountered a rebellion of Hayato tribes from the provinces of
Osumi and Hyuga in northern Kyushu. According to historical documents, in the year Yôrô 3 (720), the Hayato
tribes fortified their territories and launched a revolt against the government's fragile strongholds in Kyushu. In
the end, the Hayato were defeated in a bloody battle. The sublimation of the Hayato at this juncture in Japanese
history became a powerful mythical moment of triumph for a centralized narrative of the emerging state, and we
see references to the Hayato as subjugated people in the subsequent narratives of the Kôjiki and Nihongi, two
documents compiled with patronage of the imperial household in 712 and 720 respectively to present the unified
narrative of Japan's creation myth and the descent of the imperial family from the world-creating deities
described in those texts.
Shortly after this battle, historical sources from the nearby ceremonial complex, Usa Hachiman, indicate that an
epidemic started in the area. The disease was attributed to the malevolent spirits of the slaughtered and
subjugated Hayato. In an attempt to appease these angry spirits and to quell the epidemic, a Hôjô-e, a Buddhist
rite for the release of living beings, was performed.3
How was this appeasement accomplished? The battle that had ensued between the central government and the
Hayato was re-enacted, with puppets playing the major roles. The conflict between the government forces and
Hayato tribes was transposed onto deities, waging a battle for order in the cosmos. It was not simply a ritual
staging of conquest, but was also presented as a sumo-wrestling contest. Highly stylized, the battle of a tribicide
was represented with an ideological gloss showing the power and might of the conquering religio-political
system of the Yamato government. In the ritual, puppets served as musicians, diviners, deities and sumo
wrestlers, and the physical objects, simple stick puppets with unjointed bodies were understood to be possessed
by the spirits of those who were present at the original battle. While we may query how comforting it may have
been to malevolent spirits to see their defeat re-enacted, the rite nevertheless underscores the role of a puppet to
serve as a vessel for a spirit: a ritual copy of a physically absent but spiritually present being. This rite, an
appeasement ritual (here a variety of what is commonly referred to as a chinkonsai) came to be known as the Usa
Hachiman Hôjô-e.
The rite continued to be presented throughout Japanese history with major modifications, reinventions and
embellishments until late Tokugawa, when it ceased being performed because the small shrines responsible for
presenting it lost followers and resources to stage the event. In the late Shôwa era, it was re-imagined and re-
established at subsidiary shrines of the Usa Hachimangû and is now performed every four years, with heavy
subsidies from various folk performing arts grants and government cultural money.
In 1991, I visited the subsidiary shrines where the Hôjô-e rite was being revived and re-enacted. Though a hiatus
of over one hundred years stood between the late twentieth-century performances and their nineteenth-century
'originals', the priest at the Koyô shrine presenting the rite insisted on the 'authenticity' of the contemporary
ritual. Though his claim for authenticity was in part attributed to how carefully he had 'copied' the original rite,
his real claim for authenticity was that puppets continued to be possessed by deities. In short, the 'copy,' a
historical reenactment of sorts, was real because it was still perceived to work as ritual.
This case of the Usa Hachiman Hôjô-e, one of the earliest documented accounts of the ritual uses of puppetry in
Japan, underscores three points which inform this chapter. First, this example reveals that the use of effigy
(puppet, body substitute) in Japan is not primarily a product of a theatrical sensibility and imagination but of a
ritual one – namely, that a puppet is a useful 'copy' of a person or a deity in a ritual context and allows for the
physically absent 'real person' to be ritually present. Second, this case locates our discussion at a very early point
in Japanese history, indicating that this tradition of puppetry in ritual settings has a long and intricate history.
The Hachiman case, though performed with humble puppets, established a place for puppets in Japanese ritual
performance traditions, and many later traditions trace their origins or reference the Usa Hachiman center. Third,
the late Shôwa 're-enactment' of a ritual which was a 're-enactment' of a pseudo-historical event gives us another
angle from which to explore the idea of 'copying' – namely, the contemporary preoccupation among amateur
scholars and folks performing arts groups to create and stage rituals which are seen as 'copies' or re-enactments
of ancient, historical rituals that had become defunct. When we look at a later case on p. 44 from the island of
Awaji, we will see how this 're-enactment' comes to have a new efficacy.

Ritual uses of puppets in Japan: a brief survey

Before turning to what will be the central case of this chapter, it is useful to survey a range of uses of the effigy
created in the human form in Japanese history. It should be pointed out that while the term 'shamanism' is an
imported word in Japan, the sensibilities we see below are best described as shamanistic. A history of forms of
Japanese shamanism will reveal that the use of puppets as a central ritual object is both varied and sustained
throughout Japanese history. When looked at over time, a marked pattern of understandings of the use of effigies
of the human form in ritual settings emerges. One feature that emerges again and again is the simultaneity of
ningyô and shamanic magic, and the use of ningyô as mediators between the human and divine worlds, with
ningyô serving a wide range of representational roles. There are a number of recurring motifs:
1 Ningyô are used as spirit vessels for deities or spirits summoned by a shamanic figure, and the use of a ningyô
makes it possible to make the unseen, imagined world real, tangible and often very hauntingly present in a ritual
performance, as we see in these numerous cases of demons, ghosts and sprites presented through the medium of
puppetry.
2 Ningyô can be used as representational equals of a particular person or animal, with ningyô serving as
surrogates for actual people in purification rites.
3 Ningyô are understood to have the power to ward off danger when placed at the entrance to tombs or other
strategic places, as we see in the case of Haniwa figurines in Japanese antiquity.
4 Ningyô are understood to be substitutes for unborn children or aborted fetuses, or small infants, and in the
latter case protect them from epidemics and sickness, and appease their spirits should they meet an untimely
end.
5 Ningyô are used in appeasement rites to re-enact the calamities that brought about the malevolent actions of a
spirit, or serve as vessels for the malevolent spirits when they are summoned to the rite, as mentioned in the
opening case of the puppets used in the Usa appeasement rite.
6 Ningyô serve as substitute bodies for possession when the power of the spirit being summoned is too powerful
to enter a living human form. Examples of all of these motifs reflect a wide spectrum of understanding of the
human form in effigy.
Now we turn to a central case of ritual puppetry in Japan, one that provides a spectrum of ideas of what it means
to create a copy of someone or something.

Dôkumbô mawashi on the Island of Awaji

One of the dominant traditions of ritual puppetry in Japan was centered on the island of Awaji from the middle of
the sixteenth century to the early part of the twentieth century. Considered by many to be the precursor of the
classical Bunraku tradition, Awaji puppetry had its origins in the activities of itinerant performers, called
Dôkumbô mawashi who were loosely affiliated with the Nishinomiya Shrine, the center of the worship of the
deity Ebisu.4 Ebisu is often described in popular descriptions of Japanese religion as one of the seven gods of
luck (shichi fukushin) or as a deity worshiped by fisherman. In fact, a historical study of this deity reveals that
Ebisu represents the realm of the liminal – the unformed, deformed, uncharted, volatile, uncontrolled and
dangerous. These ritual specialists, who all presented a rite of appeasement for the malevolent turned benevolent
deity Ebisu, used puppets and sought to create an independent ecclesiastical identity for themselves, freed from
the control of the central Nishinomiya shrine. The concentration of puppeteers on lower Awaji Island was a
creative movement of ritual artists to fabricate a tradition for themselves. They eventually became the most
common itinerant puppeteers in Tokugawa Japan, traversing the country with relative freedom of movement,
presenting rituals and later jôruri entertainment.
These Dôkumbô mawashi were low status ritual specialists and took their name from a fascinating story of a
shrine priest who made a doll to appease the child deity Hiruko (who as an adult becomes Ebisu). This story
formed the founding narrative of the Awaji tradition, and the narrative was recorded in a text authored in 1638.
The actual scroll of the text was copied, and these Awaji puppeteers carried the text as a sort of license,
authorizing their performances outside the authority of the Nishinomiya shrine. In short, the document, a text
about copies if ever there was one, served as a self-made license for their work. The text was entitled Dôkumbô
Denki. Here is my translation of the brief text.5
The Leech Child drifted on the waves for many years and months.6 Before that, he arrived at Wakokuzaki and
had the shape of a wheel. There he became a kami of light. At that time, there was a fisherman by the name of
Murogimi (who later is named Hyakudayû). At a certain time, he was riding in a fishing boat when suddenly the
sky grew dark, clouds gathered and darkened the sun, and lightning flashed all around. Noting the strangeness of
this occurrence, Hyakudayû drew near to a small child he saw floating in the water. The child had the shape of a
kami and was only about twelve or so. The child turned to face him and delivered the following oracle: 'I am the
Leech Child of long ago. Until now, I have had no worship hall. Build me a temporary worship hall on the
seashore.' The hall built as a result of this oracle was the Nishinomiya Daimyôjin (Ebisu Saburô Den) in
Nishinomiya. In this shrine, a person by the name of Dôkumbô was capable of mediating for this kami and
receiving his messages. But after the death of this priest, there was no one to appease the deity, so the Leech
Child caused heavy rains and winds, fishing disasters and mishaps on land. Hyakudayû reported this to the head
of the Fujiwara family (in Konoeden) who was in the capital, and an imperial order came down. It said that he
should make a puppet with the same face and posture as Dôkumbô. Following this order, Hyakudayû
manipulated the puppet before the worship hall of the Leech Child and the deity's spirit calmed down. After this,
puppets of this type in the likeness of Dôkumbô were unusually effective in appeasing the Leech Child.
Hyakudayû then went around to many provinces, worshipping many gods. Later, Hyakudayû-Dôkumbô stopped
at Awaji and transmitted this art…. He was given the imperial edict from the capital to appease divine spirits,
and as an appeaser of kami Hyakudayû was later given the following proclamation:
The country of Japan is a divine country. Therefore, the person who appeased divine will is the ultimate person of many talents. Warning: this art is
for the appeasement of kami. Hereafter, people should not take this lightly. If they do, it will weigh heavily upon them. People after this should be
sorely afraid.
I would like to point out two levels of copying in this document: First, we have the case of a deceased human
being brought back, in a virtual sense, through a replica of the person, an effigy 'with the same face and posture'
of the deceased. The grieving child deity loses the priest who officiated for and appeased him, and in his rage
(for rage and grief are often linked) the child deity causes calamities. To bring the priest back, an effigy, a visual
copy of the priest, is created. The relationship between grief, the longing for the dead, and puppets seen here is
also found throughout the world as the founding myth in many puppetry traditions. This seems to be a common
poetic, if not always actual, understanding of human effigies.
Second, the myth in this text describes the replication of the puppet by other puppeteers as the practice of
appeasing the Leech Child in all his various locations and manifestations spreads throughout the Inland Sea.
Later, we see Ebisu puppets all over Japan, spread by itinerant Awaji puppeteers. Some of these puppeteers were
also called 'Ebisu-kaki'.
As the Awaji tradition developed, these Dôkumbô mawashi/Ebisu-kaki presented two major performance pieces.
One, this previously mentioned deity play focused on the deity Ebisu, probably had its origins in an appeasement
rite, and of themes of how to properly treat a potentially dangerous deity resonate with the larger genre of
chinkonsai. Chinkonsai, as we have seen in the case of the Usa Hachiman Hôjô-e which opened this chapter, is a
genre of ritual in which puppets have been used from as early as the eighth century. The other rite, Sanbansô,
probably had its origins in Kagura, and shared many developments with the emerging Noh Okina dance. This
suggests that two different ritual performance traditions merge in the Awaji case: ritual appeasement rites and
ritual performance of felicity and purification. Let us now turn to the latter case, Sanbasô ritual using puppets.

Sanbasô ritual on waji

On Awaji, the Sanbasô rite was used for a number of different ritual purposes.7 I review them here according to
the typology most people on Awaji intuitively use when classifying the performances. Within this typology, there
were basically two styles of performance. One, Sanbasô, consisted of music, dance (performed by manipulated
ningyô) and poetry. It was fun to watch and relatively short (five to fifteen minutes) and lent itself to an itinerant
setting, door-to-door or on street corners with a passing audience. The other, Hônô Sanbasô, was long and
serious, consisting almost exclusively of music and dance (again performed by manipulated puppets). It was
clearly used in Kagura performances, with the role of dancers being taken by puppeteers with their puppets. For
the purposes of this discussion, we focus on the Shiki Sanbasô performances, as the Hônô performances, largely
intended for divine audiences, tend to be repetitive and boring for their human audiences, be they seated in an
audience or reading about the performance in a text. Now, to the typology of types of Sanbansô performances,
each revealing a slightly different use of the 'copy'.

Kotobuki Sanbasô

Itinerant puppets made their living performing these rites on felicitous occasions, such as pillar raisings in new
homes, the launching of boats, planting of rice in seedling nurseries, and at weddings. The most common timing
of this rite, however, was door-to-door during the New Year period. What all of these times have in common is
their ritually pure nature, and the rite is full of imagery of newness, vitality, longevity and felicity.

Kami-okuri Sanbansô

The Sanbansô rite was also used to purify a home or village from evil, noxious forces or pollution. This is part of
a larger ritual context known as kami-okuri ningyô, or tamayori ningyô, in which a ningyô is used to contain a
spiritual force. In this rite, which I studied in Nagano prefecture near the town of Iida, at the Waseda shrine,
worshippers would gather to watch a rite of Shiki-Sanbasô, and would then follow the puppeteer and the puppets
in a procession to the edge of the town. As the puppet passed through the town, epidemic spirits and other evil
forces on the road would be attracted to the puppet and carried out of the village. Central to this practice was the
attraction, capture and expulsion of the spirits of insect pests. I was curious if people really believed that insects
could be expelled using puppets. People always laughed at this question and noted that the rite was to appease
the dead insects, killed by picking them off, smoking them out, and starving them by putting netting over plants.
The rite was for the spirits of insects, not the living insects. For actually getting rid of physical insects,
pragmatism beats magic every time.

Amagoi Sanbasô

Sanbasô puppets were also used in rites requesting rain, called amagoi. The lines from the chant itself, 'the sound
of the waterfall, the sound of the waterfall – even if the sun is shining, will not cease,' refer to the hope that even
in clear weather, there will be abundant water. The puppetry performances were understood to be efficacious in
appeasing angry or malevolent spirits perhaps responsible for droughts.

Ritual symbolism

The ritual symbolism of the Sanbansô rite is rich and complex, but for the purposes of this discussion, I will
focus on one outstanding motif – namely, the overt way in which the puppet is seen as a substitute shaman who
invokes the presence of the deities, purifies the space so that they can arrive, and then enters into a state of
possession when they arrive. Three puppets are used in the Sanbasô rite: Okina, Senzai and Sanbasô. At the
beginning of the rite, before the puppets are picked up, a flute is played and a drum is struck. These instruments
are intended to invite the deities to the rite, intended for divine, not human audiences. Each puppet, preparing to
be possessed, is folded over with its face on its sleeves.
The initial movements of the first puppet purify the surrounding space prior to possession. A small shaman's
rattle is also used, to purify the space. This tamafuri (spirit shaking) is understood to invigorate the performance
and bless the audience. One puppet, Sanbasô, begins to dance and goes into a frenzied trance, his eyes changing
from normal human eyes to those of round, black holes, looking into the other world. He stamps his feet (most
puppets, incidentally do not have feet, but Sanbasô does, precisely so he can perform this act of ashibyôshi, a
shamanic gesture used in trance dances to drive out evil forces and summon power.
The actual possession is made apparent by the donning of masks on the puppets, a tertiary device for expressing
the 'removedness' of the puppets from the human world. The use of masks suggests that even though puppets are
once removed from the human world, they too must be ritually removed yet again from the realm of the sacred.
We are left to ask about the ritual sensibilities being implied by the use of a body substitute, in this case, the
puppet, a 'copy' of the shaman's body, in a shamanic rite. Can it be that a puppet body is presented because of the
inherent danger of actual possession by a human being? Is it possible that the task of pollution removal is more
safely accomplished with a surrogate body than a real shaman? Or were these itinerant puppeteers, much like the
monkey performers of late medieval Japan, both playing with the propinquity of shape with their surrogate
selves, and enjoying the novelty and performative challenges of having yet more stylized and lifelike puppets to
delight their patrons?
Before concluding, there is yet another entire layer of copying and reinvention that goes on in the Awaji
Sanbansô rite. As I have noted elsewhere in my work, the tradition of itinerant puppeteering on Awaji suffered a
total annihilation in the post-war era, and even when the jôruri tradition on Awaji was successfully brought back
from the brink, and now survives and flourishes, the comeback of the ritual branch of this tradition took a more
convoluted road, largely due to the sharp outcast status attributed to these Dôkumbô mawashi.8
Throughout the 1980s and 1990s, however, there have been several interesting movements to revive these
itinerant performances. Partly encouraged by the dominant minzoku geinô (folk performing arts) movement in
Japan, which seeks to establish a locus for authentic Japaneseness in an imagined rural, traditional and
exoticized 'folk theater', we are now seeing many different staging of these itinerant performances. These
'revivals' are actually re-enactments, in which people assume the roles of traditional audience and performers
recreate what they imagine performances from the past would have been like. There are at least two different
ways we see these 're-enactments' taking shape.
First, we see some amateur groups choosing to 'revive' the itinerant practices of Ebisu-kaki, and use new settings
rather than roadways and entryways. Their new venues are nursing homes, festivals and even amusements parks
– the liminal spaces of the late twentieth century. Second, we see contemporary 're-enactment' stagings of the
Sanbansô performance choosing to include the action of an itinerant puppeteer actually arriving at the
performance space, making the puppeteer an actor and his puppets his props. Yet even the doorways and 'streets'
of the original itinerant performance are included in the stage mise en scène.
It is tempting to try to resolve which is live and which is Memorex in these endless copies of copies of copies in
the revitalization of these itinerant performances. But what I have found impressive is the degree to which the
puppet as body substitute manages to transcend any frame put on it, to evoke a ritual efficacy. Like the Usa
contemporary 'copy', these rituals get their authenticity not from how well they copy the past (which is
impossible even to know), but from how they are perceived to still be capable of working as rituals of felicity,
even with the setting so transformed.
The Sanbansô rite creates in one ritual moment a synaesthesia of images of felicity, good fortune, longevity and
fecundity, seen, flashed, heard and summoned. If we look to the chant for a narrative, we find a very thin one
indeed: a few old men show up and bicker over who dances, then do some rather tame dances by today's
standards. But when we see this rite performed with puppets, another reality is presented: death coming to life is
enacted. Lifeless matter in the form of the puppet is brought into life through the hands of the puppeteer. The text
and the performance cannot be separated from this reality: the use of a puppet as body substitute, spirit vessel or
surrogate shaman reveals the need to have a tangible focus for realities worked out in the intangible realm of the
spirit. Puppets signal working out spiritual problems, concretely but in a parallel universe, in ritual code. These
copies of human beings are not inauthentic people, deity bodies or shamans as people. They are real puppets,
doing their ritual job.

Notes

1 Kitamura Tetsurô (1970) 'Nanase harai no genryû'. Kodai bunka, Vol. 22, No. 5:126–7.
2 There has been little sustained interest in ritual puppetry beyond the Bunraku stage among Western scholars. I am therefore in the embarrassing
situation of referring the English language reader predominantly to my own work, perhaps admitting that I was in a 'select' society of religion
scholars who found this interesting. For an overview of ritual puppetry in Japan, with a detailed discussion of the puppetry performances and
rituals specific to the island of Awaji (and the rites discussed in this chapter), see Jane Marie Law (1997) Puppets of Nostalgia.
3 I discuss the textual sources for a study of this rite, and translate one of the main documents in my article, 'Violence, Ritual Reenactment and
Ideology: The Hôjô-e (Rite for Release of Living Beings) of the Usa Hachiman Shrine in Japan'. History of Religions, Vol. 33, No. 4:325–57.
4 Readers of Japanese have a wealth of studies on the deity Ebisu. Perhaps the most thorough is Yoshii Sadatoshi (1989) Ebisu shinkô to sono fudô.
Tokyo: Kokushô Rikkôkai. An article dealing with Ebisu as maritime deity is Niimi Tsuneyuki, 'Umigami to Ebisu shinkô,' Matsuri, 4:335–68.
English readers are referred to Chapter 3 of my Puppets of Nostalgia.
5 A translation of this text first appeared in my article 'Ritual Authority and Ritual Puppetry: The Case of Dôkumbô Denki'. Monumenta Nipponica,
Vol. 47, No. 1:77–97. I discuss this text in a larger argument about the establishment of the Awaji tradition in Puppets of Nostalgia, Chapter 4,
especially pp. 155–61.
6 This motif of a drifting deity (hyôchakugami in Japanese) is fairly widespread in Japanese fishing villages. A thorough study of this is Ogura
Manabu, 'Noto no kuni hyôchakugami kô'. Kokugakuin zasshi, Vol. 15, No. 3:30–43.
7 I discuss this rite in detail in Puppets of Nostalgia, Chapter 5.
8 Discussion of ritual performers and outcaste status in Japan can be found in Nagahara Keiichi, 'The Medieval Origins of Eta-Hinin'. Journal of
Japanese Studies, No 2:385–404. See also the excellent discussion in Emiko Ohnuki-Tierney, Monkey as Mirror: Symbolic Transformations in
Japanese History and Ritual. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1984. I discuss puppeteers as outcastes in Puppets of Nostalgia, Chapter 2.

Bibliography

Kitamura Tetsurô (1970) 'Nanase harai no genryû'. Kodai bunka, Vol. 22, No. 5.
Law, Jane Marie (1992) 'Ritual Authority and Ritual Puppetry: the Case of Dôkumbô Denki'. Monumenta Nipponica, Vol. 47, No. 1: 77–97.
Law, Jane Marie (1994) 'Violence, Ritual Reenactment and Ideology: The Hôjô-e (Rite for Release of Living Beings) of the Usa Hachiman Shrine
in Japan'. History of Religions, Vol. 33, No. 4: 325–57.
Law, Jane Marie (1997) Puppets of Nostalgia: The Life, Death and Rebirth of the Awaji Ningyô Tradition. Princeton: Princeton University Press.
Nagahara Keiichi (1979) 'The Medieval Origins of Eta-Hinin'. Journal of Japanese Studies, No. 2: 385–404.
Namihira Emiko (1978) 'Suishintai o Ebisu to shite matsuru shinkô: Sono imi to kaishaku'. Minzoku kenkyû, Vol. 42, No. 4: 335–68.
Niimi Tsuneyuki (1986) 'Umigami to Ebisu shinkô'. Matsuri, No. 46: 27–48.
Ogura Manabu (1954) 'Noto no kuni hyôchakugami kô'. Kokugakuin zasshi, Vol. 15, No. 3: 30–43.
Ohnuki-Tierney, Emiko (1984) Monkey as Mirror: Symbolic Transformations in Japanese History and Ritual. Princeton: Princeton University
Press.
Yoshii Sadatoshi (1989) Ebisu shinkô to sono fudô. Tokyo: Kokushô Rikkôkai.
 3
Copying in Japanese magazines

Unashamed copiers
Keiko Clarence-Smith

The image of Japan as a nation of copiers is a common stereotype. It is based on powerful myths and the
assumptions of a unitary concept of the copy and of the Japanese people as an undifferentiated, united group.
However, Japanese people, like any other, do not represent a unified group in this regard. In this chapter I shall
illustrate and reflect upon some of the uses and abuses of this stereotype through an analysis of the development
of copyright in Japan (Sakka 1999).

Copyright

The government, the publishing industry and artists have continuously contested the meaning an application of
copyright may have in Japan. It is a history of two opposed impulses – that is, the desire to copy on the one hand,
and the desire to protect the rights of the original on the other. In this sense, Handa's assertion (2001:10) that the
Japanese copyright system is a product of 'top down' imposition, and that it was not something won by the artists
with awareness of their rights, is too simplistic, if not downright inaccurate. Sakka (1999:40) specifically cites a
campaign run by Yukichi Fukuzawa, an educationalist of the Meiji period, who is said to have coined the word
hanken, a translation of the English word 'copyright', to protect his rights as the author of bestsellers.
The question of copyright as a concept that was developed to protect industry interests in their conflictual
relations with artists is complex and not simply reducible to differences between Japan and Europe, nor between
East and West. Sakka (1999:38) cites the memorandum of understanding signed by a number of publishers in
Osaka in 1698 as the first ever copyright system in Japan, but concedes that this was to do with the protection of
publishers and not to secure intellectual property rights. Yamada (2002:96–7) argues that, even in Europe, there
is a fundamental difference between the origins of English and French copyright. English copyright goes back to
the publication of rights for the purpose of protecting the publishing industry, while French copyright came into
being to safeguard 'the rights of the genius', which suggests that its main interest lay in the protection of the
artist's own individual rights. However, not all artists held to this view and Sakka (1999:27) quotes David
Bainbridge as saying that the writer Jonathan Swift was involved with the drafting of the so-called 'Anne Act'. It
would be beyond the scope of this chapter to examine in any detail to what extent copyright laws in different
countries actually protected the rights of the various parties involved before harmonisation occurred through
global legislation, but enough has been said to indicate the dangers of a simple dichotomy between Europe and
Japan.
A contemporary aspect of Japanese popular culture in which copying is much encouraged, and running counter to
efforts in the 1990s on the part of the government, representatives of industries and educational establishments
to nurture individualism and creativity, are popular magazines for young people. The youth interest in magazines
is related to their distinctively didactic approach, noteworthy in a cultural context where copying is a significant
part of formal education and general principles of learning in Japan. The purpose here is to consider the role
copying plays in such magazines, and thus to shed light on the notion of copying in contemporary Japanese
society. The notions of 'originality' and 'copying' are explored, with special reference to the role of copying in
practices and models of learning in Japan. These notions are then applied to assessments of how copying is
deployed in Japanese magazines for young women. The popularity of magazines in today's Japan is such that
since the beginning of the 1980s the turnover from magazines has constantly exceeded that from books, and the
gap has grown steadily. As I have argued elsewhere, the success of magazines is not only due to popular demand,
but also to the strategy of publishing companies and their advertisers (1998, 2003: Clarence-Smith). Magazines
are an effective medium for reaching their target audience. These magazines are directly associated with
subcultures, such as 'the An-Non tribe' (An.An and Non-No) and 'the JJ girl'. Furthermore, they set fashion trends,
such as 'Tokyo elegance' attributed to Can Cam. The circulation of Japanese magazines for young people used for
this analysis varies from 400,000 for Can Cam to Non-No's 800,000. These magazines all target young women
between the age of eighteen and twenty-five.
 An original and a copy

There is a sense that the notions of 'original' and 'copy' are mutually dependent, in that one definition would refer
to the other. According to Collins English Dictionary (1979), an 'original' is 'being that from which a copy…is
made', and a 'copy' is 'an imitation or reproduction of an original'. The same dictionary also defines an 'original'
in terms of something being 'the first' and 'genuine', but even this definition implies types of 'copies', such as 'the
second' and the 'fake'.
There is a general agreement that a 'copy' entails an 'original', as in the oft-cited definition of Justice Bailey in
1822: 'A copy is that which comes so near to the original as to give every person seeing it, the idea created by the
original.' However, some, such as Murakami (1998) and Yamada (2002), would argue that there could be no
'original' without 'copies'. Yamada (2002:53) contends that the value of an original can only exist relative to its
copies, and it is the dissemination of copies which increases the value of the original. Thus, it may be that their
mutual dependence is based on more than semantics.
This view is compatible with Walter Benjamin's argument about the desire for the aura of authenticity being the
consequence of the technological inventions of European modernity, as summarised by Hendry (2000:185). In
Benjamin's thesis, as technological advancement made it possible to make multiple copies of an object or image
with the aid of industrial machinery, the value of the original achieved a new status. The point here, as Yamada
writes (2002:13), is that both 'originality' and 'creativity' are relatively new concepts, appearing for the first time
in the Oxford English Dictionary in 1742 and 1875, and that their meaning is contingent on their use in relation
to technological advances. As Yamada (2002:52) also argues, it is due to Leonard de Vinci's Mona Lisa that the
original has acquired its unique position in the Western and now global canon of artistic genius.
The problem here is that the copies which Yamada refers to include those by Leonardo's disciples and other
sixteenth-century artists, some of them earlier in date than the occasion at which he says the Oxford English
Dictionary included the entry 'originality'. These copies do not reflect the ease with which the original was
replicated in multiple copies made by a machine, as in Benjamin's thesis, nor do such views provide any
explanation as to why some objects are copied, while others are not. This seems to suggest that there may be
some intrinsic value in some objects, such as the Mona Lisa, which makes their copies desirable, rather than the
other way round.
A common view in existing Japanese literature on these concepts (Yokoyama 1991, Murakami 1998, Yamada
2002 and 2003) is that copying and creativity are not mutually exclusive, opposing concepts. Indeed, some
(Hatamura 2003 and Tooyama 2004, for example) would say that copying is the first stage of creation. Yokoyama
(1991:15) argues that the key to creativity lies in how to combine existing knowledge and experience, and says
(1991:228) that there 'probably is a very fine line between creativity and copying'. For Yokoyama, an invention is
a result of incremental acts of copying and Murakami (1998:124) argues that a genius is a person able to engage
in superior mimesis, which others hold up as a model.
Yokoyama's thesis is based on the work of the French sociologist Gabriel Tarde, who wrote Les lois de l'imitation
in 1890. According to Yokoyama (1991:6–7), in Tarde's view, there are three key concepts necessary for
understanding a society, namely, 'imitation', 'conflict' and 'invention'. When various inventions are made, they
are imitated and disseminated. Sometimes inventions combine together and result in a new invention and other
times they repel each other and a conflict ensues. In terms of this theory, an invention is generated from
imitation of past inventions and relies on imitation for its dissemination (1991:7).
Tooyama, a patent lawyer, supports this view (see his website as of 15 September 2004 –
www.ne.jp/asahi/patent/toyama/mohou_souzou/hatamura.htm). He argues that imitation and creation are closely
related, and that there is no creation without imitation. He maintains that not all imitation can automatically be
deemed negative, but if all imitation was to be regarded as positive and without the need of regulation, then there
would be social problems, discouraging creativity. This, he argues, has resulted in the establishment of
intellectual property rights. In his view, whether something can be regarded as a creation or an imitation is a
matter of degree rather than kind, and the question of how much imitation is tolerated depends on societal
attitudes. He goes on to point out that the degree of tolerance of imitation is rather broad in Japan when
compared with other nations, and that a Japanese emphasis on harmony and cooperation does not encourage
strikingly original ideas, even though ultimately, the Japanese are just as creative as other peoples. Contrary to
received opinion, striving for creativity is sometimes encouraged in Japan and a casual search on the internet
will reveal books with titles such as French for University Students: …from Copying to Creativity and Japanese
Art Education: Development from Copying to Creation (www.amazon.co.jp).
The idea that originality is a development of copying is also present in the rhetoric of scientific advancement.
Keiji Tanaka, a renowned Japanese biochemist, describes the publication of an article on protein as 'a new world
opened up, from copying to originality' (Asahi Shimbun, 1 January 2005). Such groundbreaking innovations do
not arise easily through copying, as Yokoyama notes (1991:228):
Here, I would like to stress that copying can be difficult without substantial ability, rather than the fact that the distinction is difficult to make
between creativity and copying. There are many cases where a thing is an amazing achievement, even if it is a copy of something else.
Yokoyama also points out (1991:15) that there may be a limit to what individual efforts can achieve, thus
emphasising the aggregated efforts of teams of people.
These views are not unique to Japan, but indicative of a global culture of popular journalism. The following is an
extract of a newspaper article offering advice from the British fashion designer Vivienne Westwood to a young
fan:
the artists were in training all their lives. The basis of this training lay in copying. We would all love to be able to sit down at a piano and play
Rachmaninov piano concertos or dance like a Russian prima ballerina, but we can't, because first we would have to have an aptitude and training
and be constantly copying. Only then, if a person has real talent, is self-expression possible.
(Vivienne Westwood, The Independent, 2 December 1994)
The comment is interesting for it comes from a successful and influential artist, 'Britain's leading fashion
designer', and suggests that practices of copying as well as a natural aptitude are necessary to achieve creativity.

The notion of kata

Of various words associated with copying in Japanese, such as katachi, kata, utsushi, nazori, the notion of kata
('form') may be most relevant in understanding the importance that is given to the role of copying in those
aspects of Japanese society discussed here. In his exploration of the relationship between kata and Japanese
culture, Minamoto (1992) argues that the notion of kata is a vital concept for understanding creativity as well as
tradition, and is part of a process of change and transformation.
The basic assumption in this process is that there are different stages of copying, and that kata has to be
understood in its relation to katachi ('outer form'). In the katachi stage, copying is essentially a mechanical,
physical act indicating the replication of a fixed movement, form or position. If the learner is successful in this
they go on to the next stage, kata, when what they have learned is internalised and an individual understanding of
the meaning of what has been imitated is achieved. Amagasaki (2003:57) argues that this stage corresponds to
Gestalt in psychology, and Ikuta (1987:25) equates it with Marcel Mauss's notion of habitus. According to
Minamoto (1992:11:), 'once kata has been acquired, then the same performance can be repeated, anywhere, at
any time'.
The 'internalisation' associated with kata is more graphically illustrated in an example given by Amagasaki
(2003:57–58). He cites the case of Kanzaburoo Nakamura, a kabuki actor, who had difficulties learning the lines
of the character known as 'young Rikiya', whose role he was to perform. He was to deliver the line 'He has not
arrived yet' in response to the question, 'Isn't Yuranosuke here yet?' spoken by his lord. In this play, Yuranosuke
was Rikiya's father and a senior member of the clan. The lord was about to be made to commit a seppuku suicide
and was desperate to speak to Yuranosuke. In rehearsal, the actor's senior colleague advised him to make an
imaginary hole in the curtain where Yuranosuke was expected to appear and to look through the hole. The actor
followed this advice, imagined a hole in the curtain, and tried to look through it into the far distance. At that
moment he realised he 'understood both katachi and the 'heart' at once. By perfectly copying the way he had been
shown how the Rikiya held his body in this act, the actor achieved a full understanding of how the character he
was playing was feeling at that moment. He had learned katachi and had gone on to the next, kata (stage).
Amagasaki argues that the significance of learning kata lies in the fact that by copying an external, physical
form – that is, katachi – you recreate the internal kata – that is, the feelings and emotions of another.
A theory of kata which is commonly used in traditional arts and based on the ideas of Zeami Motokiyo, the
fifteenth-century Nô theatre master, identifies three stages to kata – namely, 'preservation', 'breaking' and
'departure.' At the preservation stage, the student concentrates on copying their master's form precisely.
Minamoto (2002) in a talk given at a symposium at Tohoku University (website at
www.sal.tohoku.ac.jp/80thanniv/minamoto.html, dated 15 September 2004) stated that this preservation stage
leads to the absorption of the form into the learner's own body, 'breaking' away and ultimately creating
something new. This is a process of trying to exercise creativity and of the student making their own mark by
breaking the mold. The departure stage is where the student establishes their own gei-fuu ('artistic style').
According to Yamada (2002:167), the stage in kata learning of breaking the mold is where 'individuality' is
encouraged. However, this individuality is not an 'anything-goes' kind of individuality, but involves 'subtle'
(2002:167) creativity which has to be added to katachi without destroying it.
Kumakura (1992:91) points out the importance of the broad accessibility of the kata model for learning in a
variety of educational environments. In his view, mastering kata is extremely difficult, but learning kata is open
to anyone and not only to artists and geniuses. Creativity may not come to everyone who tries to learn through
copying, but it is important to say that kata culture is part of popular culture and not an elitist method (1992:92).
It is often said in such learning environments that kata-nashi (without kata) is bad, but kata-yaburi (breaking-
kata) is good.

Learning and copying

As pointed out by Amagasaki (2003:56), the earlier form of the Japanese word maneru, 'to copy', is manebu,
which was derived from the word manabu, 'to learn'. Thus, in linguistic terms 'to copy' and 'to learn' are closely
related in Japanese culture. This relationship has been used to argue for copying as a fundamental element in
learning in today's Japan:
In Japan, it is still taught in many fields that the most effective way of learning is by carefully observing and then faithfully copying every
movement of a teacher, whose examples of the art serve as models for pupils to emulate over and over again. Thus artists, artisans, and ordinary
apprentices of almost any skill learn by reproducing innumerable copies of the work of a master or mistress of the art or craft. This principle applies
equally to forms of material art, such as painting and sculpture, to martial and other bodily arts, such as swordsmanship, archery and dancing, and
to the acquisition of knowledge and cerebral skills through memorising and the practice of rote learning.
(Hendry 2000:180)
Copying plays a part in learning in other societies, such as in Britain, but what distinguishes the Japanese way of
copying in modes of learning may be the established practice whereby the pupil is expected to faithfully copy
their teacher's example without explanation or discussion (Hendry 2000:184). The pupils are expected to learn by
careful observation and through repetition to absorb the copy into their embodied action. They are not expected
to ask the reasons why the teacher should be doing things in a certain way, let alone to offer their opinion. This is
what Tsujimoto (1999) calls an 'instilling' type of education, as opposed to 'teaching'. In explaining the origins of
this kind of copying, Kawase (1995: ix) cites the Nô dramatist Zeami: 'In learning, there should be no
knowledge.' Kawase goes on to interpret this piece of advice as meaning that, when learning, Nô students should
abandon their own views and start with a clean slate.
An important aspect of learning by copying is the emphasis placed on physical practice. As Kawase (1995: ix)
puts it, 'to acquire with your body' is the key. Thus, learning is achieved by applying the body, and not by
thinking with the head. Tsujimoto (1999) goes further, citing Ekken Kaibara, a distinguished Confucian thinker
during the Edo period, who said that the most important moment in education is when the process of physical
imitation and learning is achieved unconsciously. Amagasaki (2003:63) points towards the crucial significance
of physical involvement for proper comprehension in Japan. This can been seen in expressions such as hara ni
ochiru (falls into the stomach), meaning to make sense, and fu ni ochinai (doesn't fall into the viscera), meaning
the contrary.
Paradoxically, however, the emphasis on practice is important 'in order to forget' (Kage 1991:100). In his
discussion of Japanese archery, Kage (1991) argues that you have to learn basic patterns first, but it is not
sufficient for the pupil to say that they have memorised them to the point of visual recognition. They must go on
repeating them until their body has learned them, so that they are able to perform them without thinking about
them.
The essence of kata is a technique which evokes the emotions engendered by physical activities and, according
to Amagasaki (2003:61–62), is used by school teachers. He cites an example provided by Kiyotaka Miyazaki
(1985) of second year primary pupils discussing how the characters are feeling in a well-known story about a
mother fox letting her cub go to town alone. The teacher does not describe how the mother fox is feeling using
words, because the objective of the exercise is for the listening children to empathise with the characters. The
teacher asks the class:
What do you all think the mother fox said to herself ? She is watching her little cub toddle along all by himself towards the town. His figure is
getting smaller and smaller. It is even smaller than a poppy seed now. Oh, I cannot see him any more.
The key for the children to understand the story is following the mother fox's imagined gaze, in a process which
Amagasaki (2003:56) calls nazorae (tracing).
Another characteristic of copying associated with methods of learning in Japan has to do with the attention to
detail and importance placed on accuracy and the replication of the master's form. Hendry (2000:179) explains it
as follows: 'accurate reproduction or replication is an accomplishment highly valued in a Japanese view as the
most appropriate method of acquiring artistic and other (such as technological) skills.'
The value of fidelity in copying is concerned with the importance given to continuity and the perpetuation of
tradition in the arts. Yamada (2002:167–8) cites a naming practice in kabuki theatre where an actor is allowed to
succeed to the stage name of his predecessor when he has reached a certain standard of performance. Indeed, it is
a compliment in kabuki to say that an actor's performance is like that of his predecessor. According to Yamada,
this means that, even when an artist passes away, the art lives on and may through this practice go on for
generations.
One explanation for the practice of learning by copying in Japan is offered by Yamaguchi (2001). He points out
the difference in the construction materials used in Japanese and Western architecture: in the West, religious
buildings are built with stone, while Japanese equivalents are built with wood. He uses these differences to argue
that Western religious buildings are considered to be eternal, and each of them unique and original. In Japan, by
contrast, the typical practice in a certain strand of Shinto requires the regular dismantlement and rebuilding of
the shrine exactly as it was for spiritual efficacy and continuity to be achieved. For Yamaguchi, such copying is
important, as it ensures an eternal return.

Copying and Japanese magazines

As I have argued elsewhere, one of the characteristics of magazines in Japan is the emphasis they place on
copying, both as a practice to be encouraged among their readers and as a publishing strategy for borrowing from
foreign sources (Tanaka 1998, 2003). The magazine JJ, for example, seems to fully embrace the kind of celebrity
worship seen in its UK equivalents. The first feature in the January 2004 edition is entitled 'Scoop for Everybody'
and it contains a section showing a number of celebrities wearing a type of a pendant called 'dog tug'. They
include people who also appear in British magazines, such as David Beckham, Halle Berry and Paris Hilton. The
feature also gives the advice, 'If you want to feel like a celebrity, don't go for cheap stuff. You have to go for
quality to be really fashionable.' Thus, by paying a substantial amount of money for a dog tug shown in the
feature – that is, between £350 and £1,100 – it is claimed, that you too can feel and be like a celebrity.
Another feature in the magazine is entitled 'Winter casual wear: celebrity-style: six manifests'. The 'manifests'
include 'To be like Beyonce is this winter's target', containing pictures of the singer as well as Halle Berry and
Stella McCartney. In an attempt to be 'Beyonce', the magazines suggests that the readers copy two things about
her – namely, the 'hoop ear-rings' and 'neon colour'. The singer is pictured wearing large round ear-rings and a
bright orange top (Figure 3.1). The helping hand which the magazines are willing to lend goes as far as
suggesting specific items, complete with their price and the name of the shop where readers may purchase them.
The underlying assumption here is that a person is what she wears and may become another person by sartorial
imitation. The inner qualities or physical character of the model, in this case the singer Beyonce, has no
relevance. Even if we interpret the manifest from the magazine as meaning 'it is our target to look like Beyonce',
it is not the colour of her skin or eyes, the colour and length of hair, or facial features that matter. It is not even
the physical characteristics of a person that are important. It is the kind of ear-rings and the outfit which she
wears that are crucial. The magazine helps the readers by analysing a model and making a couple of simple,
attainable points that can make the readers be like her.
The promotion of copying celebrities is not unique to Japanese magazines. In the April 2001 edition of the
English language magazine Glamour (April 2001) there was a feature entitled Seven Days of Gwyneth, which
purportedly followed the actress Gwyneth Paltrow for a week. She was photographed in seven different outfits as
she went about various activities, such as a yoga class, a film premiere and a dinner date.
What distinguishes the British magazine's approach towards the aspects of the celebrity to be imitated from that
of its Japanese counterparts is hinted at in the subtitle of the feature, 'Bag the Hollywood babe's look at a fraction
of the price'. The feature looks at items or clothing or accessories worn by the actress, and comes up with an
alternative which is (presumably) cheaper, complete with its price and the name of the shop where it is available.
Japanese magazines do not tend to go for cheap alternatives or for fakes. For example, in the second example
from JJ magazine mentioned here, they go for the real thing in the name of quality, even if in some cases it
means spending more than a thousand pounds for a little pendant called 'dog tug'. Thus, it could be argued that
while the Japanese magazines opt for the original, a British counterpart is happy to settle for a copy.
This does not mean that the copying of a celebrity 'look' in the British media is always done on the cheap. The
Daily Mail newspaper started a new column in 2003 (26 March) entitled, 'I want her look'. Each time the paper
picks out a celebrity, it displays her photograph, and tells the readers 'where to get the celebrity look'. It lists
items of clothing, together with their pictures, their description, how much they are and the name and phone
number of the shop.
Encouraging copying in this way is not limited to the tabloid newspapers in Britain. The Independent on Sunday,
a broadsheet, ran a special feature in its fashion section entitled 'You've got the look'. The objective of the feature
was described as follows: 'Our experts take to the streets to find out what real people are wearing, and show you
how to recreate their style.' Each week there is a theme such as 'Salon girl', and a member of the public is chosen,
and her comments cited. The feature shows the items of clothing, similar to those which the person in the
photograph is wearing, followed by advice to readers to achieve the look and information, such as the price of
the item, the name and phone number of the shop where those items are available. In this case the original is
found among 'real people', rather than 'celebrities', but the purpose remains the same, in that both features show
the readers how to copy a look and realise the desire to be something other.
Japanese magazines also use 'real people', showing snapshots of people in the street with comments on their
fashion, but what is increasingly common is the use of fashion models exclusively employed by magazines. The
title for one of the features in the February 2005 edition of More is, 'Popular white, Popular black: De-
mannerism. Four plans'. It starts by saying, 'Shiho (the name of the model) is the example. Wearing the usual
clothes in surprising ways', and it goes on to show the model in different outfits of black and white. There are
suggestions such as 'Wearing basic items in Shiho-style', and 'Shiho's way is to mix black and white', as well as
comments such as 'Shiho tells you secretly how to wear black and white in a refreshing manner', and 'Use Shiho's
technique as your reference'. The items worn by the model in the photographs are described, peppered with
comments such as 'the key here is to choose black denim', and 'it is a correct answer here to stick to black and
white'. As I have argued elsewhere (Tanaka [now Clarence-Smith] 1998, 2003), Japanese magazines for young
people are full of such didactic comments.
A significant feature of the language used in Japanese magazines for young people is that it echoes that of the
classroom (Tanaka [now Clarence-Smith] 1998, 2003). The 'Moe' feature (Figure 3.2), for example, portrays the
model in different outfits demonstrating various combination of 'keywords'. There is a picture showing the
model wearing an orange coat, along with comments 'Keyword 2 + Keyword 9. A golden equation is finally
solved!', or another picture showing the model in a white sweater, accompanied with the comments 'Keyword 4 +
8 + 9. Enjoy the chemical reaction resulting from mixing sweet and spicy items!' It is also typical that in the last
section of this feature, lesson plans are drawn up and one of them is marked as 'the most important point'.
It is interesting to note here that the magazine is telling the readers not to settle for the 'usual' look. However, it
is not promoting unbridled self-expression as an alternative either. The readers are guided away from what they
have been wearing perhaps for some time, certainly since the last seasonal change. The example here was
published on 1 January 2004. Thus, the magazine, using a fashion model as an example, is helping its audience
with some tips for freshening up halfway through the winter period. There are expressions such as 'if you would
like to have a lead' used in the feature, and the word 'refreshing' appears more than once. The idea is to better and
elevate yourself by comparison with the masses, and not to promote individualism as such. In any case, the
'masses' here means those who do not read the magazine. When Shiho the model is quoted as 'telling you
secretly', there are hundreds of thousands of young women in her audience.
Nurturing individuality is not completely unacknowledged in Japanese magazines. The notion of individuality is
used in one example of a 'feature advertisement', which is a mixture of an advertisement and a feature article
paid for by the advertiser and written by the editorial staff of the magazine (20 January and 5 February 2004,
combined edition of Non-No). It is entitled 'We ask Takashi Tsukamoto, a young actor, about an attractive
relationship between "individuality" and watches'. The actor is asked, 'What kind of girls' fashion do you like?'
He answers: 'I like girls who have their own criteria, rather than those who say things like, "I want to be like
everyone else", or "I go for this because it's in fashion."' He goes on to explain, 'Whether or not you have your
own criteria shows in your choice of watch, too. For example, if I see a woman wearing a watch with a pretty
blue face, I would think that this colour must have made an impact on her. I would also think that this is someone
who values her own individuality.' Beneath all this, there is an illustration showing three watches, all with a blue
face. At the bottom of the page, there is the name of the brand Wicca, and the customer service number for
Citizen who paid for the advertisement. It may be significant that the word 'individuality' in the title of this
feature is in brackets. There seems to be an implied code, stipulating that 'individuality' means a blue-faced
watch.
Individuality may be a marginal or vague notion in Japanese magazines, but it is a serious concept in many
British magazines. Glamour (April 2001) contained a feature entitled, 'Victoria Beckham writes "My secret style
rules"'. The summary of this feature states: 'Create your own signature style, and don't be a slave to fashion
trends. Know what suits you and then play around with trends for your figure.' In the feature, Beckham's last rule
is 'Be your own designer', and she goes on to say, 'I think it's good to be individual and try out new things'. The
feature is full of expressions such as 'add a personal touch' and 'customise'.
It may appear that originality is being promoted here. However, on closer analysis it emerges that 'originality' is
a more nuanced and complex notion than unbounded self-expression. Take, for example, Beckham's rule number
6, 'Be the first to wear a trend'. She adds, 'Don't be afraid to go for it with fashion. It's good to be the first in your
group to wear a trend. You're always guaranteed to have people asking, "Ooh, where's that from?"' This suggests
that there is a need for social approval, for while this purchase may well be starting a 'trend' and creating a
'group', the concept of 'originality' in operation here is the kind which does not deviate from a consensual ethos.
After all, what the column is promoting is to be the first to 'copy', by picking up an item promoted by expensive
and trendy shops.
The magazine has another feature, which claims, 'going for GLAMOUR is as easy as spelling it'. The feature
gives various pieces of fashion advice, presented as a list of key words starting with each of the letters in the
word 'glamour'. Under the headline 'O is for originality', the feature explains 'make-up wouldn't be fun without
the catwalk trends each season. But while recreating the entire look may not be fitting for that after work drink,
picking one element can keep you cutting edge.' Under the 'originality' banner, what is being promoted is the
selective copying and appropriation of items from a fashion show. To be original means to be trendy. The only
reason given in the magazine for why one would not copy the look in its entirety is simply because it does not
suit a particular social occasion and not because self-expression gets in the way.
Thus, the British magazine seems to struggle with what is to be understood by originality. It may be that an
unequivocable, simple definition and use would not be compatible with selling hundreds of thousands of copies
of the magazine to readers who need the ambiguity to be able to achieve their own 'originality'. There seems to
be a constant acknowledgement in the magazine that individuality and originality are things to strive for. The
magazine is hesitant to encourage fully fledged individuality by telling readers to wear whatever takes their
fancy.
In contrast, Japanese magazines for young women do not seem to worry about the balance between promoting
originality and selling the same fashion tips to a large audience. Typically, there is page after page of
descriptions of what somebody is wearing and this is the case whether she is a wellknown figure or the
magazine's own fashion model. Even when a magazine is telling its readers to avoid 'the usual', it is so that they
can follow the tips provided by the model. Therefore they do not leave much room for individual initiative and
certainly do not suggest that their readers find something merely resembling a T-shirt worn by some actress or a
handbag similar to that which some fashion model has been photographed with. They tell the readers where to
find the exact item or the identical copy, and therefore to be precise.
The magazine Can Cam seems to take this approach a step further. The February 2005 edition contained a feature
entitled 'Midwinter Moe-style casual wear: Decisive co-ordination: Extracted from 10 Keywords', where Moe is
the fashion model used as an example, and there is another subtitle, 'If we could, then we would be Moe'. The
feature not only shows the model in various outfits, but is peppered with her quotes, such as 'This coat is classic
in form, but I wanted to choose a colour which is a surprise,' and 'I fell in love with this jumper'. The model does
not simply wear clothes and get photographed. She is also a commentator with an invited expertise on the
subject.
The next part of the feature is the section entitled, 'Projects for tackling 'Moe-style casual wear': you like
something but it won't do'. In this section, some readers take on a 'project' where they each ask a question, such
as 'How can I wear miniskirts like Moe? I am short.' A picture of the model wearing a miniskirt in an earlier
edition of the magazine is shown with the comment, 'This is the item which she (the reader) likes but it doesn't
suit her.' Then, there is a picture of the reader consulting the model who comes up with a solution, which is the
reader shown wearing the suggested outfit. The text lists the lessons to be learnt, categorised as a series of do's
and don't's. The 'project' is completed with a comment from the thankful reader.
Another feature in the same magazine is about eye make-up, telling readers how to copy the look of models'
eyes. The headline for this feature is 'Your eyes become completely like theirs!' The feature starts by saying that
their four fashion models all have 'memorable eyes' but, feigning surprise, notes that after careful observation it
has been discovered that 'they are all different'. The magazine goes on to share with its readers the features of
each model's eyes, as well as tips on how to reproduce the same effects.
The magazine even has an answer to the question, 'Who would suppose that you cannot make your eyes look like
those of someone else, even with the help of all the cosmetics available, unless there are similarities in the first
place?' The second part of the feature involves the readers' participation and consists of two sections. The first
shows the success stories of four readers. It is not difficult to see that those readers already have physical
resemblances to each model they are trying to copy. The second part is a question-and-answer session, in which
some other readers ask questions about how they can look like their idols. Each question is answered with
detailed instructions, complete with illustrations and suggested make-up products. Thus, every reader is catered
for, not only 'lucky' readers who look like the models in the first place, but also less lucky ones. It is striking that
the tone used in answering the questions in the last section is distinctively more prescriptive than is usual for the
magazine, with lots of exclamation marks. The suggestion is that the reader is at fault for not trying hard enough
to make their eyes look like those of the model. Given that the popularity of Can Cam was soaring and its
circulation was on the increase (Weekly Journey, 25 March 2004), this blunt approach in telling the readers to
copy closely appears not to produce critical or negative responses from readers.
Shop displays are also arranged to urge people to copy and, more importantly, to consume in order to copy
successfully. The Ginza branch of the Mitsukoshi Department Store ran a campaign in 2003 entitled 'You can be
Audrey Hepburn too!' (Nihon Keizai Shimbun, 22 May 2003), along with a photographic exhibition of the late
actress. It featured what they thought were 'Audrey-type fashion', involving twenty brands. Mannequins were
dressed to look like the actress, displaying various items of clothing which the store suggested the consumers
should acquire to look like her. To add authenticity to the display, a café in the basement offered the same square-
shaped croissant which appeared in one of her films, Breakfast at Tiffany's. According to the newspaper, the
background to this campaign was the fact that 2003 was the fiftieth anniversary of the first showing of Roman
Holiday and the tenth anniversary of the actress's death.

Conclusion

Stereotypes of Japan as a nation of mindless copiers, contrasted with eccentrically original Britons, continue to
appear from time to time, but are essentially inaccurate. Elements of what is ascribed to the Japanese as copying
by being contrasted with originality can be found in both cultural discourses. More research is needed on the use
of these terms in various spheres of social life within and between Japan and Britain before such categorical
distinctions can be maintained. The evidence presented above would seem to suggest that the emphasis is
different in both places and that there is a case to be made, on the basis of language differences, that a higher
value is put on copying in Japan. The didactic, even hectoring, tone employed in Japanese magazines contrasts
with the more nuanced positions adopted in the British media. Indeed, there is an unabashed quality to calls for
copying in the Japanese media, which would, if repeated, raise eyebrows in readers of British magazines, where
originality is accorded so much importance. The Japanese tradition of copying in more traditional contexts hints
at a more complex relationship between copying and creating, such that the act of perpetual copying may
become in itself a form of sublime creativity. Whether popular magazines aspire to some rougher, ruder form of
this old tradition remains a question.

Figure 3.1 'Winter casual wear: celebrity-style: six manifests'. JJ magazine, January 2004, p. 105.
Figure 3.2 'Keyword 4 + 8 + 9'. Can Can magazine, February 2005, p. 71.

Bibliography

Amagasaki, Akira (2004) 'Nazori to nazorae'. (Copying and comparison) In: Yamada, Shoji (2004), pp. 49–66.
An Advertiser's Guide to Magazines in Japan '98–'99. Tokyo: The Japan Magazine Advertising Association.
Atamura, Yootaroo (2003) Soozoo-gaku no Susume (Promoting the Study of Creation). Tokyo: Koodansha.
Cox, Rupert (2001) A proposal for the conference entitled 'The History and Practice of Copying in Japan', held at Oxford Brookes University, 2–5
September 2001.
Handa, Masao (2001) Internet-jidai no chosakuken (Copyrights in the Internet Age). Tokyo: Maruzen.
Hendry, Joy (1986) Becoming Japanese: the World of the Pre-School Child. Honolulu: Hawaii University Press.
Hendry, Joy (2000) The Orient Strikes Back: a Global View of Cultural Display. Berg Press: Oxford.
Ikuta, Kumiko (1987) 'Waza' kara shiru (Learning from 'Skills'). Tokyo: Tokyo University Press.
Kage, Seiichi (1991) Chino bunka to kata no bunka (Knowledge-based Culture and Pattern-based Culture). Tokyo: Sôbunsha.
Kato, Hiroshi (2000) Rekishi no nagare: minzoku no chikara to kata (The Flow of History: the Power of Nation and Kata). Tokyo: Bungeisha.
Kawase, Takehiko (1995) Maneru (Copying). Tokyo: Ômusha.
Kumakura, Isao (1992) 'Kata no genmitsusei to yurameki: cha-sho "Nanpôroku" ni miru kata no tokushitsu" (The Rigour of Kata: Features of Kata
Seen in the Tea-Ceremony Book "Nanpôroku"), pp. 91–4.
Minamoto, R. (1992) Kata to Nihon bunka (The Model and Japanese Culture). Tokyo: Soburisha.
Murakami, Takao (1998) Mohôron josetsu (An Introduction to Theories of Copying). Tokyo: Miraisha.
Sakka, Fumio (1999) Shôkai chosakuken hô (Detailed Account of Copyrights Law). Tokyo: Gyôsei.
Tanaka, Keiko (1998) 'Japanese Women's Magazines: the Language of Aspirations'. In Martinez, D. (ed.) The Worlds of Japanese Popular Culture:
Gender Shifting Boundaries and Global Cultures. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, pp. 110–32.
Tanaka, Keiko (2003) [now Clarence-Smith] 'The Language of Japanese Men's Magazines: Young Men Who Don't Want to Get Hurt'. In Benwell,
B. (ed.) Masculinity and Men's Lifestyle Magazines. Oxford: Blackwell/The Sociological Review, pp. 222–42.
Tooyama, Tsutomu (2004) Chizai Bunka: Soozoo to Kyooiku. (The Culture of Intellectual Property: Creation and Education)
www.ne.jp/asahi/patent/toyama/mohou_souzou/mohou_index.html
Tsujimoto, Masashi (1999) 'Manabi' no fukken: mohô to shûjuku (Return of 'Learning': Copying and Proficiency). Tokyo: Kadokawa Shoten.
Yamada, Shôji (2002) Nihon bunka no mohô to sôzô: originality towa nani ka (Copying and Originality in Japanese Culture: What Is
Originality?). Tokyo: Kadokawa Shoten.
Yamada, Shôji (2003) Mohô to sôzô no dynamism (Dynamism between Copying and Creation). Tokyo: Bensei Shuppan.
Yamaguchi, Masao (2001) 'The Concept of the Copy in Japanese Culture'. A draft of the paper presented at a conference held at Oxford Brookes
University, 2–5 September 2001.
Yokoyama, Shigeru (1991) Mohô no shakai-gaku (Sociology of Imitation). Tokyo: Maruzen.
 Part II
Arts of citation
 4
The originality of the 'copy'

Mimesis and subversion in Hanegawa Tôei's Chôsenjin Ukie

Ronald P. Toby
The most pertinent thing one may say of these first impressions is that they are exactly, to the letter, what one expects them to be…when you are
looking at the originals, you seem to be looking at the copies; and when you are looking at the copies, you seem to be looking at the originals. Is it
a canal-side in Haarlem, or is it a Van der Heyden [painting]?
Henry Adams,"In Holland"1
Perspectiva is a Latin word which means "seeing through".
Albrecht Dürer, "Der Begriff des Kustvollens"2
One fine day in 1748, under the gaze of a towering, snow-capped Mt Fuji majestic in the distance, a strange
parade comes marching toward the viewer along a spectator-lined Honchô-dôri, one of the main streets leading
from the castle through the bustling merchant quarters of central Edo, its brilliantly decorated pennants flying in
the late-summer breeze. At the intersection of Nihonbashi-dôri, the marchers turn left in the direction of
Kodenmachô and Asakusa, heart of both the artisan and the entertainment districts of the city. Save for a wisp of
cloud drifting above the low mountains and the walls of Edo Castle, the sky is a brilliant midday blue, setting off
the gaily colored curtains that festoon the eaves of the shops along the street, and the brilliantly bold-patterned
carpets hanging on the railings of the box seats.
The two "originals" of Hanegawa Tôei's Ukie (Figure 4.1) and Chôsenjin Ukie (Figure 4.2). The painted
"original" (color on paper, c. 1748, 69.7 cm × 91.2 cm, collection of the Kobe City Museum), was rendered
("copied"; "translated") as a woodblock print by Okumura Masanobu and Okumura Genroku's print shop (urushi-
e, 49.9 cm × 70.8 cm, Matsukata Collection, Tokyo National Museum). The signature "Hanegawa Tôei
Michinobu" carved into the printing block of the left-most pillar in the print is visible through the red pigment
printed over it.

Figure 4.1 "Kobe Version"

Figure 4.2 "Matsukata Collection"

The artist has represented the marchers and spectators in clearly distinct vocabularies, different from each other
as groups in several quite visible ways. The former, all male – though a few might be mistaken for lovely
maidens – wear puffy trousers gathered at the ankle, and long, flowing grey overcoats, black shoes peeking out
from beneath their trouser cuffs. All but two or three of the marchers are bearded, and sport a variety of hats and
caps. The spectators, though mostly male, include many women, a few children, and one prominently placed
infant. All the male spectators but one, by contrast with the marchers, are bare-headed, and all are cleanshaven –
not only their faces, but their pates, as well. Their footwear, when visible, consists of sandals, sometimes over
bare feet, and sometimes over gray, ankle-length socks.
This is the scene (re)-presented in the only work of Hanegawa Tôei ( fl. c. 1748) known to survive, Chôsenjin
Ukie ("Koreans in perspective"),3 a vivid, colorful, and powerful composition, rendered masterfully in
vanishing-point perspective, of what appears to be the Korean mission parading through the streets of Edo.
Hanegawa, like a more extreme precursor of Tôshûsai Sharaku ( fl. 1794–5), seems to have risen meteorically to
produce a single masterwork, and disappeared without a trace. This, his only extant work, was most likely
produced during – or immediately after – the visit of a Korean diplomatic mission (J., tsûshinshi; K., t'ongsinsa)
to Edo in mid-1748, when a brief but intense "Korea craze" seems to have gripped the residents of the world's
largest city.4
Chôsenjin Ukie has many stories to tell, of course, as most great works do, in this case about Korea, about Japan,
about identity, about the politics and problematics of vision, and most importantly, about the replication and
adaptation of images.5 On its surface – or so it has been interpreted in since the 1980s – it is a depiction of "what
a Korean embassy actually looked like,"6 as it paraded from its audience with the shogun in Edo Castle, back to
its lodgings in Higashi Honganji, a large Buddhist temple in the Asakusa district about 3 km northeast of the
castle.7
What is actually depicted – the "subject matter" – in Hanegawa's painting, however, is a problematic matter that
I shall return to below, embedded in multiple layers of mimesis, play, and copying. For the painting itself is only
one of at least a dozen extant versions (variants; copies; parodies; even, perhaps, "forgeries"), including one
"discovered," almost by accident, in the vaults of the Museum of Kyoto (Kyôto Bunka Hakubutsukan) in April
2001 in the midst of a blockbuster exhibition on Korean embassies to Japan, and their role in early-modern
Japanese-Korean cultural relations.8
One could attempt to determine a filiation of these versions – the "original," and a series "imitations" – in which
the failure of understanding in "reading" the original, or the lack of originality in executing the "copy" leads
down a slippery slope of informational and artistic entropy, and finally to a mannerist futility. For close
examination of these variants reveals

Figure 4.3 "Tenri A": Anonymous, Untitled (color on paper, c. 1748–50), collection of Tenri University Library)

significant differences among them. But, is it simply the ineptitude and absence of "originality" among the
"imitators" that accounts for these differences, or is an entirely different set of processes at work? For example,
the practice of mitate (often translated "parody" or "travesty") – of reworking familiar material through a
playful, ironic process, translating, say, a scene from the Tale of Genji into the setting of the prostitution quarter,
or "translating" a classical Chinese moralizing parable into an erotic jest – was but one of the many forms of
playfully subversive "copying" that were at the heart of eighteenth-century Japanese expressive culture. They are
among the central questions I shall pursue in this chapter.
On the one hand, it was in many ways the power and originality of subject, composition, and expression, as well
as the mastery of execution of Hanegawa's work that inspired so many to reinterpret his work. Yet, at the same
time, one might argue that the Chôsenjin Ukie was gripping to contemporaries precisely because it is itself quite
"unoriginal," drawing on multiple source-texts for its images and material, but copying and reworking both stock
elements of the existing visual lexicon and grammar, and specific contemporary works, into a thoroughly
original total utterance.
Figure 4.4 "Private Collection": Untitled (color on paper, c. 1748–50), with signature Hanegawa Tôei hitsu ("brush of Hanegawa Tôei" at lower
right-hand margin)

The elusive artist

No one knows just when "Hanegawa Tôei Michinobu" was born or died – or even, for that matter, who he really
was. No other extant work is attributed to him – even his sketchy Edo-period biography only mentions two
works, this painting and a temple-hall ceiling that no longer existed, even then. One might readily suspect that
his is a pseudonym, though no one has pursued this line of argument. Yet this one painting proved so compelling
to his contemporaries that, within a few years, at least ten "copies" were produced, some luxurious paintings,
others obvious parodies done as woodblock prints – as well as a print version of Hanegawa's "original."
At least one of Hanegawa's "imitators" even signed his work "Hanegawa Tôei", also in a large-size painting of
almost precisely the same dimensions as the "original" that clearly was not destined for the bargain-hunting
crowd. Whether Tôei was some obscure one-off artist, or a leading painter working under a pseudonym, his
Chôsenjin Ukie carried enough prestige value to potential patrons or purchasers, even of "copies" – one can be
sure that patrons of these reiterations were familiar with earlier versions, rather than unsuspecting purchasers of
"forgeries" – that at least one other painter (or a subsequent owner or dealer) sought to masquerade his "copy" as
being from the same hand as the "original."9
Yet a close examination of the "original" and all these "copies" shows an innovation and originality, and often a
wit, in the "copies" that calls into question the notion of "copying" itself, the cultural status of the "copy," and the
meaning(s) of "originality," both in Japanese culture itself, and more broadly as an epistemological, analytical,
or ideological category. And, indeed, the content of the painting(s) is itself a challenge to our notion of the
subject, for it plays with the imitative processes of mimesis and performance, shifting back and forth between
"originals" and "copies," as much a trompage in perception and decipherment as an etching by Escher in its
dimensionalities.
The possibility occurs to me that "Hanegawa" has chosen to play games with us from the first. Clearly an
accomplished artist, and among the masters of the new technique of vanishing-point perspective drawing, the
man behind the name can hardly have been unknown to his contemporaries – yet I have been able to find no
contemporary mention of him. "Tôei" is certainly a mask, a pseudonym he seems to have adopted for this work,
and this work alone. Who the famous artist might be under the mask – the most likely candidates are Tôei's
putative mentor Hanegawa Chinchô (1679?–1754), or the contemporary master Okumura Masanobu (1686–
1764), but at this stage it is only a guess – remains unclear.10
But pseudonyms were a site where artists and writers in mid-eighteenth century Japan posed riddles and played
games; "Hanegawa," I think, was among them.11 He signed himself "Tôei" writing the characters, ; but any
contemporary who lived by the brush would quickly conjure the homophonous , meaning "to project; reflect;
cast a shadow." In light of the games Tôei plays in his painting and print, and the fascination with perspective,
the popularity of visual parody and game-playing (mitate-e) – not to mention the fact that Hanegawa himself is
otherwise a complete mystery – we might ask, with Shakespeare, "What's in a name?"

The epistemology of the utsushi

Just as there are many terms for "copying" in English – "mimicry," "imitation," and even "aping" come to mind,
but so do "variations on a theme by Scarlatti," and "after Giotto," suggesting a substantial measure of originality
or "creativity" – Japanese, as well, has a rich vocabulary of the "copy." The most common term, perhaps, is
utsushi, written with the character , which, as in maru-utsushi (total copy), for example, has quite strong
pejorative connotations. But, as Quitman E. Philips notes in his study of the practices of painting in late
medieval Japan, in a brief but provocative discussion, while
the basic meaning of utsusu was "to copy," in the broadest sense… [I]n modern English usage to copy generally implies a degree of exactitude,
mechanicalness, and even mindlessness in replication that need not be assumed for utsusu. Premodern Japanese allowed for considerable
transformation of the information provided in the model in the act of utsusu.12
Utsusu could more often denote preparing a sketch, or even producing a painting, for which no complete model
existed, as much as it might a mindless maru-utsushi.
Indeed, considering the underlying Japanese verb pair utsushi/utsuri independently of the multiple Chinese
characters used to transcribe (another form of "copying") it, including, and looking at the words as
spoken, it has a range of common meanings centering on the notion of "movement or transference of some
subject or object, from one material or metaphorical location to another"; in the view of Shinmura Izuru, the
assignment of character is accidental to the core meaning.13
When I change my place of work or residence, I utsuru; reorganizing parts of my often-chaotic office, I may
utsusu the books on "copying" from one set of shelves to another; utsusu my luggage from the back-seat of the
car to the boot to make room for a passenger; when the sight of flowers moves our hearts (e.g., in the Tale of
Genji) they kokoro o utusu. And, of course, if I'm careful, every time I save a computer file, I should transfer the
data from my hard drive to a floppy disk, a server, or a zip-disk; such a transfer is an utsushi. Utsushi is "to cause
objects, shapes, or content, to appear somewhere else, just as they were"; it is even "to exist in visible form."14
While student artists in Japan – and elsewhere – might strive for an exact replication of a masterwork or model
as a way of mastering technique, few mature artists sought mere mimicry as a goal. Just as Shakespeare
shamelessly stole plots, but artfully reworked them, remaking the English language in the process, Japanese
artists sought to put their own stamp on familiar themes, not to reproduce an object indistinguishable from its
model.

The underlying event: layers of representation

In a city that rarely saw foreigners of any description, the visits of Korean missions to the shogun were a major
spectator event, with tens of thousands flocking to watch them pass. In the first two centuries of Tokugawa rule,
twelve Korean missions visited the shoguns – the first in 1607, the last in 1811.15 The Koreans' route always
took them through the most populous parts of Japan, first through the Inland Sea to Osaka, then up the Yodo
River and into Kyoto, and finally overland from there to Edo and back.16
Each mission comprised hundreds of Korean civil and military officials, and often more than a thousand
Japanese escort and support personnel, parading from their first point of entry to the shogun's capital.17 All along
the route, Japanese vied for the best seats to watch the Korean parade, often paying considerable sums for a well-
placed vantage point. Some, like Enomoto Yazaemon, who made the trip from provincial Kawagoe to Edo in
1655 for the occasion, traveled many miles just to watch the exotic parade of what he called "Chinese from
Korea."18 Others made it a family outing – like Tame'emon, a village headman in Mino (modern Gifu
Prefecture), who paid 360 monme for a three-mat seat in front of Yasubei's shop in Tarui, on the Mino Highway,
so that he and his family could watch the Koreans parade by during the visit of the embassy of 1748 – the one
most closely associated with Hanegawa's Ukie.19
Along the way, peddlers hawked souvenir guidebooks to the event; shop-owners festooned their storefronts with
bunting; spectators lined the streets waiting for the first strains of the foreign marching bands that were part of
every embassy parade. Though the event was – ostensibly – diplomatic and political, contemporary writers and
spectators often observed that the grand event was more like the great festival parades that bound villages and
urban wards, as well as entire cities such as Kyoto and Osaka, into communities:
Critique from the Box Seats
The lousy music, the fluttering pennants –
The pages ugly in their outlandish hairdos.
Drums and flutes, fiddles and lutes –
It's just like a festival.20
When an Edo memoirist penned this satiric verse in faux Chinese a few weeks later, likening the Korean
diplomatic parade of 1748 to a festival, he was being more than metaphoric, for a variety of Tôjin ("Chinese",
"alien") performances,21 often in the trappings of Korean parades had become, long before the middle of the
eighteenth century, a common feature of matsuri all across Japan.
Revelers since the Heian period had enacted aliens in festivals – what, after all, is the point of masquerading as
oneself? – and from the early Edo period festival performances of the Other had adopted (more precisely, had
"copied" or adapted) the costumery and regalia of Korean diplomatic missions. Mimetic appropriations of the
outward appearance of parading Koreans, however, could envelop a number of disparate messages, and
accommodate a variety of mythic or historic narratives of Japanese engagement with the Other, from a simple
reenactment of the diplomatic event itself, to the mythic "Empress Jingû's" equally fabulous "conquest of
Korea," the return or Tawara Tôta (Fujiwara Hidesato) or Urashima Tarô from the undersea palace of the Dragon
King, the marriage procession of Urashima and the Dragon King's daughter Otohime, or Tôdô Takatora's capture
of Korean prisoners during the Japanese invasion of the 1590s.22
Festival goers were well versed in unraveling these multiple messages, and found in them a compelling
discourse on their own identity. Indeed, they seem even to have found their own mimesis more convincing than
the "real thing," for as one eighteenth-century comic had it, "The Tôjin of Edo are more splendid than the Tôjin
of China"23 – incidentally raising questions about notions of authenticity. Another, recounting a dandy's
description of a Ryukyuan embassy's entry into Edo to his favorite courtesan in the licensed quarter, reported
this exchange: Courtesan: "Now, what did the Ryukyuans look like?" Guest: "Well, they're Tôjin, after all, so
they're like the Tôjin [performed in] festivals. But Toshima's [performance as] Chinese in the [Kanda] festival is
far more splendid!"24
This exchange – and the trope of mimetic "Chinese" trumping the "real thing" was a cliché in contemporary
discourse – reminds us once more just how powerfully representation reshapes its object. It is not only "Orients"
that are reconstituted in the gaze of the observer; were we to shift our attention from Japanese mimesis of
Koreans, Ryukyuans, or Chinese, to the construction of "Japan" under Korean (or Chinese) gaze, the same
processes of representation shaping perception would be apparent.

Child's play

Hanegawa's painting itself – as opposed to the printed version produced from it – was not planned for public
consumption, apparently, but produced for the entertainment of a young Tokugawa prince, nephew of the shogun
whose succession to office was the occasion of the Korean mission.
As with many hanging scrolls, a wooden box was fashioned to store Hanegawa's painting when it was not on
display; when in the vaults of the Kobe Museum today, too, it is kept in its box. While one cannot generally
assume that a painting and its box have remained together for two and a half centuries, there is good reason to
believe that in this case the two were indeed made for each other. The cover of the box proclaims the contents to
be a "perspective picture" (ukie), but does not describe the subject or medium of the work. However, there are
two labels pasted inside the box which, assuming that the box and work have been together from the beginning,
help us to understand the painting's history and use.
The labels inform us that, (Label 1) "[This] perspective picture was the beloved plaything of Lord [Kô]ji'in, and
was given to the nun Rishôin; Rishôin gave it to Kôshun. [Dated] Hôreki 4th year (1754), 5th month"; and further
(Label 2), "Tôeizan: Lord Kôshun, the former [Tendai] prelate of Tokushin'in, who retired from Ryôun'in. This is
a souvenir he brought back from Edo, where he resided in the Zenshô'in temple of the Hieizan [sect]. [Dated]
Hôreki 11th year (1761), 4th month. Transferred from Shinsei[sen]; [signed] Tsûwa.25
What we learn from these labels is that this Ukie was a favorite of the late Kojirô (posthumous name Kôji'in,
1745–53), son of the first head of the Tayasu branch of the Tokugawa family, Munetake, and grandson of the
eighth shogun, Yoshimune. Kojirô would have been only three when the Korean mission visited Edo Castle, and
may have witnessed the event. It is also worth noting that mimetic "Korean parades" were a regular feature of the
annual Sannô and Kanda festivals, and both these proceeded through the grounds of Edo Castle and past the
Tayasu mansion en route.26 Kojirô may well have been on the reviewing stand for one of these events, either with
his grandfather, Tokugawa Yoshimune, or his uncle Ieshige.
There is no direct evidence of Kojirô's presence either for the arrival of the Korean embassy, or a tenka matsuri
parade through the grounds of Edo Castle, but the prominent placement and detailed depiction of infants and
children Hanegawa included among the spectators the nursing infant in the foreground center-left, almost
directly in the line of march; the infant foreground-center, pointing a finger at one of the Koreans carrying a
ch'ongdogi (who returns the gaze, by the way); the toddler in the box seats, between the two sets of pennants,
who seems to be reaching out for something, etc. suggests that Tôei was intensely aware that his audience was a
small child, who would see himself in these images.
Hanegawa, that is, had been given a "charge", in Baxandall's terms,27 by Tokugawa Munetake, to produce a
painting for his son Kojirô, and, subordinated to that a multi-stage "brief" that may have run as follows: A
painting that (1) commemorates the day when Kojirô witnessed an unusual event, the parade of either (a) the
Korean embassy, or (b) the Kanda or Sannô festival through the Castle grounds; (2) engages and delights a four-
year-old boy; (3) is worthy of its patron's wealth and high station; (4) by being, of course, an excellent work of
art, and while (5) displaying mastery of the currently most fashionable concerns of Edo's intellectual and cultural
elite, (6) manages to trump all its artistic sources in the playful spirit of the day.
When we look at the painting and its numerous reiterations, therefore, it is important that we keep in mind not
merely such immediate questions as "subject" matter and "format", but underlying questions of reception. In
service of whose enjoyment or prestige ultimately, was the painting produced? The placement of children at
several anchor points in the composition, indeed the centrality of children to the painting's dynamics; the
engagement of children among the crowd of spectators with the parade spectacle passing before them; the
deployment of children, that is, as foci of the observer's attention all this and more speak to Hanegawa's brief,
and the degree to which he succeeded in fulfilling it.
When Kojirô died in 1753, at the age of nine, the painting passed into the hands of a nun, and eventually to
Kôshun, a scion of the imperial house, and Buddhist prelate in charge of the temple where Kojirô was buried.
When Kôshun returned to the Kyoto area, he took the painting back with him to Mt Hiei. These identifications,
while not absolutely certain, have the ring of truth about them. I am comfortable with the conclusion that they
indeed refer to Hanegawa's painting, that painting and case have been together from the first, though this is not
essential to my understanding of either the painting itself, or its metamorphosis at the hands of "copyists".

The matter of subject

The matter of subject is, as noted above, quite complex, and involves multiple layers of mimesis – "copying"
earlier "copies" of an ultimate referent, "copies" in a variety of verbal, visual, and performative media.
Moreover, one cannot strip aside these layers without remembering both the spirit of play, and the initial four- or
five-year-old audience for whom the painting was created.
For decades, as we have seen, Hanegawa's Ukie was read as a literal rendition of, "A [Korean] embassy
procession marching in full regalia past …while Edoites in festive attire gather to watch."28 Some years ago,
however, a colleague and I began to be troubled by the many inconsistencies between Hanegawa's "Koreans" and
any empirically verifiable understanding of what Korean embassies "really" looked like – their regalia, their
clothing, even the order of march, troubled us. The following is a list of some of our discomforts – features that
conflict with the notion of a "realistic" representation of actual Korean diplomats and their entourage, as
documented in both Japanese "documentary" paintings prepared on shogunal orders, and Korean domestic
sources.29
1 The hyongmyong-gi (dragon flag) at the head of the procession, and the ch' ongdo-gi (the smaller pennant
between it and the "ambassador's" palanquin) are in reverse of their "proper" order. The hyongmyong-gi – there
should be two of them, a "rising" and "descending" dragon – are visible symbols of the Korean king, while the
ch'ongdo-gi is supposed to "cleanse the path" – which is what ch'ongdo means. In "actual" Korean diplomatic
missions, therefore, the ch'ongdo-gi led the way, precisely to cleanse the path over which the hyongmyong-gi, and
the Korean king's letter to the shogun, were about to pass. As depicted, Hanegawa has the hyongmyong-gi travel
over polluted ground, an unthinkable discourtesy to the king. However, in festival masquerades that "copied"
Korean embassy regalia, the larger, more colorful, and more impressive hyongmyong-gi could – and often did –
lead the parade, as it did in the mummery put on by Wakebe-chô in the Hachiman festival in Tsu, or by Toshima-
chô at the Kanda festival in Edo in 1791.
In Figure 4.5 Ch'ongdo-gi flags take the vanguard of the "real" 1711 Korean embassy parade to "cleanse the
path" for the hyongmyong-gi dragon flags symbolizing royal authority, depicted here in a narrative scroll
commissioned by the shogun, and executed by an Edo atelier painter before the mission departed for Korea.
Chôsen kokusho hôtei gyôretsu-zu (color on paper, three scrolls, Osaka Museum of History).

Figure 4.5
Figure 4.6A

Figure 4.6B

Enter the dragon: Tôjin mummers in the Tsu Hachiman (Figure 4.6A) and Kanda (Figure 4.6B) festivals led with
the hyongmyong-gi dragon pennant, rather than the "cleanse the path" flags – as "real" Korean embassy parades
did. Tsu Hachiman sairei emaki (n.d., Sekisui Hakubutsukan, Tsu), and the Kanda myôjin sairei emaki (1791,
Tokyo National Museum. The painters of these scrolls were not confined to a proscenium frame, as Hanegawa
was, nor were they interested in leading the viewer into confusion.
2 The hyongmyong-gi and ch'ongdo-gi of Korean embassies and royal processions were of the type known as
hata in Japanese, banners attached to a flagstaff, with no other support. But the pennants that Hanegawa has that
preceded are represented as nobori rather than hata (both are the Japanese terms): the cloth is supported both by
the flagstaff, and by a horizontal brace at the top of the staff, and perpendicular to it.
3 The great drum immediately following the hyongmyong-gi does not accord with the musical instruments
Koreans marching bands carried; Korean marching bands of the day used smaller drums.30 It is, however,
consistent with the large drums used in Japanese matsuri processions.
4 The marchers' clothing shows a frilled collar around the elbow or upper arm of the sleeve. These are not
characteristic of Korean clothing,31 but are a well-established signifier of alienness in Japanese costumery and
iconography. In the case of the "ambassador" in the palanquin, the frills are at his wrist, but the effect is the
same. Frilled costumes were a standard element in Tôjin performances, whether on stage, or in festivals – in nô
plays such as Fuji, Tôsen, or Hakurakuten, such kyôgen as Chasuanbai or Tôzumô, jôruri or kabuki
extravaganzas such as The Battles of Coxinga or Kanbun Kanjin tekuda no hajimari, for example, frilled collars
help to distinguish the "Chinese" characters from the "Japanese."
5 The "ambassador" himself is depicted as a young boy in white pancake make-up. Adult Korean men of the
Choson dynasty did not shave their beards; indeed, they would have seen shaving as an unfilial act, for the beard
was part of the body with which their parents endowed them. It was not uncommon, however, that children were
enlisted to "play" the key roles in festival performances, and that is clearly what Hanegawa has depicted here.32
Indeed, by the mid-seventeenth century, "beard" and "Tôjin" had become linked. A dictionary of associated terms
for poets in the haikai genre lists Tôjin as a word that resonates well with hige; and the pejoratives ketôjin
("hairy Tôjin"), first documented in a jôruri of 1665, and higetôjin are woven into the text of Coxinga.33
In Figure 4.7 from left: portrait of Korean Ambassador Cho Taeok, by the Japanese painter Kano Tsunenobu
(1711); the "ambassador" in Hanegawa's Ukie; portrait of Korean scholar-official Yi Chae (early
Figure 4.7

eighteenth century), by an anonymous Korean painter. Note that both Korean and Japanese portraitists saw their
subjects as bearded, while Hanegawa's "ambassador" is a beardless youth; that Hanegawa's "ambassador" has
frilled sleeves, absent in both portraits.
6 Toward the middle of the procession, a figure on horseback can be seen with his right arm extended, holding
something. Close examination shows it to be a balance-beam scale of the sort used in small commercial
transactions. He is performing a set role in matsuri "Korean parades," that of the Makanai Tôjin, an invention of
Japanese "readers" of the Korean missions. Hanabusa Itchô (1652–1724) painted just such a Makanai Tôjin in the
late seventeenth or early eighteenth century – as did Katsushika Hokusai a century later – so the "role" was well
established at least a quarter-century before Hanegawa's Ukie.34
In Figure 4.8 from left: a page (sodong), followed by the Makanai-tôjin, in Hanegawa's Chôsenjin Ukie;
"Makanai-tôjin," in Itchô gafu (3 vols, Edo, 1770), based on a painting by Hanabusa Itchô (d. 1724); the
Makanaitôjin of a performance in the Gion festival at Tsuchiura, east of Edo; in the hands of a painter who either
misunderstood or wanted to subvert Hanegawa's composition, the Manakai-tôjin's balance-beam scale is
transformed/deformed into something resembling a courtier's shaku.
The Makanai-tôjin ("Quartermaster Tôjin), a stock role in festival Tôjin masques likely originated as a mimetic
reiteration of a characteristic extralegal (not to say illegal) feature of the "real" Korean parade – and of Korea
itself. Ginseng has long been prized in East Asia for what are believed to be its aphrodisiac and curative powers,
and – at least in Japan – Korean ginseng was the most highly prized. Lower-ranking members of Korean
missions, especially, smuggled ginseng in their gear, surreptitiously selling it to Japanese along the route to
supplement their relatively meager rations – a practice that was repeatedly, but ineffectually, proscribed – and
lowerlevel members of the entourage were reputed to be trading surplus provisions

Figure 4.8

for Japanese tobacco and other products.35 The ginseng-peddling Korean was "copied" into the festival
performance as the Makanai-tôjin – a mimesis documented in many Edo-period festivals from northeastern,
through central Japan. So firmly established was the Makanai-tôjin that Katsushika Hokusai thought it
appropriate to symbolize the entire "Sannô festival" through the Makanai-tôjin, complete with balance-beam
scale, and daikon (long radishes) "performing" the role of ginseng.
7 The procession of "Koreans" is unaccompanied by Japanese guards, as would have been the case in a parade of
"real" Koreans. The bakufu "wrapped" processions of foreign visitors – whether Korean, Ryukyuan, or Dutch – in
an envelope of Japanese guards and porters, both to protect the visitors from attack or other indignities, and to
present the foreigners as under the "control" of the bakufu.36
There are several other features of the depiction that produce a jarring cognitive dissonance with any notion of
realistic, journalistic representation of the diplomatic event of 1748 – or any other actual Korean visit. (To some
degree, we must be a bit more generous, considering that parades
Figure 4.9 Katsushika Hokusai, "Sannô matsuri," in Tôto shôkei ichiran (Collection, Chicago Art Institute)

do not stand still – after all, it would hardly be a "parade" if it did – and sketching the hundreds of participants is
too much to expect.) Some of the characteristics noted above, particularly the reversal of the hyongmyonggi and
ch'ongdogi, in my view, are concession's to the artist's main brief (in Baxandall's sense), which was to make a
compelling and well-composed picture that would grip the patron for whom it was painted, and especially the
young prince whose "beloved plaything" it became. Were the two switched, with the relatively small ch'ongdo-gi
moved to the right margin, and the towering hyongmyonggi brought closer to the center of the composition, it
would loom over the "ambassador's" palanquin, obscuring the focal character, and destroying the power of the
composition. That is too much to ask of any painter worth their salt.
But all the difficulties in accepting this depiction as "realistic" evaporate if, to the contrary, we read the signified
here, not as "Koreans," but as "the Tôjin [performed in] festivals…. Toshima's [performance as] Tôjin in the
[Kanda] festival," or Kôjimachi's performance in the Sannô festival. These two festivals, jointly known as the
tenka matsuri – "festivals of the realm" – because they, and no other festivals, paraded through the grounds of
Edo Castle, before a shogunal reviewing stand. In fact, the route Korean embassies followed returning from their
audience at the castle to their lodgings in Asakusa overlapped with the annual route of both great festivals.
Korean embassy parades and tenka matsuri parades left the castle by the Tokiwa bridge, turned left along the
moat for a half-block, before turning right down Honchô-dôri, and then left along Jikkendana – just as they are
shown here. (See the map of the overlapping routes in my "Carnival of the Aliens" (1986).)
Reading the Chôsenjin Ukie as a representation of one of these festival performances, a "Tôjin parade," that is,
rather than a parade of "actual" Koreans, seems to resolve the contradictions between the cluster of signs
Hanegawa has constructed and the "actual" Korean procession. Not a "real" embassy procession, but a mimesis –
a performative copy – passing before spectators gaily decked out for the great Tenka matsuri. But Hanegawa will
not let us off quite that easily; as soon as we resolve those problems, other contradictions appear in their place.
There is little doubt that the marchers – as depicted, at least – are not "real" Koreans, but Edoites masquerading
as their own idea of what foreigners looked like. As the wag noted in his report to the Yoshiwara courtesan,
Edoites in the festival "did" Koreans better than the Koreans did themselves. The performance/mimesis was
more convincing than the model for mimesis, precisely because Edoites knew what they thought "Koreans"
should look like, and could produce or enact that role to perfection. Those expectations had been constructed in
Japanese performance and pictorial productions over a millennium, and honed to a sharp edge of great heuristic
precision. Just as some contemporaries argued – or pretended – that kabuki's onnagata, specialists in female
roles, were more convincing than "real" women could be, some might see "real" Koreans were as a poor
imitation of what Japanese expected they "should" look and act like. Perhaps this was the audience Hanegawa
played to, as well.
But the street itself gives the lie to Hanegawa's enactment of the festival. Edo-period Japan was a closely
regulated society, by premodern standards. Rules governed many aspects of public performance of "self," from
hairstyles and clothing, to the façades of buildings. When the bakufu planned its reception of diplomatic visitors
from abroad, orders went out to local authorities all along the anticipated route, commanding the repair of roads
and bridges, the refurbishing of any buildings that might be visible from the line of march, and a wide array of
other matters. Public behavior was likewise prescribed in detail.
As the anticipated day for a Korean embassy's arrival approached, the pace of proclamation accelerated,
including instructions that the roadways be swept clean of dust and debris immediately before the foreigners
arrived. Each house was to set out a wooden water-bucket immediately under the eaves along the street, and to
sprinkle water to hold down the dust just before the parade arrived. This was exactly the same preparation
prescribed for the tenka matsuri each year. Expensive restaurants made small piles of salt at either side of the
entryway and sprinkled water to hold down the dust, as a sign that all preparations were complete for receiving
visitors – chisô. The visiting Koreans themselves frequently noted in their diaries the spotless condition of the
roads, though it is unclear whether they understood the cultural codes of chisô. But this was true only until 1719.
Though records are spotty before about 1655, surviving records through the embassy of 1719 show that the
bakufu ordered the same chisô for Korean embassies as for the tenka matsuri. As Edo prepared to receive the
Korean mission of 1748, the Edo magistrate's office issued explicit orders that the detailed chisô of earlier years
would not be required. "There is no need to put out hand-buckets all along the way [in front of each house]. Stack
the buckets in front of the police box [the tsujiban at each intersection]." Other edicts are more specific: "Put a
four to (about 72 l) cask of water at the front and rear of each ward, in case of fire. Note: it isn't necessary to
replace the water in the casks along the street-fronts where the Koreans are to pass."37
Hanegawa has played with us – after all, play was the order of the day for the cognoscenti of mid-century Edo –
his tenka matsuri "Chinamen" are marching along a street prepared for "real" Korean visitors. A large barrel sits
right at the corner, as the magistrate's office had ordered for the "real" Koreans, while "fake" Koreans march
gaily by. Hanegawa has even been kind enough to note the precise location, "Honchô 2-chôme," one street
northeast of the more famous intersection of Surugachô, home of the Echigoya merchant house.

Quotation and parody (I): subverting sources

Hanegawa did not, of course, work from a blank slate, but drew upon well-established canons of representation –
both artists' canons for representing Tôjin, parades, cityscapes, and festivals, and mimetic canons for performing
Tôjin, either on the stage or in festival. But he didn't merely work within a canon; he quite explicitly quoted other
artists' works both in setting the scene, and in staging the parade. Not only that, he was at the leading edge of an
era which took playfulness seriously, if you will, turning the traditions of allusion that were central to much of
the Japanese classical tradition into public sport, valuing the subversion of meaning, the deployment of verbal
and visual punning, and an edge of ironic tension between word and image.38
Perspective drawing had burst into public consciousness only a few years before Hanegawa's painting debuted in
the salon of the Tayasu mansion. While most early perspective prints are interior scenes, to take advantage,
according to some art historians, of the convenient grid effect of the abundant horizontal and vertical lines of
theaters and tea houses, among the earliest exterior scenes is Torii Kiyohiro's New Year's Morn at Suruga-chô,
which deploys Mt Fuji as the focal point around which the street scene revolves.39 Clearly also an advertising
ploy for the Echigoya shops of the Mitsui house, one can surmise, from the manner in which the pine-topped
wall of Edo Castle bisects the composition and separates the sacred (Mt Fuji; the shogun's residence) from the
profane (shop-girls playing in the streets) spaces – just as Hanegawa deploys the castle wall and Mt Fuji in his
own composition.
These two earlier prints (Figures 4.10A and 4.10B), in what might be termed "primitive single-point
perspective," are rich in mimetic potential on which Hanegawa could draw – models he may have "copied," or
played with, for his Ukie. Figure 4.10A, by Torii Kiyohiro (d. 1776?), New Year at Suruga-chô (Matsukata
Collection, Tokyo National Museum), is set one block west from Tôei's scene for the "Koreans"; all Kiyohiro's
sight lines point to Mt Fuji. Figure 4.10B, attributed to Okumura Masanobu (1686–1764), Festival Procession
(Kanagawa Prefectural Museum), depicts a festival masque of "Koreans" entering the frame through the central
gate, led by musicians and a brace of ch'ongdo-gi ("cleanse the path") pennants.
Figure 4.11, by Okumura Masanobu, Sakai-chôFukiya-chôshibai-machi ô-ukie (Museum of Fine Arts, Boston), c.
1745, a view into the theater district, an early outdoor scene rendered in developed single-point perspective,
deploys Mt Fuji in almost precisely the same way as Tôei's Ukie, looming above-left vis-à-vis the vanishing
point.
Hanegawa's thoroughly original, indeed innovative perspective painting, is equally a mimetic pastiche of
elements from the latest popular prints of his own day, a "copy," or parody, of multiple source-texts that
participated in the contemporary culture of play at the heart of mid-eighteenth-century Japanese discourse.
Figure 4.10A

Whether Hanegawa actually had these two specific prints in mind as he designed his own masterpiece, we can, of
course, only speculate – particularly inasmuch as we do not even know "who" he was – but the constant cross-
referencing of contemporaries' work in paintings and prints of the day make it all but certain that Hanegawa
would have known these two prints. Further, there is no doubt that he was well versed in the work of Okumura
Masanobu, author of both the Festival Procession and Sakai-chô Fukiya-chô shibai-machi ô-ukie, for not only
was Masanobu the most powerful and influential print artist of the day but it was also Masanobu's print shop, the
Okumuraya, that would publish the printed version of Tôei's painting. At the same time, the Torii school – in
which Masanobu had also studied – was at the zenith of its influence and popularity just as Tôei was executing
this work.

Figure 4.10B

Figure 4.11

Hanegawa's work, then, participated in, and commented on multiple discourses and media. Prior even to seeing
"real" Koreans or other foreigners, though perhaps not prior to seeing local mimesis of the "foreign" in festival
or on stage, Hanegawa had steeped himself in Japanese discourses of foreignness, in conventions not only for
representing aliens, but for seeing them. Japanese canons of vision and representation had it that foreigners wore
ruffles at the neck, the shoulder, the elbow, or the ankles – a convention established by the eleventh century40 –
and rehearsed both in festival masque, and on stage whenever the "foreign" was at issue.41 Foreigners were also
ketôjin – "hairy 'Chinese'" – constructed as bearded and hirsute, tonsorially distinct from clean-shaven, pate-
shaved Japanese, accounting for the contrast between bearded "Koreans" and clean-shaven Japanese spectators in
Hanegawa's composition.42
Hanegawa drew on – "copied from" – the vocabulary of the canons of representation, of course, for no painting
that did not would be unreadable. Canons of representation, following Gombrich's reasoning, are also constraints
on vision, and hence on mimesis.43 If the artist does not work from – "copy," that is, and modify – "a limited
number of types and gestures …stock figures which can be traced back for centuries,"44 the viewer's ability to
"read" the image, to receive the message, may be irreparably compromised. The outrage of the Salon at the work
of the early Impressionists and the uproar of the Armory Show of 1913, were consequences of just such cognitive
dissonance, of the challenge to the canon that they embodied.

A little perspective

In order to decode Hanegawa's game, we must return to the only title for the painting (and print) that can be
linked to him, and the only name by which we know the artist: Chôsenjin Ukie, by "Hanegawa Tôei Michinobu."
Hanegawa's title combines subject ("Koreans") and technique (perspective). Hanegawa and his contemporaries
were in the midst of a revolution in sight. The introduction of the ukie technique (also called kubomi-e, "sunken
pictures") melded with an earlier fascination with lenses (recall Yonosuke, in Saikaku's Kôshoku ichidai otoko,
peeping through a spyglass to sneak a look at a woman in the bath).
The Ukie's adoption of a technique only recently imported – appropriated – from abroad,45 is critical to an
understanding of his painting. Over a century and a half, Japanese artists had developed a rich and highly
ramified iconography of "Koreans," a set of conventions for representing them, and a set of venues in which to
represent them.46 None of these works, however, were cast in perspective, for the ukie technique had not been
introduced. In pairing his unusual, rarely seen "foreign" subject with the radically new and "foreign" ukie
technique, Hanegawa called into question the politics and semantics of seeing.47 A fad for "peep shows" (nozoki
karakuri) swept Edo, box-like contraptions in which ukie, often depicting foreign scenes, were viewed either
through lenses, or as reflected in mirrors. The placement of a "foreign" subject in a familiar place, but viewing
the mixture of foreign and familiar through the new, alien technique of the ukie, called into question the very
practice of vision itself.
Several important paintings, with which professional artists were surely familiar, showed Koreans parading to
Edo Castle, to Tôshôgu, to Nijô Castle and Daitokuji, to Kyoto's Hôkôji.48 Hanegawa reversed the rhetoric in a
powerfully cinematic devise that recalls – for me, at least – the visual trickery Mel Brooks employed in the
opening titles of Blazing Saddles. The marching aliens (are they really?) are coming from the castle; they grow
larger and larger as the viewer moves her eye from the distance to the foreground, which creates a cinematic
illusion of actual march; it is not our eyes that move, but the Koreans who march toward the viewer!

The sincerest form of flattery

Hanegawa flattered Okumura Masanobu and other of his contemporaries and forebears, by borrowing elements
of composition and detail from their works. Yet he attained an entirely new utterance of such compelling energy
and power of expression, that he inspired a dozen "imitators" of his own. Just as Hanegawa drew on the work of
others to say something original, his "imitators" were also merely honoring his composition by quoting
(copying) it, but, like him, adding inventions and innovations of their own. The best of the "copies," therefore,
are excitingly original works in their own right, in an expanding, almost Talmudic spiral of commentaries on the
"original," its "represented" and "signified," its sources, and society itself. The worst of them – not always in
technical terms, but because they misread or misunderstand the text they purport to quote – are lifeless failures.
Hanegawa's source texts – the works and events he "copied" – I prefer, here, to say "drew on," or "incorporated"
– are varied, and shed light on the games he was playing on his viewers. As best as I can reconstruct, he drew on
a variety of source texts, some for subject matter, others for technique and setting. These include a relatively
primitive perspective work, most likely by Okumura Masanobu from sometime in the 1730s, of a festival parade
in what appears to be a neighborhood in the northeastern quadrant of Edo, near Ueno.49 The use of Mt Fuji as an
anchor in perspective prints of downtown Edo was also common by the 1730s or 1740s, as is evident in Suruga-
chô no gantan, a simple monochrome print of young women playing a popular New Year's Day game of
shuttlecocks and battledores.
 Quotation and parody (II): Hanegawa's aftermath

As noted above, Hanegawa's painting and the print version of Okumura Masanobu's shop spawned several
generations of quotation, parody, and misconstruction. I have begun work on a genealogy tracking the filiation of
the Ukie (see Figure 4.12), both its ancestors and its descendants. The genealogy is as yet quite tentative,
especially since I am certain that some members of the family tree have yet to be (may never be) found – after
all, it was only in 2001 that the most recent addition to the genealogy popped up, quite by accident, in the vaults
of a Kyoto museum, where it had lain mis-labeled for decades.
In constructing this tentative genealogy, I have been guided by certain principles (listed below), equally
applicable to deriving the filiation of verbal texts as they are to visual texts. As artists "copy," they adapt the
images to their own purposes. They frequently misapprehend the "intentions" of the source-text (the "original"),
and get a "word" or image segment "wrong."
1 Elements in the source-text may be eliminated – either by design, or by accident or entropy.
2 The "copyist" may alter an element from the source-text.
3 The "copyist" may reverse an image – mirror-images are an example.
4 The "copyist" may move an image from one place in the source-text to a new location in the composition.
5 The "copyist" may add elements that were not in the source-text.
6 The "copyist" is as susceptible to misreading a source-text as any reader, whether inadvertently or willfully. By
tracing the insertion, elimination, alteration, etc., of elements across versions of the source-text, it should be
possible to propose a filiation, a "genealogy" of the source-text and its "descendants."
Applying these principles and in reference to Figure 4.12, the following may be observed:
1 Hanegawa "original" (left): the four women with a nursing infant are the only women among the line of
spectators at the lower foreground of Hanegawa's "original" Chôsenjin Ukie – though there are numerous other
women in the gallery seats. The woman to the right nurses; the woman in red, reaching to take the child, is
dressed in the height of contemporary fashion, suggesting her youth. To her left, an older woman looks on with
interest. The three might be read as grandmother, mother, wet-nurse, and infant, leaving the fourth woman, in
black, who shows no interest in the other three women and the child, as unconnected with them, except by
composition.
2 Tenri A (center): the group's coherence seems to break down. Four adult figures have become three, and the
older woman no longer interacts with the two others, or the infant.
3 "Private Collection" version (right): though in proximity to one another, the women have lost their cohesion as
a compositional group. Tochigi version (bottom): there are only three women in the group with the infant in the
Tochigi version, but now, only the nurse interacts with the infant, nursing; the other two women are engrossed in
conversation, but uninvolved with the infant. On the other hand, the artist has introduced two pairs of fashionable
young beauties walking past the spectators, interested in nothing but themselves.

Figure 4.12

For example, by tracking the fate of the group of four women and an infant, pictured in Tôei's painted version,
we can move toward a sequence of copying and adaptation, while also observing the processes of mitate and
subversion that inhabits the re-versioning of Hanegawa's visual text.
In Tôei's text, the group has an internal coherence – a rhetoric of mutual interaction – with a wet-nurse (maid)
holding the infant, while the mother reaches out for the baby, and the grandmother (in the gray head-covering)
looks on. I have not yet deciphered what the fourth woman is doing, but as there are no other women in the row
of spectators that comprise the foreground of the composition, I am certain that she is related to the "group."
In Tenri A, this fourth woman has been eliminated from the composition; the mother still reaches for her baby,
but "grandmother" seems no longer to be paying attention to "her family"; she has turned her face away from the
baby, and is concentrating on watching the parade, merging her role in the Tôei text with that of the fourth
woman who is no longer there.
In the "Private Collection" text, the coherence of the group has deteriorated still further. "Grandmother" is posed
more or less as she had been in Tôei's text, but she has been both moved and altered. She is no longer a
participant in the interaction of the mother/child/nurse group.
In Tenri B, the four women have been moved from the left foreground to the right; the baby has been eliminated.
They are now just a couple of Edo's beauties, enjoying their day's outing.
The same method may be applied to other aspects of Hanegawa's composition: the representation of Mt Fuji –
which is moved from its original position slightly left-of-center vis-à-vis Honchô-dôri, the Kobe "original," the
print version in the Matsukata Collection, and Tenri A, on the one hand, and the lineage of beginning with the
"Private Collection" iteration, and continuing through Tenri B. Most importantly, the artist in Tenri A has
resolved (lost) some of the tension so important to Tôei's work, between the mimetic parade and the preparation
of the route as if for a "real" Korean embassy, by transforming the pennants back into flags; eliminating the
ruffles from the clothing of the Koreans; bearding the Koreans themselves; altering the palanquin; altering the
giant parasols; eliminating the makanai tôjin, etc.
A sequence that is particularly revealing of the processes of "copying" and mitate that proceeds from the
"original" Chôsenjin Ukie revolves around the large water-cask at the foreground corner, the guard standing there
at attention, and the spotted dog seemingly asleep at his feet. The abandonment of festival-like chisô along the
Koreans' route, and the replacement of buckets lining the streets with four-to casks at streetcorners, as we have
seen, was mandated by the authorities for the first time in 1748, and it is this barrel that Hanegawa exaggerates
in the foreground of his composition. Guards were placed at regular intervals along the route of visiting foreign
dignitaries to prevent unruly interaction between spectators and visitors, and Koreans regularly commented on
their presence.50

Figure 4.13A "Kobe Version"

Figure 4.13B "Matsukata Collection"

Figure 4.13C "Tenri A"

In Figures 4.13A, 4.13B and 4.13C, from left: Hanegawa's "original" grouping of water-cask, corner guard, and
dog; the initial printed version, in which the dog does not appear; in Figure 4.13C, "Tenri A," the dog has begun
to jump and bark at the spectators, and an additional guard waves his staff in an attempt to quiet the dog. Figure
4.14A, "Private Collection,"

Figure 4.14A

Figure 4.14B

below left, continues the motif of Figure 4.13C, "Tenri A," with a second guard trying to calm the barking dog,
but places a cat on the rooftop opposite – perhaps commenting on the scene. Finally, below right, Figure 4.14B,
"Tenri B," replicates the paired guards at the corner, and even the calligraphy on the water-cask, but seems to
have missed the point entirely, for the second guard is scolding at an empty section of street, for the dog is not
there. In reference to Figure 4.14 the following may be observed:
1 When Hanegawa set this cycle of subversion in motion with his painted "original," he stood the guard at
attention, his staff nearly perpendicular to the ground, the very model of a minion of public order. The puppy
curled up at his feet suggests a master-and-pet relationship between them.
2 In Hanegawa's print version, the dog has disappeared – there is no way of knowing whether this was Tôei's
choice, or the decision of the block carver.
3 The puppy awakens when he reappears in the version I have called "Tenri A" (Figure 4.13C), jumping up and
barking at the spectators in the gallery at mid-block. The anonymous "Tenri A" artist – clearly a different hand
from Hanegawa's – has also doubled the guard, adding a second man who, with his back to the viewer, raises his
staff as if to scold the dog that threatens to disturb the tranquility and order of the scene.
4 In Figure 4.14A, "Private Collection," another anonymous copyist (who signs himself "Hanegawa Tôei,"
though there is no similarity of style between his version and the Kobe "original"; even the signature handwriting
is clearly dissimilar) seems to have taken up the "variation on a theme" proposed in "Tenri A", continuing the
image of the barking dog and scolding guard, while placing a cat on the roof of the corner building opposite.
Japanese representation of the self and other posited a contrast between a domestic culture that avoided the
eating of meat – even though Edo was peppered with establishments serving boar and venison, rabbit and bear –
and a meat-eating Other. A number of dishes in Korean cuisine employ dog-meat; perhaps the cat's placement –
safe on a rooftop, looking down on the dog, the visiting Koreans, and the street – is a subtle comment on the
likely fate of the hapless canine whose jumping and barking are not in play, but in panic.51
One could continue through almost every detail of Hanegawa's composition, and all its mimetic, subversive
reiterations, and find these same processes of trompage at work throughout. Most significant, perhaps, is the
wavering between representing the marchers as if they were festival mummers, as Hanegawa clearly did, and
"returning" them to a semblance of the "real Koreans" whose mimesis made festival so much fun. A line from
Figure 4.13C, "Tenri A," by way of Figure 4.14A, "Private Collection," and Figure 4.14B, "Tenri B," in which
braced pennants revert to their "authentic" form as free-flying flags, in which ruffled "costumes" once more
become the "genuine" uniforms on which they were remotely based, and the child-ambassador regains his beard,
his maturity, and his authenticity – at least a modicum of fidelity to "Korean" tonsorial practice – distinguishes
two lines of reiteration from each other: "festival" content and "reality" content.
Yet even here, the next round of "copying" could not resist once more subverting the scene: Nishimura Shigenaga
(d. 1756), in his print, Figure 4.15, Ukie Gosairei Tôjin gyôretsu ezu ("Perspective Picture of the Festival Parade
of Tôjin") continued several of the conceits of Figure 4.13C, "Tenri A," representing the masquers' finery as frill-
free, eliminating the "Quartermaster Tôjin" who would have been part of any festival masque, and providing the
"Ambassador" with a lush set of whiskers – all in conflict with the "festival parade" name printed on the margin
of the work. Having set title and content against each other, Nishimura then playfully subverts his own
subversion by restoring the water-buckets placed before each shop on either side of the street.
Where Hanegawa had framed the content of a "festival parade" in a street set to receive the "real Koreans" that
festival performance mimed, Nishimura turns Hanegawa back on himself, setting "real Korean" faces and regalia
on a street prepared for the festival. As if to mock Hanegawa,

Figure 4.15 Nishimura Shigenaga, Ukie Gosairei Tôjin gyôretsu ezu (urushi-e, before 1756, Matsukata Collection, Tokyo National Museum)

Nishimura takes the giant water-cask that had been at the foreground, and withdraws it – far oversize to its
placement in the perspective grid – at the far end of the axial street, where it towers above the marchers
themselves, and competes with the second-story rooftops of the shops along the way.

Seeing through perspective

Perspective, the representational schema Hanegawa chose for his painting, he and his contemporaries had labeled
both "floating pictures" (ukie) and "sunken pictures" (kubomi-e), underscoring the signification of depth, the
greater capacity of this mode to create the impression of three-dimensionality. But perspective, as Panofsky has
observed, is more than a technique of projection; it is itself a "symbolic form," redolent of significatory power.52
In Hanegawa's day, perspective drawing was fresh, a new way of seeing and a new way of representing – an
improved way of "copying" data from perception to paper. A brief look at earlier Japanese modes of replicating
the "seen" as the "represented" – sometimes referred to as "scroll perspective" (emaki enkin-hô) – immediately
reveals that the vanishing-point has a much greater capacity for information-transfer ("copying"). For example, a
work by Okumura Masanobu in "scroll perspective" shows that, even when the artist eliminates a roof or ceiling
to show an interior, he can represent (copy) less than half of the interior (information) onto the two-dimensional
surface of the paper.

Figure 4.16 Okumura Masanobu, Wakashu Sanemori (sumi-e album leaf with hand coloring, n.d., Buckingham Collection, Chicago Art Institute)

Using the techniques of vanishing-point perspective and foreshortening, by contrast, the artist can "copy"
information from five of the six interior surfaces of a room – the floor, ceiling, and three walls, for example.
This power to represent – whether as a transfer from some observed "reality," or as an entirely imagined set of
signs – greater amounts of three-dimensional "information" to the two-dimensional frame of a picture was part
of the great appeal of this new technique.
But, following Panofsky, the technique was more than that; it was a "symbolic form," and indeed itself a sign – it
is not only itself, but a bearer of meaning, signifying something else. Perspective drawing was not just an
empirically more "efficient" technique for encoding information from a three-dimensional world – imagined or
otherwise – onto a two-dimensional surface; it was also, and more significantly, a representational scheme
clearly and explicitly identified with its foreign origins. European perspective works had not yet been widely
seen beyond a few in Nagasaki who visited the Dutch trading outpost there,53 but perspective as translated
through the medium of Qing prints and book illustrations – perhaps "authorized" by its acceptance in Chinese
culture – excited Japanese artists and the public imagination in the second quarter of the eighteenth century.
The explicit connection of the ukie format with the foreign, its identification as a technique used by Tôjin, is not
an accidental, but an essential element of Hanegawa's play. Artists like Masanobu had earlier used the foreign
schema to encode scenes of China quite explicitly borrowed from Qing exemplars, such as Okumura's Tôjin-kan
no zu ("Picture of the Tôjin Pavilion," Kobe City Museum), an obvious adaptation of the Suzhou print, Chiting
youxi-tu ("Picture of [People] Playing in the Lake Pavilion," Wang Shecheng Art Museum),54 which represented
"Chinese" subjects in "Chinese" settings. They quickly moved to the representation of domestic subjects such as
Masanobu's Sakai-chô Fukiya-chô shibai-machi ukie.
But Tôei's work may be the first, certainly among the very earliest, to use vanishing-point perspective to bring
the distant Tôjin into domestic Japanese space – to the heart of the shogun's realm. In doing so, he focuses an
ironic gaze on the very foreignness of the representational scheme, as his parading "foreigners" – whether "real"
or "mimetic" – march ineluctably toward the viewer. Medium and message alike are alien forces that have
arrived within; like the symbolic system in which they are embedded, the marchers and Tôei's entire
composition enact the power of this new scheme of representation to penetrate domestic space, and to transform
vision in the process.
The alien representational framework highlights the weirdly indeterminate, mimetic foreign subject; the sharp
contrast in representation of the "foreign" marchers against the "domestic" ground of spectators and cityscape
call attention to the alienation of vision and representation in the new, still-foreign system of perspective.

Imitation of a conclusion

The playful transposition, inversion, and subversion of elements in Hanegawa's "original" composition as it
passed through the hands of a dozen other artists points to the originality and creativity that were at the heart of
the cultural energy of eighteenth-century Japan. This one powerfully evocative painting – really a series of
paintings and prints – raises serious questions about the meaning(s) of "copying" in the production and
reproduction of culture in Japan.
Modern discourse has been distracted by positing two mutually exclusive realms of originality and mimicry, of
creativity and copying, a discourse that owes much to the Romantic notion of the heroic artist, author, or
inventor. Too often, not only foreign commentators, but Japanese as well, have dismissed much of Japan's
cultural production as derivative – the ancient state and imperfect "copy" of Tang China; the reverse engineering
of muskets in the sixteenth century as "copying" European technology. But the sort of "copying" that is truly
valued is no simple mimicry, but an active, creative, and dynamic process, a powerfully hermeneutic, original act
of mimesis, producing not a Benjaminian simulacrum indistinguishable from any other instantiation, and
without the "aura" of an "original" work of art.
Hanegawa himself fashioned a powerfully "original" intervention while working largely, though not entirely,
within a set of well-established and newborn genres – from ruffled Tôjin costumery, to the latest, faddish
representational scheme of perspective drawing. In doing so, he alluded playfully, both ironically and admiringly,
to earlier works, both classical and contemporary, weaving an elaborately cross-textual web of meaning for his
patron, his patron's son, and his contemporaries to unravel. They responded in the same spirit; numerous
contemporaries, too, picked up on Hanegawa's game, folding it back over him. They "copied" his composition,
not to abdicate creative intent, but to comment on it, and to advance the recombinant conversation that consumed
the energies of the most creative minds of the day.

Notes

1 Henry Adams, "In Holland," in Adams, Transatlantic Sketches (Boston: James R. Osgood and Company, 1875), pp. 381–2.
2 Quoted in Erwin Panofsky, Perspective as Symbolic Form, trans. Christopher S. Wood (Zone Books, 1997), p. 27.
3 Collection, Kobe City Museum. The museum catalogs the work under the title, Chôsen raichô-zu ("The Koreans coming to pay tribute"), but the
work itself bears no title. The best evidence we have of Hanegawa's intended title – while I recognize the dangers of "intentionalism" – is the
woodblock-printed version that also bears his signature, and carries the title Chôsenjin Ukie ("Koreans in perspective," Matsukata Collection, Tokyo
National Museum); both the signature and the title are carved into the printing block, as Kishi Fumikazu, Edo no enkinhô (Keisô Shobô, 1994), p.
36. The "tribute" title today commonly assigned to the Kobe Museum painting is unquestionably the product of a later – probably twentieth-century
– collector's or dealer's invention. In this chapter, I will use either the identification on the box, Ukie, or the title of the Matsukata Collection print
version, Chôsenjin Ukie.
4 Public notices posted by the Edo town magistrate in 1748, just days after the Korean embassy departed, noted that people were "wearing Korean-
style clothes, dancing in the streets and playing music through the night." Tsûkô ichiran (8 vols., Shibundô, 1967), Vol. 2:87. The fad apparently
had not abated even three years later, when the magistrate complained that, "In recent years, many townspeople have been getting up in alien
styles, and imitating foreign customs. In particular, they have been doing up their hair in outlandish shapes; there are others, as well, who deck
themselves out in strange way." Ofuregaki Kanpô shûsei, ed. Ishii Ryôsuke (Iwanami Shoten, 1958), pp. 293–4. For a more extensive discussion
of t'ongsinsa, see my State and Diplomacy in Early Modern Japan (Princeton 1984).
5 The processes of replication were not, perhaps, fully "mechanical" in the sense that Benjamin develops to understand photography, but certainly
well along the evolutionary trajectory he posits from "[r]eplicas…made by pupils in the practice of their craft… " to the point where the "original"
no longer exists: There is only an endless series of simulacra, referring to an object only through the mediation of techniques of reproduction –
such as the photographic negative or the printer's plate. Walter Benjamin, "The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction." In
Illuminations: Essays and Reflections, ed. Hannah Arendt; trans. Harry Zohn (New York: Schocken Books, 1968), pp. 217–51. Whether
Hanegawa's Ukie, as we have it today, is an "original" or a "copy" remains an open question – and, to a degree, a matter of definition – though I
incline toward the view that it is the original in what became a series of hand-painted and mechanical reiterations ("copies"; "piracies"; "parodies").
6 The Tokyo National Museum, for example, says it is "An ukiyo-e painting that depicts the appearance of a Korean embassy procession as it
marches through Nihonbashi, and of the people gathered to catch a glimpse of them." Chôsen tsûhinshi: kinsei 200-nen no Nikkan bunka kôryû
(Tokyo National Museum, 1985), p. 8; or Kobayashi Tadashi's comment that it shows "The Korean embassy marching solemnly through Suruga-
chô [sic] in the vicinity of the Echigoya clothier's shop (forerunner of Mitsukoshi), while the people of Edo gather in their finest as spectators." Sin
Kisu, et al., ed., Chôsen tsûshinshi ezu shûsei (Kôdansha, 1985), p. 52. Since the 1990s the painting has become a standard illustration in school
history textbooks, including the highly controversial Nishio Kanji et al., Atarashii rekishi kyôkasho (Fusôsha, 2001), p. 130.
7 On Asakusa see Nam-lin Hur, Prayer and Play in Late Tokugawa Japan: Asakusa Sensôji and Edo Society (Harvard, 2000).
8 Kokoro no kôryû – Chôsen tsûshinshi – Edo jidai kara 21 seiki e no messêji (Museum of Kyoto, 2001).
9 It is equally possible, of course, that the artist's signature on this second "signed" version was added in the late twentieth century, for the Kobe
version has been widely exhibited, and is now a standard illustration in virtually all Japanese middle school and high school history texts. I reserve
judgment on this question.
10 Masanobu and Chinchô both studied under the early master Torii Kiyonobu (1664–1729), perhaps even at the same time, and built on aspects
of Kiyonobu's style. Masanobu, the more famous of the two, styled himself the "progenitor of perspective pictures" (ukie ganso), and was certainly
among the earliest Edo artists to experiment with the techniques of the vanishing point. In English, see Robert Vergez, Early Ukiyo-e Master:
Okumura Masanobu (Kodansha International, 1983). Chinchô, unlike Masanobu, was better known for his book illustrations than for single-sheet
prints. See Laurance P. Roberts, A Dictionary of Japanese Artists (Weatherhill, 1976), p. 14 (Chinchô) and p. 103 (Masanobu); for more on
Masanobu, Robert Vergez, Early Ukiyo-e Master: Okumura Masanobu (Kodansha International, 1983).
11 Ôta Nanpo, for example, styled himself "Professor Sleepy" (Neboke Sensei), while Hiraga Gennai became "The Hermit the Wind Blew In"
(Fûrai Sanjin). My personal favorite is the elusive Tôrai Sanwa, "The [Writer] who Came from China to Japan."
12 Quitman E. Philips, The Practices of Painting in Japan, 1475–1500 (Stanford University Press, 2000), p. 67.
13 Shinmura Izuru, comp., Kôjien (2nd ed., Iwanami Shoten, 1983), p. 199.
14 Ôno Susumu, Satake Akihiro, and Maeda Kingorô, comp., Iwanami kogo jiten, expanded edition (Iwanami Shoten, 1994), pp. 176–7.
15 An earlier mission by the Buddhist monk Song'un, who met with Ieyasu in Kyoto in early 1605, is not generally regarded as an official
embassy, in part because it was led by a Buddhist monk rather than a civil bureaucrat, and bore no letter from the Korean king to the shogun. The
last formal mission, in 1811, exchanged letters between king and shogun; but it was received on the remote island of Tsushima, neither visiting the
Japanese mainland, nor having an audience with the shogun – who remained in Edo.
16 One mission, in 1617, only went as far as Kyoto, where it met the shogun and delivered the king's letter in an audience with Hidetada at
Fushimi Castle, on the southeastern outskirts of the city; three missions, in 1636, 1643, and 1655, went beyond Edo to visit the shrine to Tokugawa
Ieyasu at Nikkô.
17 For a more detailed description of these diplomatic parades, see my "Carnival of the Aliens," in Monumenta Nipponica, Vol. 41, No. 4 (1986).
18 Ôno Mizuo (ed.) Enomoto Yazaemon oboegaki: kinsei shoki shônin no kiroku (Heibonsha, 2001), pp. 294–5.
19 See my "Gaikô no gyôretsu/gyôretsu – ikoku, go-ikô, kenbutsunin". In Ronald P. Toby and Kuroda Hideo, Gyôretsu to misemono (Asahi
Shinbunsha, 1994), p. 42.
20 The hyegum is a stringed instrument played with a bow. Tsuji Jihei, E-iri Chôsen raihei ki (1748, MS copy dated 1764, private collection).
21 Tôjin, which seems on its face to mean "Chinese" – more specifically, "Chinese" of the Tang Dynasty (618–907) – had far broader meaning(s)
in seventeenth to nineteenth-century Japanese discourse. Tôjin might indeed be from China; but they could also be from Korea, Okinawa, Vietnam
or Siam – and even Europe. Thus Engelbert Kaempfer, in Japan 1690–92, was hailed as a Tôjin during his journeys between Nagasaki and Edo:
Still, in some cities and towns the young gentlemen, like rascals everywhere in the world, run after us, shouting certain rhymes or ditties making
fun of the Chinese, for which these ignoram[uses] take us. The most common of these is: tôjin baibai! which is half-Chinese and means much the
same as what at home they would say to the Jews, namely: "Chinaman, haven't you got something to peddle?"
Engelbert Kaempfer, Kaempfer's Japan: Tokugawa Culture Observed, trans. Beatrice Bodart-Bailey (University of Hawaii Press, 1999), p. 285.
Overseas Chinese from Fujian also referred to themselves as Tangren, the same word, pronounced in Chinese. In Japan, it had a range of meanings
from a simple "foreigner," to an ethnic pejorative something akin to "Chinaman" in English. Throughout, I will use the Japanese term Tôjin.
22 The mythic "Empress Jingû" and her equally apocryphal "conquest of the three Korean peoples" were a staple in the Gion Festival, the most
important festival in the ritual cycle of the capital, from the time of the Ônin War (1467–77). Edo-period revelers at the Hachiman festival in Tsu
(near Ise) re-presented the "heroic" exploits of Tôdô Takatora in the Korean invasions of 1592–8 in a mimetic performance fashioned after the
diplomatic event; the late twentieth-century revival of those performances seeks entirely to efface the martial referent, though the careful reader of
the performance may find the prisoners – if so inclined.
23 Kara no Tôjin yori Edo no Tôjin ga nigiyaka, from Otoshibanashi kotoba no hana (1797), comp. Nakamura Eishû. In Mutô Sadao (ed.) Kasei-ki
rakugo-hon shû – kinsei shôwa-shû (vol. 2, Iwanami, 1988), pp. 63–4.
24 Ibid., p. 352. This comic routine dates from 1793, when a Ryukyuan embassy came to Edo.
25 Box labels, collection Kobe City Museum. For a transcription of the original texts, see Oka Yasumasa, Megane'e shinkô (Chikuma Shobô,
1992); Kishi Fumikazu, Edo no enkin-hô, pp. 57–8.
26 The Sannô and Kanda festivals had precedence in Edo, for only they among all others were privileged to march through the grounds of Edo
Castle, passing in review before the shogun himself. The earliest visual rendition we have of the Edo Sannô festival procession, the Tenka sairei zu
byôbu (before 1657; private collection), shows several groups of marchers dressed as "Koreans," "Chinese," or other foreigners. See also my
"Carnival of the Aliens," op. cit.
27 Michael Baxandall, Patterns of Intention: On the Historical Explanation of Pictures (Yale University Press, 1985), especially pp. 29–35.
28 See Note 5.
29 On the clothing of the Korean embassies, see Kong Minbong, "Choson t'ongsinsa poksik ui yongu" (unpublished master's thesis, Ehwa
Women's University, 1982), which bases its analysis largely on Japanese pictorial sources. For a broader overview of premodern Korean fashion,
see Kim Yongsuk and Son Kyeja, Chôsen ôchô Kankoku fukushoku zuroku (Rinsen Shoten, 1984), Yu Huigyong, Han'guk poksik-sa yongu (3rd
ed., Ihwa Yoja Taehakkyo Ch'ulp'anbu, 1980). Several such "documentary" paintings (kirokuga) are reproduced in the catalogs of the Kyoto and
Tokyo exhibitions listed in Note 3.
30 On the other hand, Kanô Masunobu's 1655 Chôsenjin kantai-zu byôbu (Sennyûji collection, Kyoto), and Kanô Eikei's 1682 Chôsenjin gyôretsu
zukan (Spencer Collection, New York Public Library), both depict the Korean embassy's marching band as using a giant drum – though carried by
Japanese.
31 Cf. Note 30.
32 For example, the Kawagoe Hikawa sairei emaki (1826, collection Kawagoe Hikawa Jinja), identifies by name, and sometimes by family, many
of the children in Kita-machi's performance of Tawara Tôta's return from the palace of the Dragon King – all decked out as tôjin. Kawagoe Hikawa
sairei no tenkai (Kawagoe-shi Ritsu Hakubutsukan, 1998), pp. 58–61.
33 See my "'Ketôjin' no tôjô o megutte: kinsei Nihon no taigai ninshiki/tasha-kan no ichi sokumen". In Kyôkai no Nihonshi, ed., Murai Shôsuke,
Satô Shin and Yoshida Nobuyuki (Yamakawa Shuppan, 1997), pp. 245–91.
34 It is not known whether the original of Hanabusa Itchô's "Makanai tôjin" is extant, but it was reproduced in a copy-book of his works printed
from wood blocks a half-century after his death. Itchô gafu, 3 vols. (Edo 1770). Hokusai's depiction may be found in his Tôto keishô ichiran, 2
vols. (Edo 1800, collection Chicago Art Institute); a modern facsimile edition has been published in Hokusai kyôka ehon, ed. Ikuta Shigeru
(TôkyôBijutsu). Engelbert Kaempfer, for example, notes that he was constantly enveloped by accompanying Japanese guards on his two trips to
and from Edo.
35 For example, "Trading with the members of the Korean entourage is strictly prohibited to all, without respect to rank. Any [violations] that come
to light hereafter will be treated as a criminal offense." Edo Magistrate's edict of 1711/7. In Tsûkô ichiran (8 vols., Kokusho Kankôkai, 1913), Vol.
2:66. An anonymous scribbler and amateur painter wrote in 1748 that, "lower-ranking Korean officials [in the entourage] eat the leftovers from the
Three Ambassadors' [meals], saving their own provisions, which they sell – just because they prize Japanese coins …" to buy Japanese goods, and
that they especially "like Japanese tobacco." Chôsen tsûshinshi tojô gyôretsu-zu (MS, 1748, ink and color on paper, Collection of the Shimonoseki
Shiritsu Chôfu Hakubutsukan).
36 See my chapter, "Gaikô no gyôretsu/gyôretsu". In Ronald Toby and Kuroda Hideo, Gyôretsu to misemono (Asahi Shinbunsha, 1994).
37 Tsûkô ichiran, 2:77; and Shôhô jiroku (3 vols., Kinsei Shiryô Kenkyûkai, 1966), Vol. 2:245.
38 On the playfulness of late-Edo culture, see H. D. Harootunian, "Late Tokugawa Culture and Thought". In Marius B. Jansen, ed., The Cambridge
History of Japan, Volume 5, The Nineteenth Century (Cambridge University Press, 1989), especially the section entitled "The Culture of Play," pp.
168–77. Harootunian focuses almost exclusively on verbal and literary play, mentioning the world of visual experience only once, in passing (p.
177), but his analysis is equally apposite to visual culture.
39 Torii Kiyohiro, Surugachô no gantan (benizuri-e, ôban, Matsukata Collection, Tokyo National Museum); see Tokubetsuten Ukiyo-e: Kyû-
Matsukata Korekushon o chûshin to shite (Tôkyô Kokuritsu Hakubutsukan, 1984), No. 136.
40 In the pictorial biography of the culture hero and cult figure Prince Shôtoku (574–622) who was executed in 1069, for example, each of the
three alien figures – all emissaries coming to offer tribute and submission – represented are shown wearing jackets with ruffles at the hem. Shôtoku
Taishi eden (Hôryûji collection, held at Tôkyô Kokuritsu Hakubutsukan). On frills and ruffles as a signifier of foreignness, see my "The Indianness
of Iberia and Changing Japanese Iconographies of Other". In Implicit Understandings: Observing, Reporting, and Reflecting on the Encounters
between Europeans and Other Peoples in the Early Modern Era, ed. Stuart Schwartz (Cambridge University Press, 1994), pp. 323–51.
41 See, for example, the costume worn by the "Chinese boy" character in the nô play Tôsen ("China boat"), as depicted in an album of scenes from
150 play, Nô ekagami, c. 1700–15. Takeda Tsuneo and Nakamura Yasuo, ed., Uwajima Date-ke denrai Nô e-kagami hyakugojû-ban (Tankôsha,
1981), p. 129 (No. 84). The same is true for the "Chinese" and "Tatar" characters in performances of Chikamatsu Monzaemon's play Kokusen'ya
kassen, whether in its "original" puppet-performance medium, or played by "live" actors. See the eighteenth-century illustrations reproduced in
Donald Keene, trans., The Battles of Coxinga: Chikamatsu's Puppet Play, Its Background and Importance (Taylor's Foreign Press, 1951).
42 On the "hairy foreigner," see my "'Ketôjin' no tôjô o megutte," op. cit. Japanese representations of Koreans, Chinese, and other aliens
progressively emphasized the hirsuteness of the Other over the course of the Edo period.
43 On this point, see especially Ernest Gombrich, Art and Illusion: A Study in the Psychology of Pictorial Representation (2nd revised edn,
Princeton University Press, 1961), who writes that, "the artist will therefore tend to see what he paints rather than to paint what he sees" (p. 87), that
"the starting point of a visual record is not knowledge, but a guess conditioned by habit and tradition" (p. 89).
44 Ibid., p. 87.
45 See Oka Yasumasa, Megane'e shinkô (Chikuma Shobô, 1992); Kishi Fumikazu, Edo no enkin-hô (Keisô Shobô, 1994).
46 See my "Chôsen tsûshinshi gyôretsu'e no hatsumei". In Taikei Chôsen tsûshinshi, ed., Sin Kisu and Nakao Hiroshi (8 vols., Akashi Shoten,
1994–6), vol. 1, on the development of iconographic conventions in Edo art differentiating "Koreans" from other sorts of aliens.
47 Susan Buck-Morss, The Dialectics of Seeing: Walter Benjamin and the Arcades Project (MIT Press, 1989).
48 Among the most important early examples are: Anon., Edo-zu byôbu (c. 1634–5; collection National Museum of Japanese History:
http://www.rekihaku.ac.jp/e_gallery/edozu/index.html), and Kano Masunobu, Chôsenjin kantai-zu byôbu (c. 1655; collection Sennyûji, Kyoto). In
each of these, the Koreans are represented entering the Castle, as if drawn to it by shogunal authority, rather than leaving the Castle; likewise, the
Tenka sairei-zu byôbu represents the festival procession moving toward – and into – the castle gates.
49 Untitled benizuri e, collection Kanagawa Prefectural Museum of History, Yokohama. An absolute terminus post quem may be established from
the performance of a scene from Chikamatsu Monzaemon's hit play, Kokusen'ya kassen, which opened in 1715; but the awkward, clumsy
vanishing-point perspective argues for a later date, toward the early 1730s, according with the print patterns on the garments of some of the
spectators, also popular in the 1730s. I am grateful to Kono Motoaki for his insights into the dating of this print.
50 For example, Kyong Son, vice-ambassador in 1607, noted in his diary of the trip to Japan that "Japanese officers holding large staffs lined both
sides of the road." Haesarok, entry of 24 May 1607, in Haehaeng ch'ongjae (4 vols., Seoul, 1914), Vol. 2:43.
51 Tôkaiji, a Buddhist temple just outside Edo where the Korean mission stayed before entering the town, for example, demanded a few days after
the mission left for home, that the authorities replace the temple kitchen, because, "When the Koreans lodged here, they used the temple kitchen ...
and because they stewed meat and fowl, rendering [the kitchen] unfit to prepare offerings to the Buddhas and the gods." Tôkaiji kôyô nikki entry of
8 July 1748, quoted in Yamamoto Hirofumi, Tsushima-han Edo-garô – Kinsei Nitchô gaikô o sasaeta hitobito (Kôdansha, 1995), p. 262. And
when the Koreans passed through Kyoto, rumors circulated that they were catching cats and eating them – either raw or stewed. Chôsenjin raihei-
ki (MS, 7 vols., Faculty of Letters, Kyoto University).
52 Panofsky, Perspective as Symbolic Form (Note 2).
53 Japanese painters had experimented with vanishing-point perspective in the late sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries, under Jesuit teachers,
in representations of foreign scenes, but the system does not seem to have caught on, and had to be "rediscovered" through Chinese models in the
early eighteenth century. See Oka Yasumasa, Megane'e shinkô.
54 See Oka, Chapter 4.

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Baxandall, Michael (1985) Patterns of Intention: On the Historical Explanation of Pictures. Yale University Press.
Benjamin, Walter (1968) Illuminations: Essays and Reflections, ed. Hannah Arendt; trans. Harry Zohn. New York: Schocken Books.
Buck-Morss, Susan (1989) The Dialectics of Seeing: Walter Benjamin and the Arcades Project. MIT Press.
Eishû, Nakamura (1797) Kara no Tôjin yori Edo no Tôjin ga nigiyaka, from Otoshibanashi kotoba no hana comp. In Mutô Sadao (ed.) (1988)
Kasei-ki rakugohon shû – kinsei shôwa-shû, Vol. 2. Iwanami.
Fumikazu, Kishi (1994) Edo no enkin-hô. Keisô Shobô.
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Nineteenth Century. Cambridge University Press.
Hirofumi, Yamamoto (1995) Tsushima-han Edo-garô– Kinsei Nitchô gaikô o sasaeta hitobito. Kôdansha.
Hur, Nam-lin (2000) Prayer and Play in Late Tokugawa Japan: Asakusa Sensôji and Edo Society. Harvard University Press.
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Izuru, Shinmura (Ccmp,) (1983) Kôjien. 2nd ed, Iwanami Shoten.
Kaempfer, Engelbert (1999) Kaempfer's Japan: Tokugawa Culture Observed, trans. Beatrice Bodart-Bailey. University of Hawaii Press.
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Kanô Masunobu's (1655) Chôsenjin kantai-zu byôbu. Sennyûji collection, Kyoto.
Kawagoe-shi Ritsu Hakubutsukan (1998) Kawagoe Hikawa sairei emaki. (1826) collection Kawagoe Hikawa Jinja.
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 5
Copy to convert

Jesuits' missionary practice in Japan

Alexandra Curvelo

The history of the introduction and early development of the Christian faith in Japan is part of a pattern of
singular, sustained contact, which resonates with the broader history of the action of the Society of Jesus in the
wider Pacific region. The Jesuits were not only the sole founders of the Japanese mission, but also, for decades,
the only missionaries working in the territory. Even when other religious orders began to work in the area, thus
breaking the established monopoly, the Company's contingent was by far the most numerous.1
The evangelising strategies of the mission developed during the first decades in conjunction with a progressive
understanding of the political context, social mores and cultural values of the Japanese. In this process, the idea
of the copy was consistently used as a means for the initiation of new converts to the faith and part of the
society's policy of adjustment to local conditions in Japan. This practice is most discernible in the visual arts,
although other artistic fields such as music and theatre were related, and I shall focus on the achievements
attained by the painting school that was founded as part of a successful seminary.
Recent contributions to the history of the relations between Japan and Europe during the sixteenth and
seventeenth centuries, especially in its religious and cultural dimensions, have stressed the distinctiveness of the
Japanese mission within the universe of the Portuguese Padroado.2 Its distinctive quality was not only due to the
number of converts, but also to its progress in particularly difficult political conditions, its financial structure, its
"Asiatic" features and the adoption of some local practices.3
For the purposes of the discussion which this chapter will undertake of the Jesuits' missionary practice in Japan
from an artistic point of view, all these contextual characteristics should be considered in order to better
understand the specificity of what may be meant by copying. For in the background, to the instances of
adaptation, and accommodation of the Jesuits and the Japanese to each other, is, as João Paulo Costa correctly
observes,4 an obvious but sometimes forgotten fact: namely, the distance between Japan and Portugal and the
time required for travel. The mission was located at the most distant boundary of the Portuguese (and European)
overseas dominions and, speaking in general terms, the voyage from Lisbon to Nagasaki would take between two
and two and a half years. The journey from Nagasaki to Lisbon could be accomplished in twenty-two or twenty-
three months, depending on the time of the year chosen for departure. In both directions, the ships would stop in
Goa and Macao, the two main Portuguese settlements in the East. This meant that persons and goods, as well as
money, dispatched from Europe to Japan would reach the country several years after being requested. As for the
exchange of mail, mainly with Rome, it would be necessary to expect a period of between five and six years in
order to dispatch a letter and receive its answer. Needless to say that, in such circumstances, some improvisation
was required from the missionaries and there was the opportunity for experiments in the methods employed for
propagating the faith. Far away from the main centres of decision-making – Rome, Madrid and Lisbon5 – and in
what was, it turned out, a most receptive environment, the missionaries could put into action some new methods,
starting with the mission's endurance.
The process of evangelisation in Japan was, from the very beginning, inextricably associated with the economic
dimensions of this mission. Financially dependent on the Portuguese Crown, the mission's padroeiro, the Jesuits
soon recognised this as an insufficient means of funding. In order to meet the immediate increasing necessities,
alternative resources had to be found. One of the main sources of funds was obtained through the Jesuit's role as
intermediaries between Macao merchants and many Japanese who had interests in the Sino-Japanese trade, and
as direct participants, for fathers and brothers of the Society were active in the silk traffic (trato da seda). This
was an area under discussion within the order itself, and a cause of some antagonism with the Iberian Crown.
However, from a political point of view, it became a useful strategy to gain the favours of the Japanese elite.
Merchants and priests were the two main public faces of the Western presence in Japan and both depended on
each other. From its very beginning the mission constructed its identity by promoting quite a different form of
presentation for its members from that found elsewhere in other missions. It adjusted its approaches and
methods to what was considered to be a sophisticated civilisation. The missionary practice adopted was based on
the action model that is best understood as a form of cultural 'accommodation' or 'enculturation'.6 The first
essays concerning this practice were written both in Brazil and Japan c.1550–1, and although hitherto he has
been attributed only a superficial and worldly aspect of this process, Francis Xavier played a key role. He
quickly understood that his own image was an essential part of the impact that he could make upon those whose
favours he wanted so much to obtain. Therefore, he was perfectly aware that he should present himself to the
Japanese political elite not as a humble missionary, but as a man who could command the respect and
inquisitiveness of the Japanese by dressing in rich clothing and offering them sophisticated gifts, becoming, in
effect, a model to invigorate their own desire for emulation. In this respect it is interesting to note the shift in his
self-representation, following his unsuccessful journey to Miyako and return to Yamaguchi. From this point
onwards, he self-consciously changed his attitude and appearance for the visit to Ôuchi Yoshitaka, one the most
influential daimyô.7
It was Xavier's idea to construct a church in Kyoto,8 a plan for a visible presence that could not be achieved until
Oda Nobunaga, the first of the great Japanese unifiers and an important ally to the Jesuits, allowed the
construction to resume in the 1570s. This event took place twenty-five years after Xavier's arrival in Japan. The
building of the church of Nossa Senhora da Assunção, identified by the Japanese as Namban-ji – that is, the
'temple of the southern-barbarians' – was initiated in 1574 or 1575, and the first mass was celebrated on 15
August 1575, a most symbolic date since it corresponded to the day Xavier had arrived in Japan, at Kagoshima.
By 1576 we know that the church was completely finished, following a project designed by Organtino Gnecchi
Soldi, S.J. and advised by the Japanese Christian, D. Dario Takayama. Located near Shijo-bo-mon, the temple's
interior was ao modo romano – that is to say, it followed the principles of the Roman style of architecture. Yet it
included a Japanese room with tatami and another room for the tea ceremony. For this reason, as well as for its
exterior appearance, it was clearly a compromise or accommodation between the European and the Japanese
architectural codes. Although it was probably destroyed in 1588, after Hideyoshi's anti-Christian edit was made
public, we can have an approximate idea of what the church looked like, for, apart from the written accounts, we
also have a picture of it, on a fan presently kept in the City Museum of Kobe, decorated with a series of paintings
of Kyoto.
Following this example of Xavier, Alessandro Valignano in his Advertimentos identified the architecture of
Buddhist temples as models to be emulated and applied to the construction of future Christian buildings in the
country. As for details of the interior of these churches, few elements are given, but it is likely that the hybrid
solutions, like those of Kyoto, were put into action elsewhere.
It was precisely following Valignano's first stay in Japan that the accommodation method was officially adopted
as a missionary strategy and afterwards codified in his Advertimentos.9 One of the main areas in which
accommodation was successful and effective from the very start was the practice of liturgy, a field most
receptive to this approach. On occasions, the priests went so far as to study the bonzes' sermon style so that they
could preach likewise, in a manner familiar to the Japanese initiates. A reference should also be made to the
recurrent use of Christian imagery reproduced in the Japanese style, during the great liturgical feasts, the
adjustment of the funeral rituals to Buddhist models and the adaptations made to the translation of the Holy
Scripture.
By the beginning of the sixteenth century the Jesuits in Japan had already printed a collection of mai10 (sacred
scenes) and the texts compiled by Father Manuel Barreto (comprising Japanese translations of the Holy Scripture
of Sundays, the lives of the saints and diverse prayers) refer to these sacred scenes that were performed in the
churches. According to Léon Bourdon, even though the information we have on the details of Holy Week, Easter
and Christmas performances remind us of the European archetypes from which they were derived, the fact that
they were designated as mai would seem to indicate that the recitation was accompanied by gestures and hieratic
poses similar to those of Japanese traditional dances, showing the particular influence of Nô and Kyôgen.
The role of the Japanese laymen in these transformatory accomplishments and in the expansion of the Japanese
church was crucial. During the initial period their main function within the mission's framework consisted of
translating texts and teaching both the Japanese language and the main basis of the Japanese religion and
civilisation. Among them there were some who, although themselves disconnected from religious life,
cooperated as well in these endeavours, either as brothers or dógicos (dôjuku)11. This was also the case among
the kanbô.12 However, while the dôjuku were bound to respect celibacy, living as religious men and taking part in
the mission's structure, the kanbô were laymen integrated into secular life. The emergence of both groups was a
consequence of the Jesuits' effort to adapt the original or pre-existing religious model of evangelisation to fit
local conditions. The results of this process were most evident and visible in the artistic field, where the first
signs can be traced back to the initial attempt to introduce the Christian religion to Japan. Here, once again
Francis Xavier played a decisive part.
When Xavier arrived in Japan in 1549, he had with him some European religious paintings depicting the Virgin
and the Christ, and these were the first Christian pictorial devices to enter the country. From the evidence of
letters written by him, and particularly those he sent from Kagoshima on 5 November 1549 to the Jesuits in Goa,
we can gain a good impression of the impact that such works had on the political elite:
Y el duque desta terra [Satsuma's daimyô] holguó mucho con él y le hizo mucha honrra y le preguntó muchas cosas acerca de las costumbres y
valía de los portugueses. Y Paulo 13 le dio razón de todo, de que el duque mostró mucho contentamiento. Quando Paulo fue a hablar con el
duque, el qual estava cinco leguas de Cangoxima, llevó consigo una imagen de nuestra Señora muy devota que traíamos con nosotros. Y holgó a
maravilla el duque quando la vido, y se puso de rodillas delante de la imágen de Christo nuestro Señor y de nuestra Señora, y la adoró con
mucho acatamiento y reverencia, y mandó a todos los que con él estaban que hiziesen lo mismo. Y después mostráronla a la madre del duque, la
qual se espantó en verla, mostrando mucho plazer.
Después que tornó Paulo a Congoxima donde nós estábamos, dahí a pocos días mandó la madre del duque un hidalgo para dar orden cómo se
pudiese hazer otra imagen como aquella. Por no aver materiales en la tierra se dexó de hazer. Mandó pedir esta señora que por escrito le
mandásemos aquello en que los cristianos creen, y así Paulo se ocupó algunos días en lo hazer. Y escribió muchas cosas de nuestra fee en su
lengua.14
And the duke of this land [Satsuma's daimyô] had a very good time with him and treated him honourably and asked him a lot of questions about
the Portuguese habits and status. And Paulo [Anjirô or Paulo de Santa Fé] answered to all his questions, which made him feel very pleased. When
Paulo went to talk with the duke, who was five leagues away from Kagoshima, he took with him an image of Our Lady that we had brought with
us. And the duke was very contented and kneeled down before the picture of the dead Christ and Our Lady and adored it with reverence, showing
much delight.
A few days after Paulo's return to Kagoshima, where we were, the duke's mother sent a gentleman to ask for the making of a picture similar to that
one. Since we could not find materials in the place that was not possible.
This is, as far as we know, the first written testimony concerning the introduction of religious paintings in Japan
and, significantly for our purposes, the first time that the Japanese clearly expressed the wish to copy these
works. However, as stated in the letter, at that time there was still no practical or material way to respond
positively to this aspiration. Less than thirty-five years later, however, the circumstances were radically
different. At that time, the mission was already well established in Kyushu, the island where the Portuguese had
arrived for the first time, and it comprised a seminary specifically conceived to answer to such needs.
At this point, it is worth noting that in China by the same time there is also evidence of the use of pictorial
devices such as paintings, engravings and illustrated books, as well as instruments of a scientific nature such as
clocks, mathematical utensils and maps. In the chapter entitled Del frutto che si faceva da'nostri nella residentia
di Sciaochino, written in the period between 10 September 1583 and the first half of August 1589, we are
informed that:
Molti erano attratti dal horiuolo grande et altri piccoli; altri dalle belle imagini di olio et altre stampate; altri de varij instromenti di matematica,
mappamondi, e cose artificiose che venivano di Europa.
I libri anco facevano maravigliare a tutti per la diversa ligatura dalla loro, con tanto oro e altre galantarie, oltre i libri di cosmografia et
architectura, onde vedevano tanti regni e provincie di tutto il mondo, le belle e famose città di tutta Europa e fuora di essa; con altri grandi edificij
di palazzi, torri, theatri, ponti e tempi. Dipoio anco vennero instrumenti musici, mais da loro visti.15
Many were attracted by the large and small clocks; others by the wonderful oil paintings and engravings; others by the variety of mathematical
instruments, maps of the world and ingenious objects brought from Europe.
Even the books were the object of wonder, given that they are different from the Chinese ones, since they have gold and other ornaments, mainly
the books on cosmography and architecture in which they could see several kingdoms and provinces of all over the world, the beautiful and
famous European cities and the ones outside Europe; the buildings such as palaces, towers, theatres, bridges and temples. After that there were the
musical instruments never seen before.
Over and above the similarities in emphasis on the use of pictorial devices in the Chinese and Japanese missions,
the Japanese seminary was designed and dedicated as a school of painting. To understand the impact of this
seminary and the pictorial tradition that it established within Japan we need to place it in the institutional context
and practices of seminaries in the region. By the early years of the 1580s, the cultural and educational dimension
of the Society of Jesus' action within the vast territories of the Portuguese Padroado was clearly extensive, with
a wide diffusion of established colleges and seminars. By the end of the sixteenth century in India, the main
starting point of the whole enterprise, the provinces of Goa and Malabar contained altogether twenty-two
colleges and eight seminaries.16 In China, the city of Macao, where the Portuguese had been established since
1557, was the platform not only of the Chinese missionary project, but also of the enterprise in Japan whose
mission was to become the largest of the whole Portuguese Padroado. From the base in China, Japan saw a rapid
expansion in the settlement of similar institutions.
There were ten colleges and four seminaries already working by 1581, a number that reveals both the
commitment put into the Japanese missionary project and the way their style and methods of teaching were
effective on the ground. This last remark is, I believe, particularly indicative of the history of the Jesuit presence
and action in Japan. Although it is possible to observe similar features in the missionary practices within China,
they were mainly focused on specific fields of knowledge: astronomy, mathematics, geography and cartography.
Names such as those of Adam Schall, Matteo Ricci or Manuel Dias, to name but a few in a vast universe of some
of the most prominent figures of the time, are inextricably linked with the accomplishments of the society in
Chinese territory and, above all, its capital – Beijing.
It is particularly in China with Matteo Ricci and his use of geographical knowledge and the construction of
cartographic devices that we can trace one of the most interesting Jesuit endeavours in East Asia: the use of
world maps as a means of catching the attention and appreciation of people and, above all, the Chinese elites.
Printed world maps adapted to the vision of the 'Great Middle Kingdom' – that is, placing China in the centre of
the map – were perhaps the most effective way for the Catholic priests to enter the capital and the emperor's
circle.
By tracing the history of reception of Ricci's printed maps in China, one can begin to appreciate how they were
used as a powerful and effective instrument in spreading the idea of a united Christian empire and informed the
pictorial methods employed by the Jesuit missions in Japan. Particularly evident in the 1602 edition, is a six-
panel screen with indications of all Christian domains, but no reference to the territories of Islam. Another use
made of the maps was to make them displays of knowledge that lay beyond the reach of the foreign and
uneducated viewer, and therefore to promote the idea that reproduction of the image would be a way of attaining
that understanding. In Storia dell'Introduzione del Cristianesimo nel Cina, written at the beginning of the
seventeenth century, it is stated that the maps were permanently exposed in the emperor's room, where one could
expect that Wan-li, his son, or even some relatives, might in the future want to know or ask for more information
about Western customs and laws. This would lead to a perception of the necessity for sustained contact with
Europeans. Perhaps when looking at the maps, the text continues, and seeing the insignificance of their kingdom
in the middle of such other vast lands, they would become less arrogant and decide to maintain contact with
foreign domains:
Questo non fu piccolo favore che il Re fece a questa opra de'Nostri, in tempo che molti dicevano anco male di essa, e non credevano, o non
volevano credere, quello che in esso si conteneva; quanto pie che in esso si tratta a varij propositi delle cose della christianità e delle falsità che
dicono le altre sette. E, stando questo continuamente nelle sale del Re, si può sperare che, o a questo Re, o a suo figliuolo, o altri de' suoi parenti,
un giorno venga voglia di sapere o domandare qualche cosa della nostra Santa legge, non vi essendo altro rimedio per parlargliene i Nostri,
satndo egli sì serrato senza conversare com nessuno; oltre che il vedere il suo regno sì piccolo aparagone di tanti altri, può essere che abassi
alquanto la sua superbia, e si degni pie di trattare con altri regni forastieri.17
This was not a minor favour the king has done to our enterprise in a time when there were many who said unpleasant things about it and didn't
believe, or didn't want to believe in its contents, since it referred to Christianity and the falsities alleged by other cults. By being permanently
exposed in the king's room, one can expected that this king, his son or any other relative may one day have the wish to know or ask about our
Holy Law, having no other way out but to talk with us; others, by seeing China truly dimension in the world context, may perhaps have a more
modest attitude and decide to contact foreign kingdoms.
The other location for such an attempt was Japan, where the 1602 edition of Matteo's map was revealed. Taking
as its starting point both Matteo Ricci's actions in China, the display of the 1602 edition of his map in Japan and
the return of the famous embassy of four young Japanese sent on a journey to Europe as ambassadors of Kyushu
daimyô (provinces of Bungo, Arima and Omura),18 the reproduction and use of European cartography in the
'reign of the rising sun' soon led to the development of new and unprecedented methods of evangelisation.
By the last decade of the sixteenth century, in 1590 – that is, at the same time that Alessandro Valignano's
famous embassy returned to Japan with printed maps and atlases – another cartographer reached the archipelago:
Inácio Moreira. Born c.1538–9, Moreira was a Portuguese mapmaker who stayed in Japan between 1590 and
1592 working with the Jesuits, although he was not a member of the Society.19 He arrived in Japan on 21 July
1590 as a member of the important Jesuit delegation and, together with Valignano, he reached Kyoto on February
1591, was received by Toyotomi Hideyoshi eight days later and then returned to Nagasaki. The map of Japan that
he produced on this visit became a most important source of information, for, prior to that point, there were only
the Gyôgyi-type maps that had reached Europe in the last decades of the sixteenth century, namely through the
above-mentioned embassy of 1582–90. The most important map of Japan prior to Moreira's arrival was made by
a Jesuit, Father Luís Teixeira. The map was finished c.1592 and sent to Abraham Ortelius, who printed it with the
title Iaponiae Insulae Descriptio in the 1595 fifth addenda of Theatrum Orbis Terrarum.20
The cultural and scientific dialogue that these cartographic productions were part of gave rise to impressive
artistic creations within Japan. The so-called namban byôbu 'cartographic folding screens' first appeared in the
last years of the sixteenth century. Soon, a significant number of such visual devises appeared, taking as their
main feature the depiction of a global vision of the world on one panel of the screen, and of Japan in the other.
Working as a pair, these works were meant to operate beyond a merely decorative role. If we take as an example
Japan's depiction in the Jôtoku-ji screen, attributed to Kanô Eitoku, one can see that it incorporates some
significant geographic information associated with Toyotomi Hideyoshi's campaigns against Korea in 1592 and
1597, such as the representation of the path followed by the expeditions leaving Kyushu by Tsushima Island
(Figure 5.1). Therefore, while places such as Osaka and Myako are not referred to, Hakata, Nagoya and Nagasaki
are present.21
Adopting European models as prototypes for copying – namely, Abraham Orteliu's Theatrum Orbis Terrarum,
Georg Braun's and Franz Hogenberg's Civitates Orbis Terrarum, Jodocus Hondius' and Willem Blaeu's works, as
well as various other Western engravings of the Flemish and Italian schools – different cartographic screens
appeared, now combining the mapa mundi with images of various people of the world, great cities or battle
scenes (e.g.'World map and Four Great Cities of the West'; 'World Map and the Battle of Lepanto [7 October
1571]'). Such creations could only emerge out of the Jesuits' strategic educational actions and methods in Japan,
deriving particularly from the seminary where they founded the largest mission art school, as well as their
'humanist spirit', which included a willingness and competence in cultural adaptation, in spite of opposing

Figure 5.1 Pair of eight-fold screens with a world-map and four great cities of the Western world (from left to right: Lisbon, Seville, Rome and
Constantinople). Colour and gold leaf on paper. Early seventeenth century. 158.7 × 477.7 cm (each). Kobe City Museum.

critical voices within the Order itself.22 Francis Xavier was the first to clearly perceive the new potentialities of
such methods for the success of Japan's mission. When referring to the competence of the men appointed to be
part of the enterprise, alongside physical robustness, and the necessity that they be learned in order to reply to
the many questions which the Japanese asked, he also indicated that it would be very useful if they were good
artists. They should also know something about the globe, because it was reckoned that the Japanese very much
like to know about the movement of the heavens, the eclipse of the sun, the waxing and waning of the moon, as
well as the origin of rain, snow, hail, thunder, lightning, comets and other natural phenomena. The explanations
of these things would be very useful in winning over the people23 and therefore it would not come amiss if they
were also good sophists so that they could hold their own in debates with the Japanese.
Following Xavier's perceptiveness and, thanks to Valignano's action, Giovanni Niccolò (or Nicolao), a Jesuit of
Italian origin known for his skills in painting, arrived at Nagasaki in 1583 and soon started to teach oil painting
in wood panel and canvas, as well as watercolour, bronze plaques and engraving techniques. Among his pupils
there were Jesuit missionaries, students from the college, boys from the seminary, non-Jesuits and probably non-
Christian Japanese artists.24 As a result of the interest in images implemented by the Jesuits, there was a most
interesting occurrence during the visit made by the Jesuit bishop, Pedro Martins, to the painting workshop at the
Arima seminary or boarding school, in 1596, where, at the front of the building, there was an image painted by
one of the Japanese pupils, depicting the Virgin after St Luke. This is a most precious image for the invocation of
the cult of the Virgin Mary, one of the main devotional concerns of the order. In actuality, this was a copy of the
'Virgin of St Luke' at the church of Santa Maria Maggiore in Rome, by far the most widespread image of the
Society of Jesus. The original picture was known in Europe as Salus Populi Romani, a Byzantine icon dating
from the tenth century, the favourite representation for St Francis Borgia, who used it for preaching and who
obtained permission from Pope Pius V to order a copy of it in 1569. This image in Rome was therefore part of a
matrix and complex system by which copies had been repeatedly made and sent to such places as dispersed as
Portugal and Spain, Macao, China, Japan, Abyssinia, Persia, and the Spanish territories in Central and South
America.25
The painting school held an itinerant course until 1602, the year of its re-settlement in Nagasaki, and it acted as a
'centrifugal' institution, since most of the artists who painted in the Western style in Japan were trained there.
The reason why Japan was the object of such a concentrated effort in the implementation of the Ratio Studiorum
programme and in the development of an artistic practice of copying, was not only because it acted as an
important complement to humanistic studies in the seminary, but also, as stated above, because it related to
pragmatic issues and the realisation of the mission's evangelical purpose and ambition. It was constrained by a
scarcity of resources and suffered the same needs for visual material and liturgical artefacts as India and China.
However, even considering these difficulties, the copying of Western religious images in Japan dated back
almost to the introduction of Christianity itself in the territory, and rapidly emerged, leading to a heavy demand
for such items. The cultural and artistic phenomenon that developed in this context and out of these practices of
copying has no parallel whatsoever with any other field of action of the Jesuit enterprise, since it has to do with
the emergence of a new category of images in the framework of both Japanese and European art. It has already
been pointed out for kirishitan art (see, for example, The Mysteries of the Rosary) that such a group of paintings
demonstrates 'that the artists had learned to unite their individual technique with Christian spirituality', thus
producing 'a new type of religious painting in Japan'.26 This statement is pertinent for understanding the group of
Japanese cartographic folding screens and the works classified under the heading of genre paintings, as part of a
rich and multifaceted practice of cultural accommodation through artistic copying and not as a footnote in the
European historiography of art.27
It is possible to apprehend a religious intention underneath a didactical role in the cartographic folding screens,
particularly those depicting the most famous cities and people in the world. The screen with the world map and
the battle of Lepanto that once belonged to the Okubo family, vassals of a Christian feudal lord engaged in the
Korean campaign, is a vivid example of this point of view.28 The composition, a true combination of various
visual sources, locates the battle on land and not as the naval engagement, which actually took place but would
have been a type of engagement unknown to the Japanese. Banners and flags bear the Roman monograph SNPQR
(Senatus Populusque Romanus) and Philip II, king of Spain and Portugal, is dressed as a Roman emperor.
Screens with images of music players, European couples walking in a landscape, monks reading books, riders,
hunters and knights also enclose a religious message. Sometimes using themes and settings understandable by a
Japanese public, these pictures offer a most interesting interpretation of the cultural dialogue established by the
Jesuits through practices of reproduction (Figures 5.2A and 5.2B). Mitsuro Sakamoto and Grace Vlam have
identified some of the originary European fonts for a few of these compositions, such as printings by Philip
Galle, Adriaen Collaert and Rapahel Sadeler after designs by Maerten van Heemskerck and Marten de Vos. It is
significant to note in considering the creative character of these borrowings and adaptations that the main
iconographic programmes of works such as these were conceived by the Jesuits themselves and not by the
powerful daimyo and rich Japanese merchants, their patrons. It is also important to acknowledge the
equivalences between Western pastoral themes and the seasonal pleasures expressed in Japanese paintings. Far
from a mere decorative and illustrative role, these images present Christian values through an idyllic landscape,
represented as an image of paradise and of hunts as a war between virtues and vice.

Figures 5.2A and 5.2B Pair of six-fold screens depicting Western genre scenes. Colour on paper. Late sixteenth/early seventeenth century. 97 ×
270.5 cm (each). Fukuoka Art Museum.

This leads us to a most interesting field of study related to the spiritual works written by Inace of Loyola, namely
the Spiritual Exercises (1548) and Jerome Nadal's posthumous Evangelicae historiae imagines, where allegorical
idyll and the alliance of the contemplative and active life are not only present but stressed. In the Evangelica
historiae imagines, concepts are put before one's eyes, thus instigating silent conversations.29 In other words,
conversation leading to conversion, wherein art itself can be used and seen as a spiritual exercise. Looked at
from this perspective, the images discussed above can be seen as the pictorial equivalent of Loyola's spatial
composition. The 1588 Directory for the Practice of Exercises states: 'Many are those who think hard in spatial
composition. Let them know that those who are most capable, do so by means of remembering mentally to
themselves the painted stories seen in church altarpieces and other places.'30 Even earlier, between 1560 and
1570, Francis Borja in the preface of his Meditationes para todas las domenicas argues that before beginning any
meditation, one should look for the correspondent image. Their function would be equivalent to the preparation
of some piece of food, so delicious that one could not help but to eat it. This curious 'pantagruelic' vision, as
Jean-Pierre Fabre points out, is full of symbolic meanings and clearly reveals the way pictures were seen and
employed both as preliminary tools and significant devices.
Works of art such as those mentioned here are a remarkable testimony to the ability both of the Jesuit priests and
the Japanese students and artists to create hybrid visual compositions in which the copy of Western models,
mainly from Italian and Dutch originals, served as a means not only to divulge Christianity and Jesuit doctrine,
but also and perhaps most importantly aimed to disclose European science and knowledge. If the use of the copy
as a method to better capture the Christian word and message was first a way of approaching the differences of
Japanese society, soon it went far beyond the merely imitative and developed as a missionary artistic practice
with enormous creative energy in Japan.
The association between the Society of Jesus and the visual arts was so directly and closely related that the
existence of a so-called 'Jesuit style' became the object of an enormous field of debate within the field of art
historiography. However, if today scholars tend to stress the order's capacity of adaptation and not the emergence
of an individual, original style, one can admit and agree with Wittkower's proposal of a Jesuit artistic strategy,31
using the Jesuit's dictum: modo nostro, nostra consuetudine (our manner, our custom).

Notes

1 The Franciscans, for instance, entered in 1593. For a in-depth perspective on the subject, the doctoral thesis of João Paulo Oliveira e Costa is
perhaps the most recent comprehensive work to date. See Costa, O Cristianismo no Japão e o Bispado de D. Luís Cerqueira, p. 685.
2 Very concisely, by Padroado we can understand a collection of privileges given by the church, in this case to the Portuguese Crown, as part of a
dynamic that can be traced back to the beginning of the Portuguese expansion overseas.
3 The total number of converts by the end of the sixteenth century is estimated to be 300,000 persons. See Costa, O Cristianismo no Japão e o
Bispado de D. Luís Cerqueira, p. 96. See also pp. 101–2 and 114 for the discussion of these subjects.
4 Ibid, pp. 468–9.
5 From 1580 to 1640, the main period of the Portuguese and Jesuits presence in Japan, the Portuguese Crown was under Spanish rule.
6 Costa, op.cit., p. 123.
7 Costa, op.cit., pp. 123–5.
8 About Kyoto's Christian temple, see Moura, O Namban-Ji, Templo dos Bárbaros do Sul, de Kyoto (1576) and also Sorge, Il Cristianesimo in
Giappone e il De Missione.
9 For this subject I mainly followed Costa, op.cit., particularly pp. 132–3, 664–81 and López Gay, La Liturgia.
10 Mai means dance, song and, by extension, a scenic play. See Bourdon, Rites et jeux sacrés de la mission japonaise des Jésuites vers 1560–
1565, p. 321 ff.
11 'Dógico', from the Japanese dôjuku, meaning companion. In the sixteenth century it was the expression used by the Buddhist clergy to
designate the young men that worked with the bonzes in the temples. The Jesuits came to appropriate the expression to designate their assistants,
although adapting it to the mission's needs by adding the function of prayer. Costa, op. cit., p. 908.
12 Kanbô were the mission's auxiliaries who lived isolated helping with the maintenance of the churches and of local, mainly rural, communities.
13 Anjirô (Paulo de Santa Fé).
14 Ruiz-de-Medina, Juan, S. J. (ed. and notes), Documentos del Japón 1547–1557 (Vol.1); 1558–1562 (Vol.2), pp. 156–7.
15 D'Elia, S.J., Fonti Ricciane. Edizione Nazionale delle Opere Edite e Inedite di Matteo Ricci S.I., Vol. I, Document number 310, p. 259. The text
states that there were several persons who wanted to see the clocks, the oil paintings and engravings, as well as mathematical instruments, world
maps and other rarities coming from Europe. The books were also the object of curiosity, particularly those on cosmography and architecture since
they included images of the whole world with illustrations referring to the most famous European cities and beyond, buildings, palaces, towers,
theatres, bridges and temples. The musical instruments were most admired since they were never seen by the Chinese.
16 On this subject, see Costa, Portugal e o Japão. O Século Namban and Lopes, António, 'A educação em Portugal de D. João III à expulsão dos
Jesuítas em 1759'.
17 D'Elia, op.cit., Vol. II, Document number 893, p. 474. The text refers to the scepticism of the Chinese regarding European cartography and the
importance of the Emperor's decision in putting the maps in his palace. By doing so, the Jesuits expected that by continually observing these
pictorial devices they would become curious, calling for the priests in order to have answers to their questions.
18 Pinto; Okamoto and Bernard S. J. (eds) La Première Ambassade du Japon en Europe 1582–1592. Première Partie: Le Traité du Père Frois
(texte portugais) and Sande, Diálogo sobre a Missão dos Embaixadores Japoneses à Cúria Romana.
19 Schütte, 'Ignacio Moreira of Lisboa, cartographer in Japan 1590–1592'.
20 Cortazzi, Isles of Gold. Antique Maps of Japan, mainly pp. 22–5. See also Costa, "O Japão e os Japoneses nas obras impressas na Europa
Quinhentista", p. 204. About Inácio Moreira, see Schütte, op.cit. and Marques, A Cartografia Portuguesa do Japão (Séculos XVI–XVII). Catálogo
das Cartas Portuguesas/The Portuguese Cartography of Japan XVI–XVII Centuries). A Catalogue of Portuguese Charts.
21 Cortazzi, op.cit., p. 27. About cartographic folding screens, see also Tadayoshi, 'Screens with Maps of the World'.
22 For instance, the policy taken by Xavier himself and afterwards by Cosme de Torres and Juan Fernandez, when compared with Francisco
Cabral, the Superior of the Jesuit mission during the complex period of transition between the years 70 and 80 of the sixteenth century.
23 Saint Francis Xavier, Epistolae, II, p. 373, English translation quoted by Ebisawa, 'The Meeting of Cultures', p. 126.
24 Bailey, Art on the Jesuit Missions in Asia and Latin America, 1542–1773, p. 72.
25 Bailey, op.cit., p. 70. See also Martins, 'Notícia sobre o autor e a data do quadro da "Virgem de S. Lucas" do Colégio de Jesus de Coimbra', pp.
121–35.
26 Guttierez, 'A Survey on Namban Art', p. 108.
27 For an extensive perspective on this subject, see Okamoto, The Namban Art of Japan. Also, Guttierez, op.cit., pp. 101–32.
28 Vlam, Western-Style Secular Painting in Momoyama Japan, pp. 120–30.
29 A most interesting reflection about this question can be read in Fumaroli, L'École du Silence. Le Sentiment des Images au XVIIe siècle,
particularly pp. 445–76.
30 Quoted by Fabre, 'Les "Exercices spitituels" sont-ils illustrables?', p. 201. See also pp. 202–4.
31 O'Malley et al., The Jesuits. Cultures, Sciences, and the Arts. 1540–1773. See also Michael Kiene, 'Bartolomeo Ammannati et l'architecture des
jésuites au XVIe siécle', pp. 183–96.

Bibliography

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Toronto Press.
Bourdon, Leon (1950) Rites et jeux sacrés de la mission japonaise des Jésuites vers 1560–1565. Separata de Miscelânea de Filologia, Literatura e
História Cultural. À memória de Francisco Adolfo Coelho (1847–1919). Lisbon: Centro de Estudos Filológicos.
Boxer, C. R. (1993) The Christian Century in Japan 1549–1650. S.l.e.: Carcanet Press.
Cortazzi, Hugh (1983) Isles of Gold. Antique Maps of Japan. New York/Tokyo: Weatherhill.
Costa, João Paulo Oliveira e (1993) Portugal e o Japão. O Século Namban. Lisbon: Imprensa Nacional Casa da Moeda.
–––– (1998) O Cristianismo no Japão e o Bispado de D. Luís Cerqueira. Dissertação de doutoramento em História dos Descobrimentos e da
Expansão Portuguesa. 2 Vols. Lisbon.
–––– (1999) 'O Japão e os Japoneses nas obras impressas na Europa Quinhentista'. O Japão e o Cristianismo no Século XVI. Ensaios de História
Luso-Nipónica. Lisbon: Sociedade Histórica da Independência de Portugal.
D'Elia, Pasquale, S.J. (1942–1949) Fonti Ricciane. Edizione Nazionale delle Opere Edite e Inedite di Matteo Ricci S.I., Vol. II. Rome: Libreria dello
Stato.
Ebisawa, Arimichi (1971) 'The Meeting of Cultures'. In Michael Cooper (ed.) The Southern Barbarians. The First Europeans in Japan,. S. J.
Tokyo/California: Kodansha International/Palo Alto.
Fabre, Pierre-Antoine (1996) 'Les "Exercices spitituels" sont-ils illustrables?'. Les Jésuites à l'âge baroque. 1540–1610. Luce Giard and Louis de
Vaucelles (Dir.). Grenoble: Editions Jérôme Millon.
Fumaroli, Marc (1998) L'École du Silence. Le Sentiment des Images au XVIIe siècle. Paris: Flammarion.
Guttierez, Fernando, S. J. (1993) 'A Survey on Namban Art' in Revista de Cultura, No. 17 (II Série). Lisbon: Instituto Cultural de Macau,
October/December.
Kiene, Michael (1996) 'Bartolomeo Ammannati et l'architecture des jésuites au XVIe siécle'. In Luce Giard and Louis de Vaucelles (Dir.) Les
Jésuites à l'âge baroque. 1540–1610. Grenoble: Editions Jérôme Millon, pp. 183–96.
Lopes, António (1993) 'A educação em Portugal de D. João III à expulsão dos Jesuítas em 1759'. In Lusitânia Sacra. Revista de Estudos de
História religiosa, 2 a série, tomo V. Lisboa: Universidade Católica Portuguesa, pp. 13–41.
Lopez Gay, Jess (1970) La Liturgia en la Misión del Japón del siglo XVI. Rome: Universitá Gregoriana, (Col. Studis Missionalia Documenta et
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Marques, Alfredo Pinheiro (1996) A Cartografia Portuguesa do Japão (Séculos XVI-XVII). Catálogo das Cartas Portuguesas/The Portuguese
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Martins, Fausto (1993) 'Notícia sobre o autor e a data do quadro da "Virgem de S. Lucas" do Colégio de Jesus de Coimbra'. Lusitânia Sacra.
Revista de Estudos de História religiosa, 2 a série, tomo V. Lisboa: Universidade Católica Portuguesa, pp. 121–35.
Moura, Carlos Francisco (1976) O Namban-Ji, Templo dos Bárbaros do Sul, de Kyoto (1576). Separata dos n.° 1 e 2 do Vol. X do Boletim do
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 6
Back to the fundamentals

'Reproducing' Rikyû and Chôjirô in Japanese tea culture

Morgan Pitelka

Introduction

Acquiring objects has been one of the core obsessions of practitioners of the ritualized, performative form of
Japanese tea culture known as chanoyu ("hot water for tea") since the sixteenth century. "Tea utensils" include
imported works, utilitarian pieces appropriated into the context of the tea room, commissioned objects, and
heirloom pieces passed down within families and lineages. Tea utensils play diverse and overlapping functions in
tea culture, ranging from the practical (a container for fresh water) to the economic (an investment that will
appreciate over time). Above all, these objects facilitate the construction of symbolic relationships between
temporally, geographically, and culturally distant subjects. Early modern tea practitioners commissioned
ceramics in imitation of the historical styles of pottery from China. Likewise, they collected utensils associated
with famous tea men to reproduce the taste (suki) and symbolic power of bygone cultural luminaries. In many
instances, tea practitioners even commissioned or made reproductions of famous objects (meibutsu) to invoke
the aura and authority of previous ages. Authenticity lay not in the Enlightenment notion of "originality," but in
access to the civilized past.
This chapter will explore the history of reproduction in tea culture, and illustrate how such cultural production
has been key to the perpetuation of the tradition over more than five hundred years. I will briefly consider non-
material modes of reproduction such as gestural reproduction and performative reproduction. My main focus,
however, will be material reproduction such as the creation of ceramic reproductions (utsushi).1 The function of
originals and reproductions is intimately tied to notions of value and authority within the field of tea practice, as
well as in the larger sphere of early modern and modern cultural politics.
Much of our understanding of Japanese tea culture comes from exhibitions of the various arts and crafts used
during ceremonial tea gatherings. These tea utensils are generally thought of as singular, unique objects that
nonetheless serve utilitarian functions. Tea utensils are impressive in part because they seem to possess their
own social histories, complex stories that emerge in layers of material and symbolic meaning. They often bear
poetic names, are wrapped in imported textiles, and are stored in wooden boxes with calligraphic inscriptions.
These art works and their individualized packaging represent the antithesis of modern, mass-produced objects.
The particularity of tea utensils also allows for objective classification by connoisseurs and dealers; "good" tea
utensils are authentic originals; "bad" tea utensils are derivative imitations or amateurish copies.
Close examination of box inscriptions and early modern documents, however, reveals that reproductions were
common in early modern Japanese tea culture, and continue to play an important role in the contemporary tea
world.2 Reproduction helps us to understand the operation of tradition itself. Far from being a reductive,
derivative act, reproduction serves to sustain and support tea practice; it is neither a purely creative nor
conservative process, but one that enriches, extends, diversifies, and preserves tea culture in varying degrees
depending on context, period, and practitioner. By focusing on "modes of reproduction," and particularly the
interplay of "forces of reproduction" and "relations of reproduction" (all playfully appropriated from Marx), this
chapter will situate reproduction in tea culture at the intersection of discursive, material, and social change.

Back to the fundamentals: reproducing Rikyû and Chôjirô in tea

Reproduction as a form of cultural practice requires a real or imagined original to serve as a muse or template. In
tea culture the primary fount of authenticity is not a craftsman but a tea practitioner who ostensibly "perfected" a
stream of subdued aesthetics that had been percolating in Buddhist, warrior, and aristocratic practices for
centuries. Sen no Rikyû (1522–91) was a merchant from the port city of Sakai who became an influential teacher
and professional tea master. He was only one of a number of active merchant tea masters based in Sakai during
this period, but his position under the hegemonic warlord Toyotomi Hideyoshi (1536–98) allowed him to
influence the direction in which tea culture developed in the late sixteenth century. Rikyû acquired a reputation
as a man of principles who would not sacrifice his aesthetic ideals to please his powerful employer. When Rikyû
asserted his love of simple, subdued tea rooms and utensils, he implicitly challenged the more ostentatious taste
of Hideyoshi. The struggle between Hideyoshi and Rikyû, which seems to have resulted in Rikyû's suicide and
the confiscation of the Sen house holdings in 1591, later became one of the most famous performances enacted
on the cultural stage of tea.3 Hideyoshi had attempted to use his political and associated economic resources to
demonstrate his superiority in all arenas; his portable golden tea room and large collection of famous tea objects
are well-known examples. Rikyû's embrace of rusticity (wabi) in his tea practice challenged the notion that
economic means was equivalent to aesthetic discernment.
Rikyû's aura of authenticity became so powerful in the late seventeenth century that the merest hint of
association with this martyred founder of the Sen schools served as a powerful legitimating tool.4 For the various
artistic workshops patronized by tea practitioners, finding or forging a connection to Rikyû was vital in the
increasingly competitive marketplaces of cities such as Kyoto, Osaka, and Edo. According to the seventeenth-
century histories of the Raku potters, for example, the founder of the tradition, Chôjirô, was a ceramic tile maker
working on the construction of Hideyoshi's grand Jurakudai palace. He was supposedly discovered by Rikyû and
enlisted to make rustic, undecorated tea bowls.5 The tea bowl occupies one of the key roles in the tea gathering
because it contains the prepared tea itself, and because it is handed from host to guest, thereby bridging the gap
between the resident of the "tea hut" and the visitor. Rikyû reputedly wanted a new style of bowl completely
lacking in decoration or design, an aesthetic that would be perfect for his rustic tea gatherings. He supposedly
suggested a design to Chôjirô, and the matte black and red tea bowls that resulted became the heart of the Raku
tradition. Legend claims that Chôjirô later received a gold seal from Hideyoshi that read "first in the realm"
(tenka ichi), a badge of honor and a recognition of quality. No extant evidence affirms this tale, but the notion of
Chôjirô as not only the first but the best anchors his identity in all modern discourse on tea and Japanese
ceramics.
Rikyû and in all likelihood Chôjirô were, of course, actual historical figures who contributed enormously to the
field of tea culture in the late sixteenth century. What is important to note here, however, is the fundamental gap
that exists between these men as historical subjects and the utensils that posthumously became identified with
them. This gap, which I have explored in detail elsewhere,6 is vital in understanding the process of the
production, maintenance, and reproduction of the tea tradition. It is less important, however, in the study of
reproduction in tea culture, because authenticity of form was less important to early modern tea practitioners
than sincerity of the "heart" or "spirit." As we shall see below, tea practitioners and potters who commissioned or
made reproductions of works associated with Rikyû and Chôjirô were primarily interested in capturing the
"taste" (suki) or sense of aesthetics of Rikyû, and by extension in paying homage to real or imagined ancestors
through the process of the production, exchange, and consumption of tea utensils.

Modes of reproduction in tea

Non-material modes of reproduction are vital to the transmission of tea culture and the maintenance of the
underlying power dynamic of tea practice, which privileges certain teachers as masters while relegating most
practitioners to the position of disciple. Beginning in the early eighteenth century, the tea schools that directly
traced their lineage back to Sen no Rikyû – Omotesenke, Urasenke, Mushanokôji Senke, and Edo Senke –
codified tea instruction into a series of easily consumable lessons known as the Seven Exercises (shichi jishiki).7
Within these exercises, movements of the body were broken down into forms and patterns (kata) that formed the
basic building blocks of the transmission of tea practice. Students learned these gestural reproductions through
rote repetition following attentive observation, presumably without the benefit of verbal or written explanation.
The use of forms and patterns (or "precise exercise forms," in the words of John Singleton) can be found in a
wide range of cultural practices from early modern and modern Japan.8 One historian of the Japanese martial
arts describes forms as "sequentially structured experience" and "ritualized duplication of the experience of past
masters."9 A historian of kabuki explains that on the one hand, forms were a means of preserving the movements
and gestures that made up the body of the tradition. On the other, actors could create professional identities for
themselves by creating new forms.10 Still, Catherine Bell's caution comes to mind: "[I]f we take seriously the
idea that even exact repetition of an age-old ritual precedent is a strategic act with which to define the present,
then no ritual style is autonomous."11 Reproducing the movements of past masters was a dialectical practice,
simultaneously conservative and innovative, a repositioning of precedent in a new context. Although gestural
reproductions are ritualized and non-discursive acts, they are not "just learning." Rather, practitioners engage in
gestural reproduction in the same landscape of social status, economic competition, and political necessity as
any attempt to gain social recognition, cultural legitimacy, or financial profit. As Bernard Faure reminds us in
his analysis of Zen, "We tend to overlook the fact that ritual also participates in hegemonic manipulations, or at
least may become the object of ideological reappropriation."12

Performative reproduction

Performative reproduction is likewise central to the perpetuation of the mythohistory of the tea tradition,
particularly the hegemony of the Sen lineage within the larger national (and today international) matrix of tea
practitioners. This mode of reproduction includes ritualized commemorations of ancestors' death anniversaries
and attempts to reassemble the particular utensils used for famous tea gatherings, both of which result in the
creation of a convenient historical consciousness in the tea community. For example, the Sen tea schools held
commemorative ceremonies for Rikyû regularly after his death. The third year, twentieth year, fiftieth year, one
hundredth year, one hundred and fiftieth year, two hundredth year, three hundredth year, and three hundred and
fiftieth year services are all documented, and many of these events included lavish tea gatherings at which
objects ostensibly associated with the founder were brought together and used by his descendants.13 Members of
the Sen tea schools continue to mark annual and centennial anniversaries with tea events. Like the tablets and
commemorative portraits used in China, Korea, and Japan to invoke the spirit of an ancestor during death-day
rituals, the objects brought together for these events served to link the present-day needs and aspirations of the
Sen lineage with the aura and influence of their most famous forebear.14

Material reproduction

Material reproduction takes a variety of forms, and these will be the focus of the remainder of this chapter. First
is the category related to commemorative ancestral portraits, namely reproductions of objects made, owned, or
commissioned by an ancestor. The documentary record indicates that such reproductions played an important
role in the pyramid-shaped tea schools of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. For example, in a letter from
Bunshuku (1658–1708), the second head of the Mushanokôji Senke tea school, to Sônyû (1664–1716), the fifth
head of the Raku workshop, the tea master requests two "Tôyôbô" tea bowls, two "Kimamori" tea bowls, and one
"Kengyô" tea bowl.15 These are the names of three of the most famous tea bowls attributed to Chôjirô; Bunshuku
may have wanted reproductions made for an anniversary or to distribute among his disciples. It appears that
production of Chôjirô reproductions became an increasingly common practice in the Raku workshop after the
seventeenth century. One of the most prolific makers of material reproductions was the eleventh generation head
of the Raku house, Keinyû (1817–1902), who lived through the most tumultuous period in the history of tea
culture in Japan. Born into a family of sake brewers in Tamba province, he was adopted into the Raku family
around 1831 and became head of the workshop in 1845.16 Keinyû's ceramics include many examples of
commemorative reproductions of Chôjirô's work, including a complete series of the so-called "seven bowls of
Chôjirô" (Chôjirô shichishu).17 We can interpret the abundance of explicit Chôjirô reproductions among
Keinyû's work as an attempt to provide a firm historical anchor for the Raku tradition, which was struggling with
the loss of warrior patronage of the tea schools and the crumbling of the social and cultural networks that had
provided steady business for centuries.
Although commissioning commemorative reproductions was quite common in the early modern tea world, this
is rarely apparent only from examination of the objects themselves. Instead, we need to turn to the wooden boxes
that contextualize and historicize the objects they contain. Boxes, which of course protect utensils when they are
not in use in a tea gathering, also serve as the canvas for textual inscriptions that record the description and
ostensible provenance of the utensil. A bamboo flower container in the Mitsui collection, for example, is
identified in its box inscription as follows: "Rikyû double-cut reproduction with gold-lacquered wave and
paulownia interior" (Rikyû nijû giri utsushi, uchi gawa namikiri makie).18 This nineteenth-century utensil is thus
described as a reproduction of a much older flower container "in the taste" of Rikyû. The physical differences
between the two pieces, not to mention the intertextual tapestry woven by their box inscriptions, begin to point to
the powerful function of reproduction as a form of cultural production in tea.
The original vase is 66.3 cm tall and 9.3 cm in diameter; the reproduction is 65.8 cm tall and 8.3 cm in diameter.
The original consists of a length of bamboo into which two large windows have been cut. The exposed surface is
decorated with gold, black, and red lacquer in an abstract design of interlocking waves and paulownia crests; the
hidden interior of the container is covered with glossy black lacquer. The reproduction imitates the shape of the
original exactly, mimicking the placement of the joints and windows with great precision. However, the exterior
of the nineteenth-century flower container is unadorned, exposing the grainy yellow of the bamboo wood itself.
The interior exposed by the two windows is decorated with gold, black, and red lacquer in an identical design of
waves and paulownia crests, and the hidden interior is covered with black lacquer. The back of the reproduction
is marked in red lacquer with the following script: "Rikyu reproduction. Rokurokusai (cipher)."
This inscription reminds us that precise authenticity of form and decoration was not the issue in such
reproductions. The maker of the nineteenth-century work, Nakamura Sôtetsu, in fact highlighted rather than
obfuscated the status of his piece as a reproduction of a famous object associated with Rikyû. Nakamura
eschewed the exterior decoration of the original, but imitated it exactly on the interior of the container. Such
playful but respectful innovation is often found in material reproduction in tea, in which the value of the original
piece is thought to lie in its "spirit" rather than in its precise physical characteristics. In this case, the exposure of
the natural color of the bamboo seems to be a reference to Rikyû's preference for simple, muted objects.
Furthermore, according to the box inscription, this work is one of a series of ten flower containers that Nakamura
produced for the tenth head of the Omotesenke tea school, Rokurokusai (1837–1910), perhaps associated with
the 300th commemorative anniversary of Rikyû's death in 1890. The object can thus be understood as a material
marker of Rikyû's aesthetic "genius" and iconic status in tea history. Ritually, it would have functioned to invoke
Rikyû's memory in commemorative tea gatherings and mortuary ceremonies; symbolically, it also highlights the
cultural capital of its owner's lineal connection to the field's apotheosized founder.
We can also understand many instances of material reproduction as acts of "situated learning" that link together
individuals in a "community of practice."19 According to this theory, engaging in the reproduction of tea utensils
served as a form of experiential learning that was anchored in a sense of shared cultural practice. Craftspeople
who made reproductions honed their skills through repetitious exercises of self-discipline, but did so in the
social context of the tea world, where the value of tea utensils is determined collectively. Making reproductions
was only a valid means of improving one's skills, focus, and depth of understanding because a community of tea
practitioners agreed that the original that was being reproduced had merit.20
The work of the seventeenth-century sword-polisher, calligrapher, and occasional Raku potter Hon'ami Kôetsu
(1558–1637), for example, was frequently reproduced by early modern potters seeking to hone their technical
skills. Kôetsu was a well-connected and influential figure in his own day, but he became even more celebrated
posthumously, appreciated in the eighteenth century as a quirky and innovative artist, and in the late nineteenth
century as a "genius" in the Western mold. His awkward, amateurish, yet somehow inspired tea bowls, made in
collaboration with the Raku workshop, became sources of great fascination within the tea world, and inspired
many respectful imitations. In particular, a famous red Raku tea bowl attributed to Kôetsu named "Kaga Kôetsu"
became the object of interest for many professional and amateur tea potters. This piece is today designated an
"Important Cultural Property" by the Japanese government, and is in the collection of the Manno Museum in
Osaka. It has a half-cylinder shape with an uneven lip and a flat, carved base. The exterior walls appear to have
been scraped flat with some kind of tool, which left behind vertical hatch marks around the rim. A small disk of
black glaze or lacquer can be seen inside the foot ring. The color of the bowl, which ranges from white to yellow-
orange, is the product of applying a pale red slip to a white clay, both of which were then covered by a
translucent glaze. The bowl is not particularly distinctive in its overall shape, but in the accumulation of small
details it has acquired a larger-than-life identity in the world of tea bowl personalities.
Ôhi Chôzaemon (1630–1712), the founder of the Ôhi kiln (located in what was then the Kaga domain), made
perhaps the first reproduction of this piece in the late seventeenth century. Although he had worked in the Raku
workshop in Kyoto, he was too young to have met Kôetsu in person. Instead, he probably came into contact with
the tea bowl "Kaga Kôetsu" when it was owned by the founder of the Urasenke tea school, Sen Sensô Sôshitsu
(1622–97). Sôshitsu was Chôzaemon's patron, and may even have commissioned this earliest of reproductions.21
The bowl is consistent with the examples of reproduction cited above, being an attempt to capture the spirit of
the original rather than the exact form. Chôzaemon's bowl diverges considerably from the original in its
decoration; rather than using clear glaze to cover a white claybody washed with yellow slip, Chôzaemon's piece
uses the traditional amber glaze of the Ôhi kiln to produce a shiny, translucent brown bowl that imitates the
original only in the general shape and in the presence of vertical hatch marks.
Potters from the Kyoto Raku workshop also made reproductions of Kaga Kôetsu. The eighth generation Raku
potter, Tokunyû (1745–74), for example, copied the piece during the brief period of activity before his untimely
death.22 His younger brother (Ryônyû, 1756–1834) became head of the household in 1770, at the age of fourteen,
and over the course of his long career became one of the most technically proficient potters in the Raku tradition.
Constantly experimenting, Ryônyû delighted in making reproductions as a means of developing new skills with
the clay. He is known to have produced at least three versions of "Kaga Kôetsu."23
Amateur tea potters also produced numerous reproductions of Kôetsu's red bowl. One collection of Japanese
ceramics that is particularly rich in such objects is held at the Freer Gallery of Art at the Smithsonian Institution,
amassed by the Detroit-based industrialist Charles Lang Freer (1854–1919). Freer acquired his Japanese
ceramics in a period spanning four decades, both during his own travels to Japan in 1895, 1907, 1909, and 1910,
and through the offices of dealers in Japan, Boston, New York, and Paris.24 The large number of works that
dealers attributed to Kôetsu at the turn of the century indicates both the rise of interest in his art during the Meiji
period and the recognition that the name of this seemingly individualist artist would enhance the value of even
the humblest Raku ceramics. Four tea bowls in the Freer collection – all originally attributed to Kôetsu himself –
appear to be amateur reproductions of "Kaga Kôetsu." Each piece reproduces the half-cylindrical, boxy shape;
the hatch marks on one side of the exterior wall; and the yellow, red, and white coloration of the original. One
piece even carefully reproduces the black disk of color found inside the foot ring of "Kaga Kôetsu." Only
recently, with a small exhibit mounted at the Freer in 1998, have these key examples of ceramic reproduction in
tea culture been recognized as valuable objects worthy of display in the museum context.

Proto-mass production

Less well known but just as crucial to the institutionalization and dissemination of tea culture in early modern
Japan is proto-mass production of tea utensils. A document attributed to Raku Sanyû, Catalogue of Raku Vessels
[Raku utsuwa mokuroku], provides evidence that making reproductions allowed Raku potters to produce large
quantities of ceramics that were standardized in design and decoration but infused with idiosyncratic character.25
The catalogue lists the names of famous Raku tea bowls such as Chôjirô's "Ôguro," "Hayabune," "Kenkô," and
"Kimamori" among others, as well as incense containers, lid rests, and flower containers. The document is not
simply a listing of famous objects made in the past, but rather an inventory of the types of ceramics that could be
ordered from the Raku workshop. We can imagine that in the mid-seventeenth century, a Kyoto tea practitioner
might have visited the workshop, browsed the catalogue, and decided to purchase a reproduction of the Chôjirô
tea bowl "Kimamori." Depending on the workload of the workshop, he would receive his "new" tea bowl in a
matter of days, weeks, or months. In all likelihood the tea bowl would have varied somewhat from the original,
which after all was not even on hand for the Raku potter to examine. In basic shape and glazing, however,
"Kimamori" and the other named objects came to represent paradigms of Raku ceramics. This system is similar
to the Chinese culture of "modular production," which Lothar Ledderose argues allows "standardization of units
that stops short of perfect duplication."26 Raku ceramic production does not begin to approach the scope of
manufacture seen at porcelain kilns in China or Japan, but it does represent an early articulation of the notion
that some consistency in design was desirable even to consumers who ostensibly valued asymmetry and
naturalness as foundational aesthetic principles.

Conclusion

I have attempted in this chapter to sketch a picture of the different practices of reproduction in Japanese tea
culture, which I have designated "modes of reproduction." It is not my intention, by deploying terminology
associated with historical materialism, to imply that the modes of reproduction described above can be
teleologically organized into stages of development. Rather, adapting Marxist rhetoric to the analysis of cultural
practices such as tea and ceramics opens up the space for us to pay attention to discourse while also focusing on
material and social conditions.
Let us briefly consider, for example, the forces and relations of reproduction (again, following the core Marxist
notion of "forces and relations of production"). "Forces of reproduction" refers to the productive capacity of
makers of reproductions. In the case of Raku, this includes clay, glaze, a very small assortment of specialized
tools, and a small, indoor, charcoalfired kiln. Raku potters did not use a potter's wheel and did not require a
large, multi-chamber kiln (as was the case with most early modern ceramic traditions). Likewise, although
making Raku ceramics certainly required practice and patience, it did not involve the kind of dexterity seen in
painting, calligraphy, or making porcelain. It was therefore not particularly difficult (in the materialist sense of
"forces") to produce material reproductions of Raku ceramics.
"Relations of reproduction" refers to the connection between the producers and consumers of reproductions. In
the Raku tradition, this (in most cases) indicates the relationship between the Raku potters and their primary
patrons, the Sen tea masters and their disciples. The Sen were the dominant group because they were directly
employed by elite warrior leaders in the Tokugawa period. The Raku potters, though they acquired increased
status in the eighteenth century when they become disciples of the Omotesenke school, were subordinate in
terms of both economic means and social standing. The Sen therefore had the power to authorize or forbid
material reproduction. The abundance of Raku reproductions in Japanese tea culture is largely a result of the fact
that they served the social, historicist, and aesthetic needs of the Sen house; without Sen patronage, such objects
would not have been profitable (or permissible) for the Raku potters to produce.
The modes of reproduction described above are thus characterized by distinct forces and relations of
reproduction. Transformations in either forces or relations resulted in concomitant changes in the larger mode of
reproduction. Two of the most significant examples of such transformation occurred in the late eighteenth
century, when the tradition itself became the object of reproduction, and the nineteenth century, when the
Tokugawa government (and its system of patronage) was overthrown.
In 1736, a woodblock printed book known as Collected Raku Ceramic Secrets [Rakuyaki hinô] was published in
Osaka. The text is divided into several sections. First is a prologue that explains that the person listed as the
author (sakusha) in the colophon, Nakata Senryûshi, in fact compiled (henzuru) the book, a process that is
described as "fishing for the secrets of the way of pottery" (tôdô no hiyô o tsuri). A detailed table of contents
lists thirty-eight subheadings, including "Constructing and firing the kiln," "Making red Raku," "Making the
clay," and "Making black Raku glaze."27 The main text is speckled with drawings of tools and kiln components.
This is followed, in a second volume, by a discussion of tea bowl shapes supplemented by several diagrams. The
next section is a genealogy of Raku potters written in classical Chinese, that begins with Chôjirô and ends with
the sixth Raku potter, Chônyû (1714–70).28
This text was extremely popular in eighteenth-century Japan, in both the woodblock printed version and in
manuscript versions. As a result of its publication and widespread dissemination, Raku ceramic production
spread across the archipelago by the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries: some tea practitioners began
making Raku ceramics at home as a hobby; several proprietors of tea-related businesses added a Raku ceramic
component to their operations; and some ceramic workshops shifted their production in part or full to making
ceramics as described in Collected Raku Secrets.29 The publication of this book represents a series of acts of
reproduction that resulted in an expansion in the practice of Raku ceramics. First, the author Nakata Senryûshi
appropriated the techniques of the Raku workshop and explained them in clear and concise technical language,
aided by furigana that provided the reading of difficult Chinese characters. (It is not known how Nakata obtained
access to the apparently accurate information about producing Raku ceramics.) Authorship of Collected Raku
Ceramic Secrets effectively reproduced the experiential knowledge of making Raku ceramics in textual form.
The text was then carved into woodblocks and printed in book form, allowing exact replication on a massive
scale. Potters and tea practitioners then purchased the book if they were able, or borrowed a volume and copied it
(along with notes, errors, omissions, and other forms of purposeful and accidental editing) in their own hand.
Lastly, potters put the information in the text into practice by mixing new recipes of clay and glaze, repeating the
techniques of making and decorating ceramics, and mimicking the firing processes described in the manual to
produce their own reproductions of the ceramics of the Kyoto Raku kiln.
In terms of the forces and relations of reproduction, the publication of Collected Raku Ceramic Secrets
represents a massive upheaval in the established mode of Raku reproduction. The author and publisher appear to
have embarked on this successful venture without the approval or knowledge of the Raku potters or their Sen
patrons, effectively removing the practice of producing and reproducing Raku ceramics from their control. The
resulting spread of Raku practice amounts to an early form of massification, as the productive capacity of Raku
ceramics suddenly became available to a broad population of tea practitioners outside of Kyoto, Osaka, and Edo.
Another major upheaval occurred in the second half of the nineteenth century, when the chain of patronage that
sustained Raku ceramic production collapsed within a period of less than a decade. The Sen tea masters were
dependent on warrior patronage for their status and substantial portions of their incomes, so the dissolution of
the Tokugawa government in 1868 and the dismantling of the status system between 1869 and 1876 effectively
cut the Sen, and by extension the Kyoto Raku potters, from their base of support. As I have described in detail
elsewhere, the Sen responded by refiguring the tradition to suit the new transformations in Japanese society. New
patrons were found in the rising industrialist class, and more importantly, in women who were instructed by the
Meiji government to be "good wives and good mothers" in part by learning the newly domesticated "traditional
arts" of flower arranging and tea. The Raku potters, likewise, resuscitated their fortunes only when interest in the
individualist "geniuses" of Japan's cultural history such as Rikyû, Chôjirô, and Kôetsu became the objects of art
historical and connoisseurial attention in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.
In these modern formulations of cultural value, however, the reproduction – or perhaps here "copy" would be a
more appropriate term – was not recognized as a valid form of cultural production. Reproducing the works of the
past became anathema, and imitation – once the central skill of the artist – was cast aside as "a childish,
senseless enterprise."30 The work of the genius was said to occur in the vacuum of originality rather than the
field of rote-learned forms and inherited styles. For early twentieth-century Japanese intellectuals, this
epistemological framework necessitated rethinking the history of their nation's cultural production to highlight
the triumph of innovative individuals rather than the dominance of conservative schools. This task was urgent
because Japan was already under suspicion as a notorious "borrower" of technology and culture from other
societies. One British diplomat commented in 1900 that "It must be remembered that Japan has never originated
anything."31 Proving otherwise became the goal of many historians, artists, critics, and government officials.32
As Japan's fortunes improved as a colonial and capitalist Great Power, Japanese intellectuals moved from
proving that Japan was on a par with the West to demonstrating that the former was a superior civilization.
"Traditional" arts such as tea found a new identity in the nationalist climate of the interwar years as living proof
of Japan's cultural uniqueness, with the modes of reproduction discussed above excised from public discourse.

Notes

1 I have chosen to avoid the term "reiteration" in my analysis of tea culture because I want to avoid the narrow deconstructivist emphasis on the
instability of purely linguistic meanings. Likewise, I avoid the expression "repetition" here because I am not in this context interested in the
psychoanalytic interpretation of copying as a symptom of trauma. Instead, I employ the phrase "reproduction" because it suggests the larger issue
of the transmission of objects, discourse, and power (in other words, culture) within a society, as explored in the writings of Walter Benjamin, Pierre
Bourdieu, and Chris Jenks.
2 Similarly, several recent studies highlight the importance of reproduction in various early modern cultural practices, particularly painting. See, for
example, Brenda G. Jordan and Victoria Weston (eds) Copying the Master and Stealing His Secrets: Talent and Training in Japanese Painting
(University of Hawai'i Press, 2003); and Elizabeth Lillehoj (ed.) Critical Perspectives on Classicism in Japanese Painting, 1600–1700 (University
of Hawai'i Press, 2004).
3 The story that Hideyoshi ordered Rikyû to commit suicide may be apocryphal. In fact, no documentary evidence exists of such an order.
4 For more on this subject, see Chapter 3 of Morgan Pitelka, Handmade Culture: Raku Potters, Patrons, and Tea Practitioners in Japan (University
of Hawai'i Press, 2005).
5 Most studies of Chôjirô emphasize the importance of this alleged patronage relationship with Rikyû. See Hayashiya Seizô, "Chôjirô gaisetsu,"
Chôjirô, Kôetsu, Vol. 1, Nihon no yakimono (Chûôkôronsha, 1988), 81–6; Akanuma Taka, "Raku," Hayashiya Seizô, ed., Chawan: ichi Raku ni
Hagi san Karatsu (Tankôsha, 1983), 114–26; and Isono Nobutake, Chôjirô, Vol. 17, Tôji taikei (Heibonsha, 1972), 77–97; and Horiguchi Sutemi,
Rikyû no cha (Kagoshima Kenkyûjo shuppankai, 1948, reprinted 1978), particularly the section "Rikyû no chawan," 661–779.
6 Pitelka, Handmade Culture.
7 Hamamoto Sôshun, "Shichiji shiki," Kadokawa chadô daijiten, 604. Paul Varley reports that the Seven Exercises may have been related to the
"seven things" of Zen: great capacity and great function, swiftness of intellect, wondrous spirituality of speech, the active edge to kill or give life,
wide learning and broad experience, clarity of mirroring awareness, and freedom to appear and disappear. See Varley, "Chanoyu: from the
Genroku Epoch to Modern Times," in Paul Varley and Kumakura Isao, eds. Tea in Japan: Essays on the History of Chanoyu (University of Hawai'i
Press, 1989),181 and footnote 61. Three of the Seven Exercises in fact predated the eighteenth century, but had not previously received special
attention as methods of preparing or serving tea. Nishiyama Matsunosuke, Iemoto no kenkyû (Azekura Shobô, 1959. Reprinted, Vol. 1, Nishiyama
Matsunosuke chosakushû. Yoshikawa Kôbunka, 1982), 368.
8 See John Singleton (ed.) Learning in Likely Places: Varieties of Apprenticeship in Japan (Cambridge University Press, 1998) for a rich
examination of experiential learning in Japan.
9 Karl Friday, Legacies of the Sword (University of Hawaii Press, 1997), p. 105.
10 James R. Brandon, "Form in Kabuki Acting," James R. Brandon et al., Studies in Kabuki: Its Acting, Music, and Historical Context (The
University Press of Hawaii, 1978), pp. 63–132.
11 Catherine Bell, Ritual Theory, Ritual Practice (Oxford University Press, 1992), p. 101.
12 Bernard Faure, The Rhetoric of Immediacy: A Cultural Critique of Chan/Zen Buddhism (Princeton University Press, 1991), p. 286.
13 Kumakura Isao and Tsutsui Hiro'ichi, "Rikyû no nenki," Rikyû daijiten (Tankôsha, 1989), pp. 671–703.
14 Sherman E. Lee, "Varieties of Portraiture in Chinese and Japanese Art," Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art 64 (1977): 118–36; Jan Stuart,
"Calling Back the Ancestor's Shadow: Chinese Ritual and Commemorative Portraits," Oriental Art Vol. 42, No. 3 (Autumn 1997): 8–17; and Jan
Stuart and Evelyn Rawski, Worshipping the Ancestors: Chinese Commemorative Portraits (Freer Gallery of Art and the Arthur M. Sackler Gallery
of Art, 2001).
15 Sen Sôya and Kizu Sôzen, "Mushanokôji Senke," Shiryôhen, Vol. 6 of Sadô no genryû, 86.
16 Hayashiya Seizô, Raku daidai, Tamamizuyaki, Ôhiyaki (Chûôkôronsha, 1974), p. 165.
17 Hayashiya, p. 168.
18 Mitsui Bunko, Mitsui Bunko denrai Omotesenke no chadôgu (Gakushû Kenkyûsha, 1994), pp. 59, 234.
19 Jean Lave and Etienne Wenger, Situated Learning: Legitimate Peripheral Participation (Cambridge University Press, 1991).
20 The iemoto system was a vital component of creating shared notions of value in early modern tea culture. See Robert J. Smith's classic analysis,
"Transmitting Tradition by the Rules: An Anthropological Interpretation of the Iemoto System." In Singleton, Learning in Likely Places, pp. 23–34.
Also, see my explication of the iemoto system in Chapter 4 of Pitelka, Handmade Culture.
21 In the collection of the Ishikawa Prefectural Museum of Art.
22 Hayashiya, p. 97.
23 Mitsui Bunko, p. 146.
24 Thomas Lawton and Linda Merrill, Freer: A Legacy of Art (Freer Gallery, 1993).
25 Raku utsuwa mokuroku (listed under the title Chaki teihonki in the Kokusho sô mokuroku) in the collection of Tokyo Geijutsu Daigaku.
26 Lothar Ledderose, Ten Thousand Things: Module and Mass Production in Chinese Art (Princeton University Press, 2000), p. 6.
27 For a complete transcription of the table of contents, see Pitelka, pp. 23–4.
28 Certain parts of the genealogy are factually dubious, such as the claim that Chôjirô, a Korean, was guided on the path of clay by Rikyû, yet died
in 1625, more than thirty-three years after Rikyû. Other details are accurate, however, such as the notes that Sônyû and Sanyû were both adopted.
29 See my description in Pitelka, Handmade Culture. I also provide a chart of some of the Raku kilns of the early modern period in Appendix IV
of Morgan Pitelka, "Raku Ceramics: Tradition and Cultural Reproduction in Japanese Tea Practice, 1574–1942" (Ph.D. dissertation, Princeton
University, 2001).
30 Konrad Fielder, On Judging Works of Visual Art (1876; University of California Press, 1957), pp. 42–3. See also the 1857 comments of William
Burger (Theophilé Thoré):
Why did Michelangelo and Raphael not despair, coming as they did after Phidias and Apelles? And how did they raise themselves as high in
poetry as the inimitable Greeks? By not imitating. [A] condition applies, which allowed the Italians to equal the Greeks. It is: do not imitate the
Renaissance.
Burger, "New Tendencies in Art," translated by Christopher Miller. Charles Harrison et al. (eds) Art in Theory: 1815–1900 (Blackwell Publishers:
1998), p. 387.
31 Algernon B. Mitford, The Attaché at Peking (London: Macmillan & Co., 1900), p. 107. Cited in Hillel Schwartz, The Culture of the Copy:
Striking Likenesses, Unreasonable Facsimiles (Zone Books, 1996), p. 368 and fn. 140.
32 See, for example, the document Kokutai no hongi, one of the fundamental statements of the ideology of national uniqueness in the interwar
period, drafted by Hisamatsu Sen'ichi in 1937. Translated in Robert Kind Hall and John Owen Gauntlett, trans., Kokutai no hongi: Cardinal
Principles of the National Entity of Japan (Harvard University Press, 1949).

Bibliography

Akanuma Taka (1983) "Raku." In Hayashiya Seizô (ed.) Chawan: ichi Raku ni Hagi san Karatsu. Tankôsha.
Bell, Catherine (1992) Ritual Theory, Ritual Practice. Oxford University Press.
Brandon, James R. (1978) "Form in Kabuki Acting." In James R. Brandon et al. (eds) Studies in Kabuki: Its Acting, Music, and Historical Context.
The University Press of Hawaii.
Faure, Bernard (1991) The Rhetoric of Immediacy: A Cultural Critique of Chan/Zen Buddhism. Princeton University Press.
Fielder, Konrad (1957, 1876) On Judging Works of Visual Art. University of California Press.
Friday, Karl (1997) Legacies of the Sword. University of Hawaii Press.
Hall, Robert Kind and John Owen Gauntlett (trans.) (1949) okutai no hongi: Cardinal Principles of the National Entity of Japan. Harvard
University Press.
Hamamoto Sôshun (1990) "Shichiji shiki." In Hayashiya Tatsusaburô et al. (eds) Kadokawa chadô daijiten. Kadokawa Shoten.
Harrison, Charles, et al. (eds) (1998) Art in Theory: 1815–1900. Blackwell Publishers.
Hayashiya Seizô (1974) Raku daidai, Tamamizuyaki, Ôhiyaki. Chûôkôronsha.
Hayashiya Seizô (1988) "Chôjirô gaisetsu." Chôjirô, Kôetsu. Nihon no yakimono, Vol. 1, Chûôkôronsha.
Horiguchi Sutemi (1978, 1948) Rikyû no cha. Kagoshima Kenkyûjo shuppankai.
Isono Nobutake (1972) Chôjirô. Tôji taikei, Vol. 17. Heibonsha.
Jordan, Brenda G. and Victoria Weston (eds) (2003) Copying the Master and Stealing His Secrets: Talent and Training in Japanese Painting.
University of Hawai'i Press.
Kumakura Isao and Tsutsui Hiro'ichi (1989) "Rikyû no nenki." In Rikyû daijiten. Tankôsha.
Lave, Jean and Etienne Wenger (1991) Situated Learning: Legitimate Peripheral Participation. Cambridge University Press.
Lawton, Thomas and Linda Merrill (1993) Freer: A Legacy of Art. Freer Gallery.
Ledderose, Lothar (2000) Ten Thousand Things: Module. and Mass Production in Chinese Art. Princeton University Press.
Lee, Sherman E. (1977) "Varieties of Portraiture in Chinese and Japanese Art." In Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art, No. 64: 118–36.
Lillehoj, Elizabeth (2004) (ed.) Critical Perspectives on Classicism in Japanese Painting, 1600–1700. University of Hawai'i Press.
Mitsui Bunko (1994) Mitsui Bunko denrai Omotesenke no chadôgu. Gakushû Kenkyûsha.
Nishiyama Matsunosuke (1982, 1959) Iemoto no kenkyû. Azekura Shobô, reprinted, Nishiyama Matsunosuke chosakushû vol. 1, Yoshikawa
Kôbunka.
Pitelka, Morgan (2001) "Raku Ceramics: Tradition and Cultural Reproduction in Japanese Tea Practice, 1574–1942." Ph.D. dissertation, Princeton
University Press.
Pitelka, Morgan (2005) Handmade Culture: Raku Potters, Patrons, and Tea Practitioners in Japan. University of Hawai'i Press.
Schwartz, Hillel (1996) The Culture of the Copy: Striking Likenesses, Unreasonable Facsimiles. Zone Books.
Sen Sôya and Kizu Sôzen (1983) "Mushanokôji Senke." Shiryôhen. In Sen Sôsa et al. (eds) Chadô no genryû, Vol. 6. Tankôsha.
Singleton, John (1998) (ed.) Learning in Likely Places: Varieties of Apprenticeship in Japan. Cambridge University Press.
Smith, Robert J. (1998) "Transmitting Tradition by the Rules: An Anthropological Interpretation of the Iemoto system." In John Singleton (ed.)
Learning in Likely Places: Varieties of Apprenticeship in Japan. Cambridge University Press.
Stuart, Jan (1997) "Calling Back the Ancestor's Shadow: Chinese Ritual and Commemorative Portraits" In Oriental Art, Vol. 42, No. 3:8–17.
Stuart, Jan and Evelyn Rawski (2001) Worshipping the Ancestors: Chinese Commemorative Portraits. Freer Gallery of Art and the Arthur M.
Sackler Gallery of Art.
Varley, Paul (1989) "Chanoyu from Genroku to Modern Times." In Paul Varley and Kumakura Isao (eds) Tea in Japan: Essays on the History of
Chanoyu. University of Hawai'i Press.
 7
An investigation of the conditions of literary borrowings in late Heian and early Kamakura
Japan

Rein Raud

It is fair to say that most of the innovative processes that appeared in Japanese poetry in the latter half of the
Heian period are in one way or another connected to the re-evaluation of the poetic tradition, and by proxy to the
problematic of imitation, allusion, plagiarism and originality. The efforts of a few mid-Heian poets, such as Sone
no Yoshitada, to broaden the scope of waka vocabulary and to introduce expressions to the poetic language that
must have been current in the daily speech of courtiers, though not in literary expression, were not particularly
successful and the general consensus among most poets of different houses seems to have been that the elegant
vocabulary of the first three anthologies was what one should use when writing one's own verse. In a cultural
system where any successful courtier was supposed to master the art of poetry to some extent, this limitation was
doubly practical. First, it limited the amount of strictly necessary competence to a relatively small textual corpus
which did not require full-time dedication to be mastered. Second, it set up a certain standard which disqualified
the texts of those who had not been initiated into the cultural world of court aristocracy at all, such as warriors,
in spite of their hold on political power.
The ko-uta and imayô fashions that swept through the court world at some point in this period only reinforced the
status of waka as the prime vehicle of poetic expression, since these popular genres could never aspire to the
same position, not even with the help of the imperial patronage of Go-Shirakawa, who personally compiled the
Ryôjin hishô anthology, probably in 1169. Thus, in a sense, the canonical restrictions on waka diction and
imagery were simultaneously a guarantee of the cultural status of the genre. My intention here is to investigate
the mechanism of borrowing, imitation and allusion in the context of the reproduction of a certain 'poetic
subjectivity' that was at the same time an aesthetic and socio-cultural position that enabled the court nobility to
learn to live with the changing realities at the turn of the Heian and Kamakura periods, as well as to claim
cultural supremacy over the warrior class that had taken over the system of political power.
The cultural function and generic identity of waka poetry was, as said, directly linked to its tradition – much
more so than that of Heian court prose, for instance – and this connection was put to good use. The skill to use
poetic vocabulary 'correctly' required of the practitioner not only the ability to distinguish an elegant phrase
from a plain one, but also the knowledge of what could be called the codified meanings of poetic words. Since
Konishi Jin'ichi's well-known article on the Kokinshû style (1978), the influence of Chinese poetry of the Six
Dynasties period (317–589) on the court waka as it emerged into the public sphere during the latter half of the
ninth century has frequently been stressed (McCullough 1985), usually drawing attention to its more formal
aspects – play of words and characters, witty expression and an elegant aesthetic. What is less emphasised are
the ideas that formed the intellectual background of much of various artistic activities in China during the Six
Dynasties period: the eclectic doctrines now called 'dark knowledge' (xuanxue) and Neo-Taoist mysticism that
taught the existence of unfathomable principles beyond the surface of nature, which could and should be grasped
by the poet or painter in the process of artistic creation. This went very well with the magic function of language
and poetry in the Japanese cultural system. But while the Chinese poets sought to elucidate in nature the
principles that regulated the whole world order and were only manifest in the outward form of the world, their
Japanese colleagues linked the chain of natural phenomena to the micro-cosmic sphere of human passions. The
Six Dynasties Chinese tended to apply metaphysical knowledge to the natural environment. Indeed, the prime
objective of Japanese poetry soon came to be the utmost precision of emotional nuances, the capability to
express every single undulation of feeling so that if the recipient of the text happened to be similarly sensitive,
the message was received without fail.
What is important in the present context, however, is that poetic practice was, from the start, based not only on
the need of the mind for self-expression or poetic techniques and conventions, but significantly also on a corpus
of 'knowledge' about the world and human condition. This 'knowledge' did not necessarily have to correspond to
the actual world. From the botanical and geographical precision of the early Man'yôshû poets who actually
travelled to places and absorbed famous views, the Japanese cultural mind quickly switched to a textual reality
where clusters of culturally generated associations efficiently replaced the actual world as the point of
reference.1 In a word, a certain corpus of poetic texts replaced the world itself as the source of information about
the world.
All of this has to be kept in mind when we discuss the nature and functions of poetic borrowings in this cultural
setting. A poetic system in which its own tradition is also the source of cultural knowledge and which aims at the
transmission of nuances of emotion that are as precise as possible, while at the same time placing restrictions on
the use of vocabulary, sooner or later has to clarify the conditions of borrowing, reproduction, imitation of and
allusions to existing texts by other authors. In the Japanese case, this is done under the circumstances where each
recipient of a text is also a potential poet and the corpus of texts from which one can borrow is, at least in theory,
shared by the entire interpretive community, where each allusion can be immediately recognised. The situation is
rather untypical even for canonical poetic cultures, since at a certain moment the cumulative corpus of texts
pushes the practitioners beyond a certain threshold and each single word can, in principle, be interpreted as an
element in an allusion chain, especially if it has clearly established codified meanings. Even if the poet has used
the word so to say 'innocently', any subsequent reader, critic or respondent may make use of the allusive
capacities of the word and recall a context in which it has appeared previously, assuming that the initial poem
had the same allusion in mind. Obviously, this also reinforces the role of cultural knowledge, because an author
who lacks the background is unable to produce texts whose primary meanings for the interpretive community
would be under their control.
This moment arrived some time in the twelfth century and coincided with the court's loss of political power, a
process that significantly invigorated the poetic and philological activities of the nobles who sought for
alternative arenas for their self-realisation, simultaneously trying to preserve their cultural supremacy. The rise
of allusion techniques at the foreground of poetic expression is thus directly connected to a certain kind of
historically conditioned socio-cultural subjectivity. A court poet was at the same time a representative and a
product of an unbroken tradition. This has been eloquently formulated by Fujiwara no Yoshitsune in his preface
to the Shinkokinshû:
The poetry of Yamato traces its origin to the division of Heavens and Earth when the human condition had not yet been settled – ever since
[Susanoo established himself in] the Soga village of Inada-hime it has been transmitted as the speech of the Middle Country of the Plain of Reeds.
Since those times this Way has risen into great prominence – the stream [of tradition] has continued until now without ever being interrupted.
Immersed in passions, it can be the go-between that expresses one's feelings, and it is also this Way that orders the world and pacifies the people
(NKBT 28:33)
Yoshitsune (1169–1206), the younger son of the formerly all-powerful Kujô Kanezane, had been appointed to the
offices of sesshô and dajôdaijin during his lifetime and apparently did not suffer during Minamoto no
Michichika's coup that removed Kanezane from power, although he may have died later as a victim of a political
assassination. He was also a prominent poet with seventy-nine inclusions in the Shinkokinshû, a number
surpassed only by Saigyô (ninety-four) and Jien (ninety-two). Thus he was perhaps in a better position than
anybody else to express the cultural stance of high aristocracy.
In this statement by Yoshitsune above we can see the mixture of discourses that delineate the poetic field of the
period. First and foremost, there is the discourse of the 'unbroken tradition' traced back to the era of the gods,
making poetry even antedate the appearance of human culture. Since the Kokinshû, the stress on the ancient
tradition has been one of the arguments that bolstered the status of waka as high poetry, equal if not superior to
Chinese verse. Compared with Tsurayuki's views on poetry expressed in the preface to the Kokinshû, however,
Yoshitsune's position is closer to the Confucian view, crediting poetry with political and moral functions. This is
not a simple paraphrase of the claim to the psychological power of 'softening even the hearts of fiery warriors'
that had been asserted in the Kokinshû preface (NKBZ 7:49). In a situation where waka practice is not challenged
by Chinese poetry, but the political position of the courtiers has, in fact, already been surrendered, the blending
of the Confucian and the Japanese mythological discourses amounts to a strong bid for cultural power without
which the brute force of the warrior establishment cannot really function.
As is well known, the court nobility had never really been united politically and the sphere of cultural pursuits
had soon enough also become filled with intrigues and internal struggles. There were two antagonistic attitudes
toward the poetic tradition that are usually labelled 'conservative' and 'innovative' and personified in the houses
of Rokujô and Mikohidari. In fact, it is not altogether fair to use these labels, since the difference of the houses
lay in the their aims: the Rokujô house was a more academic and scholarly establishment, engaged in
philological research for its own sake, while the orientation of the Mikohidari house was toward poetic practice.
Thus, even the formidable philological work that Shunzei and Teika carried out was necessary for them in order
to improve their expressive capacity in the writing of actual waka.
The scholarly achivements of the Rokujô should not be underestimated simply because they were not a match for
the Mikohidari as poets. The Rokujô view of the poetic tradition privileged ancient texts for the reason that they
were ancient, handed down from times immemorial; the Mikohidari view valued those texts of the tradition that
they considered to be good and relevant as poetry also for their contemporary times. The same basic difference
characterised the attitudes of the respective poets when they had to judge contemporary verse, for example as
judges at poetry contests. The comments of such Rokujô scholars as Kenshô immediately identify the allusions
and parallels of any given text in the tradition, usually concentrating on whether certain words are applied
correctly for the expression of certain standard feelings. By contrast, the scholars Shunzei and Teika are more
frequently speaking about whether the feeling of the particular poem sounds fresh and appealing.2
The same difference also manifests itself in the understanding of continuity in poetic practice. This is why Teika
has, in his theoretical writings, introduced the notion of nushi aru kotoba, 'words with owners', something akin to
the notion of copyright, clearly delineating the kinds of poetic expressions that can and those that cannot be
alluded to in current writing:
The first 5/7-syllable lines are best avoided, depending on the style of the poem. For instance, it does not matter
how many times one writes iso no kami furuki miyako ('The capital, as ancient as Furu at Isonokami'), hototogisu
naku ya satsuki ('is the cuckoo singing? the fifth month'), hisakata no ama no kaguyama ('Kaguyama of the wide
skies') or tamaboko no michiyukibito ('the traveller on the path which is straight as a jewel-headed spear'),
because otherwise poetry would be impossible. But I have been taught one should never write toshi no uchi ni
haru wa kinikeri ('the year is not over, but spring has arrived'), 3 sode hijite musubishi mizu ('the water scooped
with sleeves wet'),4 tsuki ya aranu haru ya mukashi no ('is there no moon, or the spring of olden times')5 or
sakura chiru ko no shitakaze ('the wind under the trees when cherry blossoms fall')1,6 (NKBT 65:102).
The same admonition is repeated in the Eiga taigai, with almost the same examples. All of the prohibited
examples are from famous poems by well-known authors, whereas the allowed ones are cliches. According to
Robert Brower and Earl Miner:
Teika's point is that only the first two lines of such famous poems as these should be avoided as a basis for allusive variation – not necessarily the
rest of the poem or the poem as a whole. He would have allowed such a poem to be used for allusive variation provided the poet alluded to less
famous lines or echoed the poem in a more subtle way. Of course the more famous the poem, the more subtle the allusion could be.
(1967:45)
This evaluation of Teika's position is rather plausible, but it also means that in Teika's system the easy
identification of an allusion was a drawback. Obviously, the more famous a poem was, the greater the probability
it would be alluded to over and over again – and the easier it was to recognise in each such case. On the one
hand, Teika protects the poems he views as extraordinary achievements from being worn down in clumsy
practice; on the other hand, he creates a mechanism of distinction between more advanced insiders and those
who only have a superficial knowledge of waka poetry and are familiar with just the most famous poems. This
latter position, characteristic of the Mikohidari school is well illustrated by an example from poetic practice, a
remark by Shunzei from the Sengohyakuban utaawase, who was to judge the following text:
SGHBUA 162h (323) Fujiwara no Yasusue (Rokujô)
omokage o the image of the mind
hana no nioi ni comes before the real
sakidatete fragrance of the flowers
eda ni shirarenu blossoms unknown to the branches
hana o miru kana thus appear to the eye
Shunzei, who is the judge, is not very much taken with the poem:
As to the left, it seems I have seen a poem7 that begins with omokage ni hana no sugata o sakidatete ('the sight of the flowers comes before the
image of the mind'), and although it is not absolutely necessary to evade poems that have not been selected for the imperial anthologies, the poem
still does not look too attractive, since the positions of the quoted phrases have not been changed.
(NKBT 74:482)
If the evasion of allusions to the texts that do not appear in the imperial anthologies is not strictly necessary, this
seems to mean that those that do should not be used. What Shunzei means by 'evading' (sariai) here seems to
concern what I have called structural patterning or otherwise very easily recognisable allusions, since he has no
problems with other poems that use subtexts from the imperial anthologies and has written quite a number of
such poems himself. Nevertheless, the poetic treatises of the Mikohidari school forbid the use of recent poems
for honkadori, which is probably why Watanabe Yumiko has suggested (1989:32) that parallels with recent
poetry should not be considered examples of this technique, but mere 'influence' instead.
This kind of differentiation suggests strongly that a competent poet had not only to be conscious of what could
and could not be borrowed or imitated, but that there were different techniques of borrowing, alluding and
imitating that could be used for poetic practice, and different rules applied to their use. According to the
elements used, we could tentatively classify all kinds of literary borrowings as follows.
 Simple quotation

The new text contains a direct quotation from another text which is not integrated into the structure of the
expression at all. This technique is not used very frequently, but is not impossible. For example, Go-Toba-in
refers to the opening passage of Makura no sôshi in the following waka:
SKKS I 36 Go-Toba
miwataseba when you look around
yamamoto kasumu the mist at the bottom of the mountains
Minasegawa and the Minase river
yûbe wa aki to how can one think that
nani omoiken the evenings are best in autumn
The scene refers to spring, which is evident from the use of the word kasumi, which is reserved for spring mists,
and it appropriately appears in the first spring scroll of the anthology. The quotation is nevertheless not exact:
Sei Shônagon asserts that it is autumn that is at its best in the evening, not vice versa.

Inclusive imagery/expression

The text integrates some specific image or word-chain used in the subtext into itself, and thereby makes use of
their emotional overtones. A variation of this technique is structural patterning, a way of building a new poem
onto a lexico-syntactical structure that is taken from another text or several texts:
SGHBUA 167h (333) Fujiwara no Yoshitsune
tare o kyô without waiting
matsu to wa nashi ni for anybody today
yamakage ya in the shadow of the mountain
hana no shizuku ni under the dribbling flowers
tachi zo nurenuru I stand until I am soaked
This poem is put together, with a few rather subtle alterations, from elements of two subtexts:
GSIS 1047 Uma no naishi
tare o kyô for whom am I waiting
matsu to wa iwamu today I shall tell
kaku bakari just as I am
wasururu naka no lost in oblivion
netagenaru yo ni in this loathsome world
SCSS 87 Fujiwara no Mototoshi
yamazakura the mountain cherry
sode ni nioi ya will it leave its scent
utsuru tote onto my sleeves
hana no shizuku ni under the dribbling flowers
tachi zo nurenuru I stand until I am soaked
The moods of these two poems are rather different from each other, the bitterness of Uma no naishi's poem
contrasting with the cheerful, if somewhat conventional aestheticism of the speaker of Mototoshi's poem. Thus,
in spite of the direct patterning of the new poem onto two old examples it succeeds in binding the two moods
together, into an aestheticism that is meant to be the antidote of bitterness, but this nuance is available only for
the reader who recognises the patterns of the subtexts.
The new poem might use the subtextual material more interestingly also by deconstructing its initial meaning. In
the following example the poet inverts the poetic significance of an image of a subtextual poem:
SKKS 128 Kunaikyô
hana sasou inviting the flowers,
Hiranoyamakaze the wind of Hiranoyama
fukinikeri has blown, and now
kogiyuku fune no the trace of the boat rowing by
ato miyuru made can be seen
Hiranoyama is situated near Lake Biwa. When the cherry blossoms have scattered on the surface of the water of
the lake, the poem suggests, they cover it so thickly that boats actually leave trails behind them. The honka of
this poem comes from the Man'yôshû:
MYS II 351 Sami Mansei
yo no naka wo to what should I
nani ni tatoemu compare this world of ours
asabiraki to the absence of the trace
kogiinishi fune no of the boat that rows away
ato naki ga goto when morning breaks
The expression in the honka is a metaphor for the evanescence and ephemerality of our world. In the poem of
Kunaikyô, the meaning is reversed: the trace of the boat in the water is real, although we do not normally
perceive it, but the cherry blossoms that fall into the water make it visible. One ephemerality, as it seems,
discloses another, and this is the way of the world, which is affirmed, not negated. The observation of the real
scene in nature would amount to little more than plain description; the crux of the poem lies precisely in the
inversion of the expression of the Man'yôshû poem.

Contrastive feeling

Similar to the deconstruction of the subtextual image, contrastive feeling is produced whenever the text alludes
to an emotional situation suggested by the subtext in order to deconstruct it or to demonstrate its implausibility.
This is the standard technology of poetic exchanges, where it is customary for the answerer to express disbelief
and doubt about the feelings expressed in the preceding text, especially at certain stages of a love affair. The
following exchange between Go-Suzaku-in and a court lady, not a very remarkable poetic achievement in itself,
is a typical example:
SKKS 1250 Go-Suzaku-in
harusame no spring rains must be
furishiku koro ka falling heavily this time
aoyagi no the green willow
ito midaretsutsu all its leaves are mixed up
hito zo koishiki this is how I have fallen in love
SKKS 1251 Fujiwara no Seishi
aoyagi no of the green willow
ito midaretaru the leaves are mixed up
kono koro wa and this time
hitosuji ni shimo there is hardly a straight thought
omoiyorareji that could reach me
SKKS 1252 Go-Suzaku-in
aoyagi no of the green willow
ito wa katagata the leaves may hang
nabiku tomo toward different directions
omoisometen but since they were dyed by these thoughts
iro wa kawaraji their colour will surely not change
SKKS 1253 Fujiwara no Seishi
asamidori light is this green
fukaku mo aranu no depth in it
aoyagi wa how could I trust
iro kawaraji to that the colours of the green
ikaga tanoman willow will not change
Here, the subversive attitude always engages the entire subtext and is not limited to a single image. In both of
her poems the lady mistrusts the man, inverting his first image of 'leaves mixed up' that was meant to convey his
inner emotional turmoil to mean inconsistency in feelings, and when he admits liaisons with other women but
claims sincerity towards this particular correspondent, the lady again questions the trustworthiness of the colour
(= the feelings) of the willow (= the man). All poetry collections as well as most diaries abound in exchanges of
this kind. This dialogical and usually playful element is indeed present in Japanese poetry from the earliest
times, and thus this kind of allusion is probably the most ancient. In fact, it is the subversive attitude itself that
has become the object of copying in the poems that make use of this technique; by undermining the textual
pursuits of their subtexts, they faithfully reproduce the contrastive model.

Inclusion of narrative

In this case, the text alludes to the narrative structure of the subtext. Poetic exchanges that contain a basic
narrative structure lend themselves particularly well to this kind of allusion:
SZS IV 259 Fujiwara no Shunzei
yû sareba when evening comes
nobe no akikaze the autumn wind from the fields
mi ni shimite pierces my body
uzura naku nari and the quails start singing
fukakusa no sato - this is the village of Deep Grass
The poem, reported in the Mumyôshô to be Shunzei's favourite among his own work (NKBT 65:73) is based on
an allusion to the following exchange:
KKS 971, IM 123 Ariwara no Narihira
toshi o hete for all these years
sumikoshi sato o in this village I have lived
idete inaba and if I go now
itodo fukakusa will it become a field
no to ya narinan of truly Deep Grass?
KKS 972, IM 123 Anonymous
no to naraba when this is a field
uzura to narite into a quail I shall turn
nakioran and keep singing
kari ni dani ya wa won't you come here even
kimi wa kozaramu for a brief hunting trip?
Shunzei places himself, as it were, in the position of the man who has indeed returned to the village of Deep
Grass long after this scene, remembering the parting words of the woman; however, time has passed, the village
is desolate and real quails are singing in the fields. Shunzei's poem is, in its mood, a logical continuation of the
narrative begun in the Ise monogatari exchange. However, in poems that include subtextual narratives it is also
possible to invert or to subvert the logic of the subtext, as it has been done in the following poem:
SKKS 134 Fujiwara no Teika
sakurairo no the cherry-coloured
niwa no harukaze spring wind of love has left
ato mo nashi no trace in my garden
towaba zo hito no if the visitor comes
yuki to dani min snow is all one can see
The honka, or root poem of this waka, is one by Ariwara no Narihira that appears in the Ise monogatari and the
Kokinshû:
KKS I 63, IM 17
kyô kozuba had I not come today
asu wa yuki to zo tomorrow as snow they would
furinamashi have fallen down
kiezu wa ari tomo true – they would not melt
hana to mimashi ya but would one see them as flowers?
This poem, in fact, is part of an exchange, the answer of Narihira to the poem of an unknown lady:
KKS I 62, IM 17
adanari to fickle though they are
na ni koso tatere by their reputation,
sakurahana the cherry blossoms
toshi ni mare naru they have waited for the one
hito mo machikeri who comes so rarely each year
The Ise monogatari is extremely brief about this exchange, saying about the first poem only that it was written
when somebody who had not been visiting for a year came to see the cherry blossoms. It does not even say
explicitly that the author is a lady, although this is evident from Narihira's answer, if read through the poetic
code. She obviously refers to herself and her reputation in her poem, claiming more constancy in her feelings
than he is willing to credit her with; Narihira's answer uses winter imagery to hint at her age (snow is frequently
used as an image for white hair) and her withering beauty, again undermining her claim. Teika has turned the
situation around and looks at the garden scene from the point of view of the lady, but gives her a character
altogether different from the subtextual one. For the speaker of his poem, the love-toned wind has passed and
only the snow of old age and the peace of mind that comes with it remains.
In both cases the underlying narrative is used as a means to deepen the feeling of the poem, to provide it with a
background that adds depth to the new text. Hinting at an underlying 'story', however fragmentary, is indeed one
of the favourite types of allusion in late Heian and early Kamakura poetry, precisely because of its power to
textualise personal experience, to provide particular, momentary feelings with a history that can only be felt, not
explicitly understood – something that suits particularly well the aesthetic of yûgen, or 'mystery and depth', as it
was practiced and propagated by Shunzei.

Inclusion of personality

In this case the text alludes to the author of the subtext and possibly certain situations connected with the life
of/lore about the author. It seems the admonition not to quote poetry by living authors is not valid if the purpose
of the quotation is precisely to draw the attention of the well-informed reader to the quoted person, such as might
well be the case in the following poem:
SKKS 374, SGHBUA 714m (1427) Minamoto no Michitomo
fukakusa no the village of Deep Grass
sato no tsukikage and the loneliness
sabishisa mo of the moon
sumikoshi mama no just the same as when I lived here
nobe no akikaze the autumn wind from the fields
Quite obviously, Michitomo is alluding not only to the exchange in the Ise monogatari (dan 123) quoted above,
which one can immediately identify as the subtext of this poem, but also to the poem by Fujiwara no Shunzei
(SZS 259) that uses nobe no akikaze as one of its central images. And this makes perfectly good sense:
Michitomo was the former husband of Shunzei's 'daughter' (actually granddaughter) whom he had divorced
because of political reasons and, at the time of the Sengohyakuban, their relations were still rather strained.
Michitomo uses 'the autumn wind', which, according to the poetic code, is an image of estrangement rather than
a fond memory of the past. It is used here to evoke Shunzei's poem with an effort, so as to justify himself,
hinting that his relations with Shunzei's 'daughter' were difficult already when they were still living together. The
poet can thus join elements from various poems as building blocks so that his message operates on many levels
at the same time.
From the analysis of these types of allusion we are, I think, justified to draw the following conclusions:
• The linguistic consciousness of late Heian and early Kamakura poets was heavily influenced by the 'knowledge'
contained in the textual tradition, which took primacy over outer reality as the resource of material for
expressing the events of inner reality.
• Under the circumstances, each available word was loaded and over-coded, any utterance of any word was
necessarily a repetition, therefore a borrowing, an element of a chain of occurrences.
• This linguistic consciousness helped to constitute the cultural identity of court aristocracy when they had been
ousted from political power, but strived to maintain cultural power, which made them emphatically conscious of
these cultural mechanisms.
• To use and follow the tradition did nevertheless not mean just to reproduce it as it was, but quite often also to
invert and to deconstruct the imagery of the subtexts, and this 'subversive' attitude was itself a traditional
pattern.
• Paradoxically, the fact that the authors were conscious of their linguistic circumstances and the necessity to
repeat indeed enabled them to use the techniques of allusion and borrowing for conveying extremely personal
feelings and to do it in highly original ways, creating a poetic system that is one of the highest achievements of
Japanese culture.
 Abbreviations

NKBT = Nihon koten bungaku taikei, Iwanami shoten

NKBZ = Nihon koten bungaku zenshû, Shôgakkan
MYS = Man'yôshû
KKS = Kokinshû
SIS = Shûishû
GSIS = Goshûishû
SZS = Senzaishû
SKKS = Shinkokinshû
SCSS = Shinchokusenshû
SGHBUA = Sengohyakuban utaawase
IM = Ise monogatari

Notes

1 I have described this phenomenon in more detail in Raud 1999.

2 See, for example, SGHBUA rounds 167, 186, 230 for Shunzei's, 752, 755 for Teika's comments and round 1201 for Kenshô's rather different
attitude.
3 KKS 1, by Ariwara no Motokata. All the quoted poems are very famous.
4 KKS 2, by Ki no Tsurayuki.
5 KKS 747, by Ariwara no Narihira.
6 SIS 64, by Ki no Tsurayuki.
7 In fact, the alluded poem is Shunzei's own (CSES 207, ZSKS 50) q.v. NKBT 74:482 No. 6–7.

Bibliography

Brower, Robert and Miner, Earl (1967) Fujiwara Teika's Superior Poems of Our Time. A Thirteenth-Century Poetic Treatise and Sequence.
Stanford: Stanford University Press.
Konishi Jin'ichi. (1978) 'The Genesis of the Kokinshû Style'. HJAS, Vol. 38, No. 1: 61–170.
McCullough, Helen Craig (1985) Brocade by Night. Stanford: Stanford University Press.
Raud, Rein (1999) 'The Lover's Subject: Its Construction and Relativisation in the Waka Poetry of the Heian Period'. In Love and Sexuality in
Japanese Literature, Proceedings of the AJLS, Vol. 5, Summer 1999, pp. 65–78.
Watanabe Yumiko (1989) 'Shunzeikyôjo ni mirareru dôjidai kajin no eikyô'. Waka bungaku kenkyû 59/11.
 8
Chinese calligraphic models in Heian Japan

Copying practices and stylistic transmission

John T. Carpenter

For nearly two millennia calligraphers in Japan have honed their brushwriting skills through copying Chinese
models. Already by the Nara period (710–784), the emerging Japanese aristocracy and Buddhist clergy were
sponsoring the transcription of religious texts and governmental documents on an impressive scale. To better
understand the early transfer of scribal practices from the Continent to Japanese court circles we must therefore
familiarize ourselves with the models of Chinese handwriting most prevalent in each era and with the means
used to reproduce and disseminate them. Whether for religious or secular purposes, brush-writing styles evolved
within aesthetic systems that prioritized certain models over others and in environments – scriptoria or literary
salons – that encouraged peer evaluation of a person's mastery of those models. We may also note that in ancient
East Asian capitals, calligraphy came to be recognized along with poetry composition and music as one of the
'performance arts' highly esteemed by elite society.
A history of Japanese calligraphy thus must address the reception of exemplary models, both imported and
indigenous, keeping in mind the considerable time gap that often exists between the original inscription of a
model and the period when it enjoyed greatest currency. If we attempt to investigate court calligraphy of the
Heian period (794–1185) – or indeed any traditional Japanese literary or artistic pursuit – from a conventional
Western art historical approach we will be very disappointed. Any stance that views works as the result of
constant experimentation, individual innovation, or continuous stylistic evolution does not apply to premodern
Japan. Similarly, such motives were not driving forces in the production of arts and crafts before the Romantic
era in the West, when ideas of individual creative genius and artistic inspiration came to the fore. Antiinnovative
techniques such as conformity to a teacher's model, conscientious copying and deliberate archaism have always
been essential elements in the tradition of East Asian calligraphy. This is not to say that innovation did not occur;
it was simply less of a priority.1
The literary critic Konishi Jin'ichi used the term 'restriction' (kôsokusei) to describe the attitude that encourages
an artist or artisan to create works according to specifications laid down by a pre-existing model or provided by a
teacher.2 Individual creativity was 'restricted' in favour of adherence to established forms. From a modern point
of view this may be thought to have negative implications. But, as Konishi points out, in ancient and medieval
Japan it was believed that true 'freedom' in a traditional artistic vocation (michi) could only be acquired through
restriction of individual, idiosyncratic expression.3 Later, Konishi revised his terminology slightly, replacing
kôsokusei with kihansei, 'conforming ethic', which has a less pejorative connotation.4 When it comes to the
vocation of the calligrapher – whether a professional scribe (entrusted to make transcriptions of official or
religious documents) or a calligrapher of high rank in palace circles – conformity of style was accomplished
through the study of models.
In the case of calligraphy, a 'conforming ethic' applies to both a physical activity and mental attitude, since only
through repetition over a long period of time can a model be mastered. Just as a member of court circles would
discipline his or her body to move in prescribed fashion in the performance of palace etiquette or ritual, a
calligrapher would carry out the transcribing of a text, especially a final copy for presentation, according to
established conventions. Furthermore, as part of a calligrapher's training, models were memorized and
interiorized in order to expertly carry out the 'performance' of a text in a highly polished manner – not at all
unlike a musician performing a score, or a singer a libretto. To the extent that bodily posture and bodily
movements have become natural, the performance can be carried out with alacrity and grace. Calligraphy,
whether of an official document, Buddhist sutra, or love poem, becomes a record of a performance of a text by
the skilful movement of the hand. Since calligraphy is the result of training and can be adjusted according to the
needs of the occasion, it may be proposed that within courtly contexts that scribal personality is a construction
closely related to social identity insofar as both are consciously created. A person can adopt different
calligraphic personalities according to requirements of the function, and the models relied upon vary
accordingly. In Japanese court contexts, the very act of writing and copying texts became a ritual, whether for
official, religious, or personal motives.
To investigate such issues of copying as they apply to the Japanese court calligraphy in premodern times, this
chapter examines the Akihagijô (Autumn Bush Clover Calligraphy Model), a horizontal scroll (8.42 metres long)
including transcriptions of forty-eight waka (31-syllable Japanese court verse) and copies of eleven examples of
fourth-century Chinese epistolary writing.5 On the reverse side of the scroll is a completely unrelated section of
an ancient Chinese encyclopaedia. Three different calligraphers (most probably of three different generations)
inscribed the texts in a variety of script types: kaisho (formal script) for the encyclopaedia; sôsho (cursive script)
and gyôsho (semi-cursive script) for the letters, and sôgana (cursive script used phonetically, as kana) for the
poems. The Akihagijô therefore serves well as a case study in the history of 'copying' since it is a compilation of
copies of earlier manuscripts, which we can certainly assume were copies themselves. It has a distinguished
provenance: after being handed down through various imperial and aristocratic families, it entered the collection
of the Tokyo National Museum. Over the course of nearly a thousand years – through early modern times when
calligraphic models were circulated in woodblock printed editions, and even into modern times when
photographic reproductions have became readily available – the Akihagijô has earned esteem as a calligraphy
model in its own right, frequently reproduced as a compendium of archaic Japanese handwriting styles. In 1957,
it was officially designated a kokuhô (National Treasure), the ultimate culmination of the canonization process
for a Japanese work of art.6
After a discussion of some ancient East Asian copying practices and the types of Chinese models most prized by
Heian court society, this chapter will analyse sections of the Akihagijô that reveal how Japanese aristocrats
sought to master a repertory of exemplary handwriting styles of earlier generations.

Methods of calligraphic copying

The most common method of mastering calligraphy in the East Asian tradition is through the process of freehand
copying known as rin (C: lin), which literally refers to 'observing something to one's side'. The term occurs in
common compounds such as rinsho (inscription done by rin) and rinsha (copying done by rin), which can refer
to the act of copying a model or the copy itself. In such rin processes, the calligrapher, with the model alongside
the writing paper, moves the brush down the page, constantly glancing back and forth between the original and
the sheet upon which the copy is being produced. A variation on this process is hairin, literally, 'observing
something behind', a technique in which a well-studied model is hidden from view while the student does a
freehand copy from memory. Afterwards, the model can be consulted to see where the copy departed from the
model. Through diligent calligraphy practice (tenarai) over the course of an extended period – months, years, or
a lifetime – a student can interiorize selected models and acquire the ability to reproduce faithfully the forms of
the model, even if it is not right at hand.
Students of calligraphy in ancient times, like those today, often combined rin copying with the technique of
making a skeletal grid of the model. In this method, the model is placed underneath as in the hairin technique,
but rather than fully execute the characters the student makes only a thin, lightly inked (or charcoal pencilled)
line tracing of the central axis of each stroke. Once a skeletal grid of each character is created, the model is
placed alongside to allow the student to write the characters carefully, glancing at the original when necessary.
Having made a skeletal grid, the student need not worry about overall proportion and spacing between characters
(which are often the most difficult variables to control when trying to maintain a steady rhythm of inscription),
and may instead concentrate on modulation of individual strokes and technical subtleties of entering strokes,
turns, and finishing strokes. This method has the added advantage of allowing a tracing copy to be made without
the danger of damage from ink seepage onto the original. It is virtually impossible to detect this method of
copying, since all traces of the outline are completely covered over with ink. It is also a useful technique for
someone to do a convincing facsimile of an original, whether as a calligraphy practice or as a forgery.
Another broad category of copying is mo or bo (C: mo), or 'tracing' – as in the compound mosha (tracing copy) –
which can be carried out with various degrees of precision. The most straightforward method is to put a sheet of
semi-transparent paper over the model and carefully brush the characters using what shows through as a guide.
In ancient China translucent waxed paper was used for such purposes. Another technique for making extremely
precise tracing copies is referred to as shuanggou guotian (J: sôkô kakuten), literally 'outline tracing and filling
in with ink', which was the means used for creating many of the most famous Chinese models in ancient times,
such as that in Figure 8.1.7 Though such meticulous tracing techniques never gained such wide acceptance in
ancient Japan, examples imported from Tang (618–907) China were highly prized. Responding to the great
demand for such copies, the Tang court appointed official copyists (C: tashuren; J: tôshonin) to make such
copies, either from originals or based on stone rubbings.
The term usually used today by Japanese commentators to refer the same meticulous copying technique is sôkô
tenboku (outline tracing with dabs of ink). The process involves placing a sheet of fine-grained paper over the
model and using a fine brush to meticulously trace the entire outline of each character, to create a sôkô, or what
is more informally referred to in Japan as kagoji ('caged' characters). To facilitate tracing, the model could be
placed over a window or a desk equipped with an illuminating device. Once complete, the outline is filled in by
small overlapping brushstrokes: kakuten or tenboku. If desired, the copyist can reproduce even minuscule details
of the model right down to the traces of a splayed brush or irregularities caused by ageing or damage. When
carefully executed, tracing copies might at first glance easily be mistaken for originals. Even the best copies,
under close examination, however, will betray signs of the copyist's handiwork. Among the telltale signs of
tracing copies are unnaturally stiff connecting strokes, traces of crisscrossed hairline strokes at the corners of
dots and strokes (where a small brush has been moved unnaturally in different directions), unnatural ink-
absorption patterns, and an overall stiffness to characters produced by the lack of variation in ink tone.8
In summary, whether done by tracing or freehand, the performative act of copying models plays a central role in
the East Asian calligraphic tradition. If we readjust our art historical stance and qualitative judgements to accept
copies (and the related category of forgeries) as valuable material for research, we open up possibilities of a
more thorough study of the transmission of calligraphy models in specific historical contexts. Such an approach
invites us to consider which models were most esteemed at by the cultural elites in a particular era – keeping in
mind that calligraphy until early modern times was inherently an elite art, if only since books, manuscripts and
even paper itself were precious commodities whose distribution was quite restricted. A study of the transmission
of models, it should be noted, does not deny the validity of an intuitive or purely aesthetic experience of East
Asian calligraphy, but rather places such visual delectation in a broader history of reception of styles –
individual, school, period, regional, or national.

Early Japanese copying of Wang Xizhi models

In the broadest view of stylistic hierarchies, the matter of what constitutes a 'national style' of calligraphy in the
East Asian context immediately comes to the fore. Such issues are especially problematic in the case of Japan,
since all its script types and styles ultimately derive from Chinese forms, even the distinctive kana phonetic
syllabary. Notwithstanding the immense debt to the Continent, it was inevitable that certain kanji models (and,
needless to say, kana models) would develop at variance with Chinese aesthetic priorities, if only because
political, social and pedagogical systems – not to mention languages – operated for the most part independently.
Even if one postulates a model of continental cultural hegemony at various junctures, it must be kept in mind
that a Chinese-style civil service system (and connected examination system) never took firm hold in Japan. This
meant that, by the mid-Heian period at least, court service and proximity to the emperor or his regency was
determined more by family connections than by promotion based on merit. Truly outstanding talent, however,
was recognized and rewarded with more rapid promotion in court rank. The repercussions in the realm of scribal
practices meant that access to models was more restricted than in China. In Japan, until early modern times,
aesthetic priorities and scribal conventions often passed down within court-family based lineages – with models
often being handed down from parents to children.
Depending on one's scholarly vantage point, the differences of 'national styles' can be accentuated or
downplayed. For instance, one may view the China–Korea–Japan historical artistic exchange as a natural
outcome of a greater political, economic and cultural continuum between the continent and Japanese
archipelago. Such an approach is most useful in tracing the broader transmission of the Chinese models over the
course of centuries. But a more chronologically focused standpoint that looks at imperial patronage and courtier
networks – or the more intimate salon culture of the mid-Heian period – calls for a greater sensitivity to the
subtle shifts in aesthetic priorities that came to the fore during this age. Rather than attempt to put forth any
particular arguments supporting or disputing the idea of a distinctive wayô (Japanese-style) calligraphy,
however, I should like to approach the issue of a Japanese 'national style' of calligraphy from a more pragmatic
point of view of the technical aspects of transmission of models by the manual process of copying. The very
process of copying in pre-photographic times, I shall emphasize, inevitably involves a transformation of the
original, even if the copyist believes he or she is being faithful to the original.
When calligraphy scholars speak of a distinctive Japanese style emerging in the ninth and tenth century Heian
court, what they are actually referring to is the official acceptance by the court of the cursive and semi-cursive
variations of the so-called Wang style, associated with eminent Chinese calligraphers Wang Xizhi (c.303–c.361)
and his son, Wang Xianzhi (344–88). The 'two Wangs' were the most prominent calligraphers of the Eastern Jin
Dynasty (317–420), a crucial century in the history of Chinese calligraphy during which both basic script types
and aesthetic conventions were to a great extent consolidated. Though connoisseurs and writers throughout
history have argued the merits of one Wang over another, it is now impossible for us to take an authoritative
stand on this issue, if only because not a single shred of genuine Wang family calligraphy has survived. What we
know of their styles is based entirely upon early tracings, freehand copies, or ink-rubbings of stone-engraved
calligraphy (many of them in very worn or damaged condition) from various historical eras.9 While a number of
precise tracing copies survive made by the 'outline and fill in' technique, we can only speculate as to what extent
calligraphy traditionally attributed to Wang father and son actually resembles their original handwriting.10
History has tended to give priority to the father as the master stylist, and entire books have been written on the
subject of the evolution of Wang Xizhi's reputation in China and Japan.11 Suffice it to say that the handwriting
style of Wang (hereafter referring exclusively to the father, Xizhi) became widely known during the sixth
century and by the beginning of the seventh century his position as the premier Chinese calligrapher was firmly
established.
In the context of a history of East Asian calligraphy, one crucial factor in the adoption of the Wang style as
official court style was the scribal diligence of Zhiyong (J: Chiei; act. late sixth century), a seventh-generation
descendant of the great Chinese master. Zhiyong is said to have inherited genuine examples of Wang's
handwriting and to have spent three decades making some eight-hundred copies of the Qianziwen (J: Senjimon:
Thousand Character Classic) in his ancestor's style, in both formal and cursive script types. They were eventually
distributed to Buddhist temples throughout the Eastern Zhejiang region, where they could be further available for
copying. Zhiyong's efforts may be viewed as one of those defining moments in East Asian calligraphic tradition
in which the proliferation of a model helped establish a stylistic norm.
But sheer quantity does not guarantee the predominance of a model: official approbation by the social and
cultural elite is also crucial. In East Asian capitals of ancient times, the imperial imprimatur at various junctures
played an important role in the acceptance or rejection of certain models. For instance, in the early seventh-
century China, the second Tang Emperor, Taizong (J: Taisô; ruled 626–49) played a crucial role in scribal
trendsetting, since he in effect made the Wang style the model for his own handwriting and encouraged members
of his court to follow suit.12 The Emperor is said to have studied the Wang style under the tutelage of Yu Shinan
(J: Guseinan), a direct student of the aforementioned Zhiyong. The emperor also set out with great enthusiasm
amassing a collection of all extant works by Wang and sponsored professional scribes to make meticulous copies
of several of them.13 In this way, a distinguished lineage of aristocratic calligraphers who practiced the Wang
style emerged. At the same time there was a concerted effort to define a canon of accepted works in the style of
Wang, or at least in the Wang style as it was perceived in Tang China, and as it was then transmitted to the Nara
(710–84) and Early Heian courts.
Celebrated Wang-style calligraphy models such as the Yueyi lun (J: Gakkiron: Essay on General Yueyi) in formal
script and the Lanting xu (J: Ranteijo: Orchid Pavilion Preface) in semi-cursive script immediately earned a
place as essential models in the Japanese tradition. The majority of models associated with Wang, however, were
actually short letters and miscellaneous notes to friends, some of them consisting of only a few columns
inscribed in highly cursive script.14 Perhaps the most highly regarded of these is the tracing copy known as the
Sangluan tie (J: Sôranjô: Letter on the Disturbances), a letter in which Wang states his regret at not being able to
mourn his ancestors, whose tombs lay in the conquered territories in the north (Figure 8.1).15 Another excellent
tracing copy long cherished in Japan since the Nara period is the Kong Shizhong tie (J: Kôjichûjô) in the
collection of the Maeda Ikutoku Kai, once again a short personal note by Wang inquiring after the well-being of
a friend (which is accompanied by two other short letters). Both scrolls bear seals indicating that they belonged
to the Imperial Household collection during the Enryaku period (782–805), that is, before the capital was moved
to Heian-kyô (Kyoto). It is reasonable to assume that they were among a group of twenty examples of Wang's
calligraphy, which records mention were earlier donated in 756 to the Shôsôin Treasure House at Tôdaiji in
Nara.16
The Sangluan tie represents the type of work which scholars today use as a touchstone for describing the 'Wang
style' of cursive calligraphy. The scholar Eugene Wang in an essay discussing this scroll suggests, however, that
this work represents an ur-tradition in the Chinese context.17 He notes that this work – copies and records of
which seem to have disappeared in China by the time it reached Japan – did not come to the attention of Chinese
connoisseurs again until the 1890s. It represents a freer, slightly more excitable presentation of the Wang style
than was traditionally esteemed in China. Yet in the Japanese tradition it represents the norm rather than the
exception. When celebrated mid-Heian calligraphers, referred to collectively as the Sanseki, the 'The Three
[Brush] Traces' – or sometimes alternatively as the 'Three Sages [of Calligraphy]' – are said to have worked in
the Wang style, it is often based on comparisons with this kind of model. Counted among the Three Traces are
Ono no Michikaze (also pronounced Tôfû; 894–966), Fujiwara no Sukemasa (Sari; 994–8) and Fujiwara no
Yukinari (Kôzei; 972–1027). Although the Three Traces, especially Yukinari, are said to have been the final
consolidators of a distinctive Japanese style, it must be kept in mind that the calligraphers themselves clearly
thought when writing kanji that it was a Chinese style. As has been emphasized by Thomas LaMarre: 'Rather
than distinct boundaries [between 'Chinese' and 'Japanese' styles], we find zones of indiscernability. The styles of
the Three Precedents [Traces] did not actually construct a new zone autonomous from Chinese styles; one bleeds
imperceptibly into the other.'18 We know from contemporary diaries and other records that Heian court
calligraphers, including Yukinari, would have had access in imperial and courtier family libraries to good tracing
copies of Wang-style works such as the Sangluan tie.19

Wang Xizhi letters in the Akihagijô

Although actual evidence of the process of transmission of the Wang epistolary calligraphy style during the
Heian period is extremely scarce (in contrast to examples of sutra-copying styles for which abundant examples
survive), we are fortunate to have surviving examples of rinsho copying of Wang letters in the Akihagijô, or
Autumn Bush Clover Calligraphy Model, introduced briefly above (Figures 8.2 and 8.6). Akihagi (autumn bush
clover) in the given title refers to the first two words of the opening of a waka on the first sheet on the reverse
side of the scroll (discussed at the end of this chapter). The suffix jô (C: tie), an abbreviation of hôjô (C: fatie),
was often included in the titles of exemplary models of premodern times throughout East Asia.20 In the case of
the Akihagijô, we may assume that 'jô' in the additional sense of 'accordion-binding album', was attached
retroactively to the original scroll-format manuscript after it was reproduced in woodblock-printed editions (in
album format) during the Edo period – yet another manifestation of 'copying' and model making (Figure 8.3).
Intriguingly, the Wang letters and poems (with the exception of the first sheet) are all transcribed on the reverse
side of a section of a text of a Chinese encyclopaedia entitled Huainan honglie binglue jianggu (J: E'nan kôretsu
heiryaku kanko) (Figure 8.4). Usually referred to in abbreviated fashion as Huainanzi (J: E'nanji: Masters of
Huainan), the text in twentyone volumes was compiled at the court of Liu An, ruler of the principality of
Huainan in Western Han dynasty (206 BCE–9 CE). The Huainanzi is a didactic text providing moral knowledge
needed for sage rulers, drawing on teachings of Laozi and Zhuang Zi, with interpolations by later military
writers, statesmen, and legal philosophers on the rise and fall of empires.21 The text on the reverse side of the
Akihagijô is inscribed in an extremely rigid but expert scribal style of the Sui (581–618) or Tang (618–907)
dynasties, but in all likelihood is a transcription commissioned by the Nara or early Heian court – a conclusion
allowed by comparison to sutra texts made in Japan in a quite similar style.22 Although it is impossible to
reconstruct the circumstances under which someone would take a perfectly good recension of a chapter of a
Chinese classic and re-use the reverse side for calligraphy practice, it may be seen as a sign of the times that by
the Heian period someone would not feel the least bit inhibited to recycle an ancient Chinese text to test his or
her skills at the more flamboyant cursive and kana writing styles of the day.
It is not unusual to find examples of sutra copying done on the reverse side of no-longer-needed correspondence.
(Many early examples of kana owe their survival to such paper recycling practices since copies of sutra texts,
especially ones prepared as offerings, had a better chance of surviving.) But here we have an exceptional
situation of the letters and poems being copied onto the reverse side of a perfectly serviceable Chinese secular
text. From a modern vantage point, the 'accidental' text on the reverse side of the Akihagijô may be more
interesting than the original didactic text, but at the time it must have seemed an irreverent act to use a precious
Chinese classic as scrap paper for calligraphy practice.
With the exception of the last four of the eleven copies of Wang letters in the Akihagijô, no early copies or
rubbings of these letters are known to survive in China. Even if these copies of Wang letters disappeared in the
region of their origin at an early date, the connection of all the Wang letters is apparent: some of the letters open
with greetings that include Wang's name, and all exhibit a writing style that, in varying degrees, adheres to that
of other known copies of Wang letters. In a situation similar to the Sangluan tie, these belong to the category of
Wang-related materials no longer available in China (until modern times) that were preserved, cherished, and
copied in Japanese court circles through premodern times.
Close observation of various characters reveals many faltering connecting strokes, which suggests that the
characters were being made as a copy of an original rather than in a natural fashion. The calligraphy scholar
Iijima Tachio even went so far as to propose that these Wang letters (and the poems that precede them) were
produced by the 'outline tracing' technique similar to that used in the Sangluan tie.23 Iijima's theory, which does
not seem to have gained acceptance among other scholars who have studied the work closely, nevertheless draws
attention to the debate over techniques of copying used in ancient times. Several of the specific examples of
'traced' characters Iijima cites (including certain characters that seem to have a separate, narrow brush line
running down the middle) seem to me to be evidence of the use of a 'skeletal grid' technique described on p. 158.
Whatever the final consensus turns out to be, these issues related to the awkwardness inherent in the process of
making a 'copy' has been central in the centuries-long debate over authorship of various sections of the
Akihagijô.
In recognition of their rarity and intrinsic interest, the Wang letters and the poems that directly precede them
(both on the reverse side of the Huainanzu), have had various attributions through the centuries, most notably at
an early stage to Michikaze and in recent years to Yukinari, both of whom have always been counted among the
most eminent mid-Heian calligraphers. Research on the content and kana usage of waka suggests that the
manuscript could have been no earlier than the early to mid-tenth century, placing the original inscription in the
era Michikaze was active. Despite the long history of debate over these issues, perhaps we resign ourselves to the
fact that there just is not enough evidence to definitively establish or discount authorship one way or another.24
Still, in recent years Furuya Minoru, the author of the most detailed study of the Akihagijô to date, has attempted
to corroborate the traditional attribution to Yukinari.25 Furuya made a character-by-character comparison of the
calligraphy of the Wang letters of the Akihagijô with the same characters culled from accepted genuine works of
Yukinari's such as the Hakushi shikan (Scroll of Poetry by Master Bo [Bo Juyi]), dated 1018) and the Honnôji
gire (Honnôji Poetry Fragments), and he noted the various close stylistic correspondences.26 Furuya also cites an
entry (dated 26th day of the sixth month of 1007) in Yukinari's diary, Gonki, that mentions the previous year the
courtier-calligrapher was presented with nine scrolls of the Huainanzi from Emperor Ichijô.27 Yukinari would
have been thirty-six years old, by which time his calligraphic skills had already received wide recognition.
Furuya also, rightly I think, notes that only someone of highrank would have felt free to take a quite precious
Chinese manuscript and use the reverse side for calligraphy practice.
These arguments do indeed add weight to the attribution to Yukinari's hand, but still one might detect
weaknesses in Furuya's argument. For instance, the comparisons that Furuya makes are all of very common
kanji, and the fact that they resemble each other might rather be viewed as further evidence of how the Wang-
Yukinari style had become the dominant court style of the Heian court. As already suggested, a remarkable
'conforming ethic' pervaded calligraphy of premodern times, and one aristocrat's hand could easily resemble
another's, especially in the rendering of common characters. As for the argument that Yukinari had access to
scrolls of the Huainanzi, while it is a coincidence that Yukinari's diary mentions that he had a copy of this text,
others in Yukinari's court circles would have as well, not to mention his own sons and daughters (some of whom
are said to have practiced their father's style).28 Even if we accept that the Wang letters are rinsho, we could
expect Yukinari at age thirty-six to have been able to write in a more practised hand than these pages reveal. I
would find it more convincing to say that the proud father took the no longer needed Chinese text and gave it to
one of his children, probably a son (because kanji models were more suitable for a boy), for calligraphy practice.
But without further evidence, such ideas remain in the realm of speculation.
Although there is no way to positively corroborate an attribution to an individual calligrapher, it is reasonable to
assume that the transcriptions of all of the sheets on the reverse side of the Huainanzi were copies of earlier
models (perhaps of Michikaze and/or Yukinari handwriting) made some time in the first half of the eleventh
century, or possibly as late as the twelfth century. Various other theories have been put forth, including a most
provocative one by Komatsu Shigemi that proposes the Wang letters and waka were transcribed by Emperor
Fushimi (1265–1317) in the late thirteenth or early fourteenth century. We know that Fushimi at one time had the
scroll in his possession, since his handwritten seal is found on the seams of the sheets of paper on the side the
Huainanzi is inscribed (Figure 8.5).
We also know that Fushimi was a skilled calligrapher and copyist. But the hypothesis of a Fushimi transcription
was strongly disputed by eminent philologist Kyûsojin Hitaku and others, so the issue remains moot.29 Even if
Komatsu's theory is not accepted, the point is well taken that in an environment where copying is a widely
accepted means of calligraphic study it is often hard to determine exactly when a work was transcribed based
solely on philological or stylistic considerations. Deliberate archaism is always a possibility and we must always
keep in mind that even as new styles emerge, old ones are not necessarily supplanted.
Wang letters such as we find in the Akihagijô provide little or no new insight into the Chinese calligrapher and
statesman's biography, nor do they seem to have any particular literary aspirations (though many are very
moving). Some are simply fragments. Clearly, the original letters were being copied as calligraphy models and
not for their intrinsic interest, which is the case of many calligraphy models. A translation of the first of the
letters (Figure 8.2) will suffice to give a general sense of the types of contents involved:
Twenty-fifth day of the First Month. Xizhi respectfully greets you. This year I have been reflecting on things and am full of regrets, but what can I
do? My thoughts are with you and I share your sadness. But receiving your letter just now gives me great joy. This hasty response is just to let you
know that I received your letter. Respectfully Wang Xizhi.30
This letter, though transcribed in cursive script, is actually the most controlled of the twelve examples. The four
full columns and final short one are rendered at a comfortable pace – one rapid enough to create a sense of
flowing brush, though not so fast as to depart drastically from the Wang model (as happens in later letters).
There is a good balance of highly cursive graphs for conventional letter-writing expressions and a bit more
accentuation and emphasis given to words of emotive content – for example, ganhai (J: kankai: regrets), the first
two characters of the second column; or nan (J: nan: difficult), third character from bottom of the third column –
as is a characteristic of Wang letters. Useful comparisons can be made between the manner of cursivization here
and that of the Sangluan tie. Note that by epistolary convention, the Chinese term of respect dunshou (J: tonshu:
respectfully) – the second and third characters from the bottom of the first column or the final two characters of
last column – is often inscribed in an extremely abbreviated fashion as here. The character shou often appears
simply as a single elongated dot.
But as the sequence of letters of the Akihagijô unfurls, something happens. The level of cursiveness increases
dramatically; strokes get fatter, softer – even flabby in some cases. We can observe that the person doing the
rinsho copying, as though aware that there was a certain unbalance, unpleasant exaggeration of certain graphs,
begins to find a different rhythm, enabling a slightly more cursive tendency than would normally be found,
which allows a more fluent execution. In the course of a single performance of copying over the course of five or
six sheets of paper, we witness a gradual departure from an orthodox Wang model. In the case of the final letter
(actually just a fragment of a letter), we are fortunate to have a surviving takuhon (ink rubbing) showing an early
Chinese version of the same characters in a more controlled Wang style (compare Figures 8.6 and 8.7). Though
this letter has only six characters arranged in two columns, the comparison between the freehand copy and a
more conservative version is instructive:

At the same time, we can observe the calligrapher working in an extreme cursive mode that is just a step away
from the characteristic writing style of sôgana, a distinctive form of Japanese writing discussed more fully in the
following section of this chapter. It is a natural, rather random experimentation, and the calligrapher who wrote
these practice pages is the same person who had written out page after page of transcriptions of Japanese poems.
In exercises such as this, Heian calligraphers were testing the limits of cursiveness (at what point do we lose
legibility?), and weighing the density of forms (in relation to the new forms of kana emerging). Surviving
calligraphy of the late tenth and early eleventh century clearly demonstrates there was a fascination with this
problem among aristocratic calligraphers. Every attempt was being made to preserve Wang in a system of
inscription that could have literally written him out of existence.

The emergence of sôgana

As mentioned, immediately preceding the pages with the Wang letters are fifteen sheets of poems rendered in
sôgana (Figures 8.8 and 8.11). They show how the breakdown in orthodox forms of kanji led to the development
of a new system of writing in Japan. In retracing this process of the transmutation of script types into a new
system of writing, we may from a historical perspective suggest that this represents the emergence of a 'Japanese
style'. Nevertheless, we may assume that the calligrapher creating it surely must have felt that it was actually a
free-hand copy of Tang dynasty versions of Wang– it was not seen as a consciously conceived native style. In an
environment of inscription where poetry is being written in ever more cursive forms, it would have been natural
for Chinese writing practice to be affected. The calligrapher was exhibiting fluency in two different but
interdependent 'dialects' of inscription.
As has been well documented, the first stage of transition to a distinctive Japanese syllabary was the use of kanji
(disregarding their original meanings) to represent phonemes in a form of writing that came to be known as
man'yôgana, deriving its name from the ancient Japanese poetry collection Man'yôshû (Anthology of Myriad
Leaves).31 Already used for inscriptions on swords or ritual bronze implements from at least the sixth century,
by the Nara period man'yôgana was widely used for the transcription of Japanese poems. While few original
manuscripts from the earliest stages of the development of kana survive, this system continued to be commonly
used in writing through the tenth and eleventh centuries. In the early Heian period, man'yôgana in highly cursive
forms was referred to as sôgana or sô no kana (cursive-script kana). In contrast to modern hiragana, sôgana is
written in a script that generally adheres to Chinese cursive-script conventions. Even to the reader unfamiliar
with premodern kana forms, it is obvious that the characters have more strokes and are compositionally more
complex than kana of the eleventh and twelfth centuries, from which hiragana of the modern period were culled.
Appreciation of sôgana, more so than most other varieties of East Asian calligraphy, is an acquired taste, perhaps
because of its transitional quality; it always appears to be slightly sloppy cursive kanji or rather clunky kana.
Due to its close formal relationship to orthodox cursive kanji, sôgana never appears as sprightly as kana in
renmentai (continuously linked format) of subsequent generations. Compare the Akihagijô transcriptions of
Kokinshû poems with a later transcription of poems from the same anthology in calligraphy with a confident
attribution to Fujiwara no Shunzei (1114–1204): the thin ink lines are brushed with alacrity and a dynamic flair,
with many of the kana linked in pairs and triplets as if they were a single joined unit (Figure 8.10). The only
Chinese character used in each transcription is hito (other person, or, in these, cases meaning 'lover'); in both
examples, a two-stroke character (one of the simplest kanji in the language, and in fact, simpler in outward form
than most kana) straddles a column of kana, providing a visual accent.
Because of its widespread use among women of the court from the ninth century onwards, the new variety of
kana was also commonly referred to as onna-de, or the 'women's hand'. Needless to say, men also used onnade
when writing poems, and letters (especially to women) or messages in vernacular for private use. The characters
of sôgana are still a bit too complex to execute with a completely relaxed, free-flowing brush, and often betray a
somewhat ponderous, monotonous rhythm. Furthermore, since the calligrapher did not have the option in sôgana
of retreating to standard or semi-cursive script forms of kanji, there is also a lack of variations in form that we
would look for in kanji calligraphy. Despite these initial obstacles to immediate appreciation, once its historical
position is understand, sôgana becomes enjoyable in its own right. Furthermore, we can understand why,
especially in the antiquarian spirit of late Edo Japan, connoisseurs and calligraphers often turned to it as a
cherished model.
Early examples of writing in sôgana script found in the Akihagijô include an opening sheet with two poems,
believed by many scholars to be inscribed by Michikaze in the mid-tenth century (Figure 8.8), but which was
added separately and is not on the reverse side of the Huainanzi. Whatever the connection to the other sheets
may be, the opening sheet has become an iconic model in the tradition of copying archaic scripts. To help show
how cursive forms of Chinese characters served as a phonetic syllabary, the transcription below provides both the
original kanji and the modern-day hiragana equivalents. The two anonymous poems on autumn themes are from
the Kokin wakashû, originally compiled around 905–915.32 They read:
Poem 1

akihagi no shitaba i[ro-]

zuku ima yori zo hi-
tori aru hito no
inegate ni suru
Now that the lower leaves
of autumn bush clover
are turning colour,
those who are all alone
sleep with even more unease.
Poem 2
nakiwataru kari no [na-]
mida ya ochitsura-
mu mono [o]mofu yado no
hagi no uhe no tsuyu
Dewdrops on bush clover
at the house where I dwell
in thoughts of love,
could it be from the tears
of geese crying overhead?
These poems, inscribed on the first sheet, from early on gained an attribution to Ono no Michikaze, and certainly
many of the characters stand out for their boldly brushed, fully inked effulgence (a trait associated with
Michikaze's calligraphy); others are barely discernible where the brush ran dry. The two poems are each written
in four columns of approximately equal length, with all of the characters more or less the same size. Though
many of the kana are linked together in clusters of two or three characters, the columns lack any of the graceful
ligatures that characterize kana calligraphy that were emerging at this time. Even at the time they were copied
they must have seemed a bit 'old-fashioned'.
The fourteen other sheets, comprising an additional forty-six poems inscribed in a different hand, are generally
thought to have been transcribed a generation or two after the opening sheet, but it is impossible to say for sure
just when (e.g. Figure 8.11) Though the opening sheet and ones that follow are by different hands, the sôgana
forms do closely resemble each other, suggesting some kind of link to a no longer surviving sôgana poetry
manuscript from which both were derived. The calligrapher of the fourteen sheets of sôgana – whom we should
recall as the same calligrapher who did the five sheets with transcriptions of the Wang letters – in modern times
has been attributed to Fujiwara no Yukinari. As mentioned on p. 165, Furuya now believes it is a sustainable
attribution. On this issue I am inclined to side with those who say that there just is not enough evidence to decide
the issue and look instead to other issues than authorship. From my own close examination of the characters, I
feel confident that it was not inscribed by a master calligrapher, but rather by someone skilled but still struggling
to do rinsho practice.
Arguments have shifted back and forth over the centuries as to the exact relationship between the first sheet,
which does seem to be somewhat older, and the sheets that follow. Furuya has convincingly argued that the first
sheet was a remounted double page from an original accordion-bound (detchô-bon) poetry book. The liberal
spacing between the poems, and the arrangement in four columns would corroborate a format of one poem per
page. The other sheets (which were without doubt done on connected sheets in scroll format) to a certain degree
adhere to the column division and spacing of the first sheet. This leads us to conclude that the latter sheets were
rinsho of a manuscript that once included the present first sheet, or which were copied to replace missing
sections.33 Other scholars point out, persuasively, that both the opening sheet and subsequent sheets must have
been copies of earlier models.34 All of the sheets, including the opening sheet, under close examination reveal
that they were done with excessive deliberation and hesitancy, which is the sign usually of either a very young
calligrapher (still struggling to gain control of the brush), a very old calligrapher (hand shaking because of
infirmity or frailty), or someone copying a style of calligraphy that is not their own usual handwriting style.
For instance, let us look at an example of a waka (the fourteenth in the sequence) from one of the later sheets
(Figure 8.11). Like approximately half of the forty-eight poems of the Akihagijô, it is not otherwise known from
any other published poetry anthology. Thus, another exciting aspect of working on a manuscript like the
Akihagijô, from a literary point of view, is that we get the sense of poets and calligraphers working with texts
that have not yet been canonized, and the process of copying poems over and over goes hand in hand with the
process of culling good poems for preservation. This anonymous poem apparently did not survive the test of
time – might we suppose because the theme of a woman's unrequited love for a watchman in the hills not
appropriate for imperial anthologies? Or might we speculate that the clumsy repetition of sounds of the opening
lines – …furu furu yami yama no yama… – was perceived lacking in courtly euphony)? I shall let the reader
judge; it reads:
shigure furu
furu yami ya/ ma no
yama mori ni
a/ ranedo kesa ha
sode / zo tsuyu keki [keki]
Though autumn rains beat down
in darkness on these hills,
the watchman never appeared,
and thus as dawn arrives
my sleeves are soaked with dew.
Note the very last two characters of the original transcription, keki, are completely redundant. Looking closely at
details of the original manuscript (Figure 8.11A), we can see that the calligrapher trembled while inscribing
them initially, and went back and rebrushed them. The second time around, the lines were more smoothly
rendered, which is tell-tale evidence of a copy being created with careful attention to making a faithful rendering
of the shapes, the character and the flow of the brush of the original.
Since we already know that the examples of Wang letters were definitely part of copying practice, it is safe to
assume that the preceding sôgana pages were a copying practice as well, based on a now lost original (all done
on the reverse side of a no longer needed Chinese text). Why the first sheet of sôgana was attached – at some
point after the late thirteenth or early fourteenth century, we may assume (since it lacks the kaô of Fushimi found
on the other sheets) – is a bit of a mystery. Whatever the reason, by the seventeenth century, it was considered an
integral part of the Akihagi-jô, and always reproduced with the other sheets, as can be seen in Edo period
woodblock-printed and manuscript versions of these sheets (Figures 8.8 and 8.9).

The Akihagi-jô as exemplary model

As earlier mentioned, the presence of the distinctive handwritten seal (kaô) of Emperor Fushimi on the reverse-
side seam of all the sheets of the Akihagijô (except between the first and second sheets) confirms that it was in
the imperial collection from at least as early as the late thirteenth or early fourteenth century (Figure 8.5).
Fushimi acquired renown for both bringing together a number of the most important models of Heian calligraphy
and his intensive study of them, in a manner reminiscent of Taizong, the second Tang emperor. Both sovereigns
went to great lengths to acquire the finest examples of noted calligraphy of previous generations, and both,
through their own scribal enthusiasm, helped promote a highly refined, but decidedly archaic manner of
handwriting. Emperor Fushimi we know in his youth had studied works by the mid-Heian master Yukinari,
whose style by the early thirteenth century was viewed as quite old-fashioned, but nevertheless as a paragon of
courtly elegance.35 Through direct study of original works such as Akihagijô and surviving examples of works by
Michikaze and Yukinari, Fushimi played a crucial role in what later came to be referred to as the jôdai yô, or
'archaic style' of Japanese calligraphy. Fushimi was an expert copyist, as evidenced by a number of his copies of
Heian manuscripts still extant, including most notably a skilled freehand copy of Byôbu dodai (Draft of Poems
for a Screen) by Michikaze. We also know that he did other close copies of other mid-Heian models.36 After
seeing copies from Fushimi's hand as adept as this, we can understand why calligraphy scholars such as Komatsu
Shigemi might have hypothesized Fushimi as the calligrapher of the Akihagijô.
Although it is impossible to reconstruct the subsequent history of the scroll through medieval times, we know
that by early modern times the Akihagijô was still, or once again, in imperial hands, in the collection of Emperor
Reigen (1654–1732), son of Emperor Go-Mizunoo (1596–1680), who, like Emperor Go-Yôzei (1571–1617)
before him, were all imperial calligraphers of outstanding talent. Like his distant ancestor Fushimi, rather than
practice the style of the times, Reigen cultivated his hand in a distinctively archaic manner – based on models of
mid-Heian calligraphers – which by the seventeenth century we may describe as a highly affected elegance.
Reigen inscribed the lid of the paulownia box in which the Akihagijô was transmitted, noting that at the time it
had an attribution to Ono no Michikaze, not Yukinari as some modern scholars have proposed (a further
reminder of the controversial nature of calligraphy connoissuership). By the time Reigen gained possession of
the Akihagijô scroll, the box in which it was stored also included Yukinari's transcription of Hakushi shikan
(Scroll of Poems of Master Bo [Bo Juyi]), mentioned earlier as a representative masterwork of middle Heian
calligraphy – which, significantly, was also once in the possession of Fushimi. In short, Reigen in the early
modern period was heir to both crucial ancient models in the tradition and a crucial proponent of the jôdai-yô,
following in the legacy of Emperor Fushimi. By the Kamakura period the mid-Heian Three Precedents were
viewed as paragons of court calligraphy in an environment of nostalgia. By early modern times numerous works
came to be attributed to them in a bout of historicist enthusiasm.
Without elaborating here on Reigen's distinguished accomplishments as a promoter of the literary arts, suffice it
to say that the era in which he was active as a cultural arbiter – the late seventeenth and early eighteenth century
– was a critical juncture in the history of Japanese calligraphy, when ancient handwriting models were more
widely disseminated through woodblock printed reproductions. We can propose that Reigen and his immediate
relatives played a key role in that process of disseminating models.
By the eighteenth century, copies of the Akihagijô started to circulate beyond intimate court circles and
eventually became widely known woodblock printed books imitating traditional takuhon, 'stone-rubbing' copies.
At least six woodblock printed models were produced, including an edition with postscript by noted Kokugaku
(National Learning) scholar and poet Katô Chikage (1735–1808). In line with Kokugaku prioritization of
Japanese vernacular literature, this version excludes the Wang letters and reproduces only the waka texts. A
marginal note on the opening sheet notes that this is a reproduction of 'genuine brushwork by Lord Michikaze'
(Michikaze ason shinseki). Such modelbooks (hôjô) made these seminal models widely available and were
crucial instruments in the dissemination of an 'ancient style' in early modern Japan.
Perhaps the most famous recensions of the Akihagi-jô in early modern times are those by Priest Ryôkan (1758–
1831), which were clearly based on the study of takuhon versions and not the original (Figure 8.9). He is known
to have created three versions, but we can assume that he copied it countless times.37 Once again, we can see the
ways in which models can be transformed and how individual idiosyncrasies emerge in the process of copying.
Ryôkan's work, of course, is entirely enjoyable if viewed without recourse to earlier models, and its deliberately
archaic style fits well with what we know about the priest-poet's preference in his verse and calligraphy for an
ancient Man'yôshû style. Nevertheless, familiarity with the original model adds to the connoisseurial enjoyment
of Ryôkan's work. As modern readers, we can imaginatively reconstruct the various strata of performances of
copying underlying Ryôkan's rendition.
In conclusion, the Akihagijô documents the history of calligraphic copying in Japan, from the beginnings in the
Nara period, right up to the modern period. It captures a crucial time in the history of Japanese calligraphy when
members of court society strove to make cursive Chinese characters cooperate with emerging forms of a new
kana syllabary. Reviewing the various sheets of the Akihagijô scroll, whether from the front side, with formal
characters of a Chinese encyclopaedia, or from the reverse side with poems in sôgana or letters in highly cursive
script, we can detect several places where the ink bleeds through to the other side. Especially on the pages with
waka, it is as though different hands and different generations are engaging in a wakan (Japanese–Chinese)
dialectic. We may say that while the original Chinese can stand on its own, its pre-eminent status at a certain
juncture was displaced by the Japanese poetic text.
Conversely, the Japanese characters can never be viewed without the Chinese characters in the background,
serving as a metaphor of the actual history of their mutual evolution. The Akihagijô is telling the story of a
process of the breakdown of orthodox Chinese forms through freehand copies. In the transformation of Chinese
characters into so-called 'Japanese' ones, there was no specific or conscious aesthetic decision that led to the
evolution of a new style. Rather, it was a process of continual transformation in the context of a new literary
salon culture that enjoyed waka as much as verse by Bo Juyi, the Chinese poet par excellence of the Heian court.
It bespeaks several generations of dialogue of a court culture that treated both languages and writing systems as
two sides of the same coin, not as a foreign currency.
Although this chapter has focused on perhaps less than an hour or so of a courtier's (or possibly a court lady's)
calligraphy practice a thousand years or so ago, it is a most instructive document shedding light on the
performance of copying in ancient times. It demonstrates how a 'conforming ethic' had already begun to prevail
in court calligraphy at the earliest stages. It also illustrates how the copying and transmission of models had a
central role in the history of Japanese calligraphy. A palimpsest of transcriptions of classical Chinese text in
formal script, overwritten with copies of ancient Chinese epistolary writing, and Japanese court poetry, the
Akihagijô encapsulates a complex history of the practice of calligraphic copying in ancient Japan. Having a
documented history of being in collections of emperors and aristocrats who were noted calligraphers themselves
and who played central roles in the transmission of models from Heian court into early modern times, in turn it
became a calligraphy model itself, which was endlessly replicated in both manual and mechanical reproduction,
with different levels of fidelity to the original text. Today, it has been elevated to the status of a canonical text in
the East Asian calligraphic tradition, now replicated in numerous editions through photographic reproductions.
Though the technology and motives vary from generation to generation, the impulse to copy remains as strong as
ever.

Author's note

This chapter is a much revised and expanded version of the paper originally presented at the 'History and
Practice of Copying in Japan' conference held at Oxford Brookes University in the autumn of 2001, and I am
greatly indebted to the organizer, Rupert Cox, and other conference participants for their comments and queries
during the discussion session. Subsequent research was carried out in the spring of 2003 at the National Institute
for Japanese Literature in Tokyo, and I am indebted to Suzuki Jun for facilitating my visit. Later that year, a
version of this paper was prepared in Japanese for a research seminar at the Institute organized by Joshua
Mostow and Kuboki Hideo, and benefited from the comments made by seminar participants.

Figure 8.1 Tracing copy after Wang Xizhi, Sanluan tie (J: Sôranjô: Letter on the Disturbances), probably eighth century. Ink on paper; 28.7 × 63.0
cm. Sannomaru Museum, Imperial Household Collection.

Figure 8.2 Freehand copy of a letter by Wang Xizhi by a Japanese calligrapher, from the Akihagijô, probably early eleventh century. Ink on paper;
height 24.1 cm. Tokyo National Museum.
Figure 8.3 Page from the woodblock printed 'Ekisai-bon' version of the Akihagijoo c.1817. From Furuya Minoru, Akihagijô to sôgana no kenkyû
(Tokyo: Nigensha, 1996), p. 218.

Figure 8.4 Manuscript version of a section of the Huainanzi (J: E'nanji: Masters of Huainan), on the reverse side of the Akihagijô, probably a Nara
period transcription of a Sui or Tang dynasty recension. Ink on paper; height 24.1 cm. Tokyo National Museum.
Figure 8.5 Kaô (brush written cipher) of Emperor Fushimi on the seams of the reverse side of Akihagijô. Late thirteenth, early fourteenth century.
Tokyo National Museum. From Furuya, p. 209.

Figure 8.6 Freehand copy of a fragment of a letter by Wang Xizhi by a Japanese calligrapher, from Akihagijô, probably early eleventh century. Ink
on paper; height 24.1cm. Tokyo National Museum.
Figure 8.7 Ink rubbing of a letter by Wang Xizhi. China.

Figure 8.8 Sôgana transcription of anonymous autumn poems from the opening sheet of the Akihagijô, calligraphy traditionally attributed to Ono
no Michikaze. Probably late tenth century. Ink on dyed paper; 24.5 x 24.5 cm. Tokyo National Museum.
Figure 8.9 Priest Ryôkan (1758–1831). Freehand copy of a woodblock printed version of the Akihagijô. Early nineteenth century. Ink on paper.
From Furuya, p. 227.

Figure 8.10 Transcription of two poems from the Kokin wakashû, Book 19 (nos 10 and 11), calligraphy attributed to Fujiwara no Shunzei, late
twelfth–early thirteenth century. Fragment of handscroll remounted as a hanging scroll; ink on paper. Fujii Eikan Bunko, Ritsumeikan University,
Kyoto.

Figure 8.11 Sôgana transcription of anonymous autumn poem from the Akihagijô, calligraphy traditionally attributed to Fujiwara no Yukinari. Ink
on paper; height 23.8 cm. Tokyo National Museum. From Furuya, p. 11.
Figure 8.11A Detail

Glossary of Chinese and Japanese characters

Pinyin romanization is used Chinese words (with Wade-Giles and Japanese romanization given in parentheses).
Akihagijô
Akihagi utamaki
Bo Juyi (Po Chü-I; J: Haku Kyoi)
Byôbu dodai
detchô-bon
dunshou (tung-shou; J: tonshu)
Edo
Fujiwara no Sukemasa (Sari)
Fujiwara no Yukinari (Kôzei)
Fushimi tennô
Hakushi shikan
gan (J: kankai)
Gomizunoo tennô
Gonki
Goyôzei tennô
gyôsho
hairin
Heian
hito
hôjô (C: fatie)
Honnôji gire
Huainan honglie binglue jianggu
(Huai-nan hung-lieh ping-lüeh chien-ku; J: E'nan kôretsu heiryaku kankô)
Huainanzi (Huai-nan tzu; J: E'nanj
Ichijô tennô
Jin (Chin; J: Shin)
jôdaiyô
kagoji
kaisho
kakuten
kanji
kana
kaô
Katô Chikage
kihansei
Kokin wakashû
kokugaku
kokuhô
Kong Shizhong tie (K'ung shih-chung t'ieh; J: Kôjichûjô)
kôsokusei
Lanting xu (Lan-t'ing hsü; J: Ranteijo)
Maeda Ikutoku Kai
man'yôgana
Man'yôshû
michi
Michikaze ason shinseki
mo (C: mo)
mosha
Nara
onna-de
Ono no Michikaze (Tôfû)
Qianziwen (Ch'ien-tsu wen; (J: Senjjmon)
Reigen tennô
renmentai
rin
rinsha
rinsho
Ryôkan
sanseki
shuanggou guotian (J: sôkô kakuten)
sôgana
sôkô tenboku
sô no kana
sôsho
Sui (Sui; J: Zui)
Taizong (T'ai-tsung; J: Taisô)
takuhon
Tang (T'ang; Tô)
tashuren (J: tôshonin)
tenarai
waka
wakan
Wang Xianzhi (Wang Hsien-chih; J: Ôkenshi)
Wang Xizhi (Wang Hsi-chih; J: Ôgishi)
wayô
yaseki
Yueyi lun (J: Gakkiron)
Yu Shinan (Yü Shih-nan; J: Guseinan)
Zhiyong (Chih-yung; J: Chiei)

Notes

1 I have previously discussed some of these ideas of 'conformity' in relationship to calligraphy of a later period in 'Authority and Conformity in
Twelfth-Century Japanese Court Calligraphy'. In Transactions of the 39th International Conference of Orientalists in Japan (1994) (Tokyo: Tôhô
Gakkai, 1995), pp. 60–80. Some of the issues related to copies of Wang Xizhi models are introduced in my doctoral thesis, 'Fujiwara no Yukinari
and the Development of Heian Court Calligraphy', PhD dissertation (Columbia University, 1997).
2 Konishi Jin'ichi. 'Michi no keisei to kairitsuteki sekai' (The Development of Michi [Artistic Vocations] and Regulated Social Systems).
Kokugakuin zasshi 57, No. 5 (September 1956:15–24).
3 Related issues on the role of copying in the case of classical Japanese poetry were raised by Matsumura Yûji in a paper entitled 'Honkadori no
ichi: hyôsetsu to orijinariti no aida' (The Position of Allusive Variation: Between Plagiarism and Originality), presented at the Twelfth Annual
Meeting of the Association of Japanese Literary Studies, 21–23 November 2003, held at the University of California, Los Angeles (publication of
proceedings, forthcoming). See also Rein Raud, Chapter 7, in this volume.
4 Konishi Jin'ichi, 'Michi': chûsei no rinen (Michi [Artistic Vocations]: Ideology of the Medieval Period) (Tokyo: Kôdansha, 1975). 'Conforming
ethic' as a translation of kihansei is found in Konishi Jin'ichi, 'Michi and Medieval Writing', trans. Aileen Gatten. In Earl Miner, ed. Principles of
Classical Japanese Literature (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1985), p. 181.
5 Illustrations of the entire scroll are found in Furuya Minoru, Akihagijô, Vol. 1 of Nihon meiseki sôkan (Compendium of Famous Japanese
Calligraphy) (Tokyo: Nigensha, 1976); more detailed studies have been published by Furuya in his pioneering study Akihagijô ronkô (Studies on
the Akihagijô) (Tokyo: Bokusui Shobô, 1972) and the more recent Akihagijô to sôgana no kenkyû (Research on the Akihagijô and Sôgana) (Tokyo:
Nigensha, 1996), a revised and expanded version of his earlier study, to which this chapter is greatly indebted.
6 Asahi hyakka Nihon no kokuhô (Asaki Encyclopedia of National Treasures of Japan) (Tokyo: Asahi Shinbunsha, 1999), Vol. 1:110.
7 An excellent overview, with illustrated examples, of Chinese (and by extension, Japanese) techniques of calligraphic copying are given in the
introduction to Shen C.Y. Fu, et al. Traces of the Brush: Studies in Chinese Calligraphy (New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 1977); for
the discussion of the shanggou quotian technique, see p. 3.
8 Various examples are discussed in Lothar Ledderose, Mi Fu and the Classical Tradition of Chinese Calligraphy (Princeton: Princeton University
Press, 1979).
9 For a fuller discussion of the use of ink rubbings, see Amy McNair, 'Engraved Calligraphy in China: Recension and Reception', Art Bulletin, Vol.
77, No. 1 (March 1995), 106–14.
10 As an introduction to her analysis of the Yüan painter and calligrapher Wu Zhen (1280–1354), Joan Stanley-Baker poses a number of questions
that a connoisseur might raise concerning calligraphy associated with any master of ancient times. Among the questions she asks: 'How do we
ascertain which, if any, of the attributions to a given master, say Wang Xizhi, may be original?' She continues, 'When no demonstrable prime object
has been established beyond reasonable doubt, how do we ascertain if any of the attributions could be copies of any (lost) prime objects?'; see Joan
Stanley-Baker, Old Masters Repainted: Wu Zhen (1280–1354), Prime Objects and Accretions (Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press, 1995), p.
156. 'Prime objects' is the term (borrowed from George Kubler) Stanley-Baker uses to differentiate genuine and original works from replicas,
attributions, or fakes.
11 The standard study in Japanese is Nakata Yûjirô, Ôgishi o chûshin to suru hôjô no kenkyû (Research on Calligraphy Models with (Tokyo:
Nigensha, 1970). An excellent English-language summary of Wang's role in the history of Chinese calligraphy is provided in Ledderose, Mi Fu,
pp. 12–28.
12 Evidence of Emperor Taizong's own calligraphic style is known only through rubbings made of stelae: Jin ci ming (Inscription for a Chin
Ancestral Hall) and Wenzhuan ming (Inscription for a Hot Spring). The latter is known by a stone rubbing made during the emperor's lifetime,
dated 648, that was among the remarkable cache of manuscripts discovered by Paul Pelliot in 1907 at the Cave of One Thousand Buddhas at
Tunhuang. The two rubbings are reproduced, respectively, in Shodô zenshû (Complete Words of Calligraphy) (Tokyo: Heibonsha, 1954–1968;
reprinted 1982), Vol. 7: pls 86–89 and pls 90–95; see also Léon Long-yien Chang and Peter Miller, Four Thousand Years of Chinese Calligraphy
(Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1990), pp. 249–52.
13 Ledderose, Mi Fu, 25–8.
14 See the special issue of Shoron (Writings on Calligraphy), Vol. 31 (May 1999) devoted to Wang Xizhi letters.
15 Mounted on a scroll with two other tracing copies of short letters by Wang, most literature refers to the entire scroll by the title of the first letter.
The title of the letter has been expansively translated as the 'Letter of Sadness about the Wars which Cause Families to Remain Apart'. In Chang and
Miller, Four Thousand Years of Chinese Calligraphy, p. 283; the text given there reads:
I, Hsi-chih [Xizhi], am writing with reverence. Amidst the extremity of the chaos, my ancestral tombs have once again been ravaged. My heart
goes out toward them, and I wail, rant, and choke to death. I am filled with pain, my heart is broken. Tormented as I am, what can I do? What can I
do? Though they were repaired in no time, I have not had the chance to rush there [to attend to them]. The grief gnaws deeply into me. What can I
do? What can I do? Faced with the paper, choking with tears, I do not know what to say. Yours sincerely, Hsi-chih.
16 Ledderose, Mi Fu, 13.
17 Eugene Wang, 'The Taming of the Shrew: Wang Hsi-Chih (303–361) and Calligraphic Gentrification in Seventh-century China'. In Character
and Context in Chinese Calligraphy, ed. Cary Y. Liu, Dora C. Y. Ching, and Judith G. Smith (Princeton: Art Museum, Princeton University), pp.
132–73.
18 Thomas LaMarre, Uncovering Heian Japan: An Archaeology of Sensation and Inscription (Durham and London: Duke University Press, 2000),
p. 87.
19 Carpenter, pp. 127–32
20 For example, the Fûshin-jô, a letter by Priest Kûkai; or the Kyûkaku-jô, a letter by Priest Saichô. In each of these cases the word jô is added to a
title derived from the opening characters of the manuscript. The Akihagijô is also known as the Akihagi utamaki ('Autumn Bush Clover' poetry
scroll)
21 Translations of various passages of Huainanzi can be found in Thomas Cleary, trans. The Book of Leadership and Strategy: Lessons of the
Chinese Masters (Boston: Shambala, 1990). Unfortunately, the translations in this volume are rather randomly selected arranged and rather
liberally translated to make them seem more relevant to Western readers, but still the gist of the text comes through. An excellent scholarly study of
Huainanzi is found in Griet VanKeerberghen, The Huainanzi and Liu An's Claim to Moral Authority (Albany: State University of New York, 2001).
From reading VanKeerberghen's study we can understand how this text would have indeed been of interest to members of the ruling elite of the
Heian court. That such a text was discarded and reused for calligraphy practice seems all the more inexplicable.
22 The issue of the dating of the Huainanzi text is discussed in Horie, 'Kokuhô Akihagijô den Tôfû hitsu' (National Treasure Akihagi-jô, attributed
to Tôfû [Michikaze]), MUSEUM, No. 162 (Tokyo National Museum), (September 1964). The entry on the Akihagijô in Haruna Yoshishige, ed.
Kohitsu jiten (Kyoto: Sansaisha, 1969) suggests that it is a copy of an pre-Tang version and must be a transcription of a Sui dynasty (581–618)
version.
23 Iijima Tachio, 'Akihagijô sôkoku tenboku ron' (Essay on the Akihagijô and Outline Tracing Technique). Shohin, No. 283 (August 1985), pp. 2–
39.
24 A useful compendium of scholarship on these issues is given in Furuya, Akihagijô to sôgana no kenkyû, pp. 197–201.
25 Furuya Minoru, Akihagijô to sôgana no kenkyû, pp. 166–9; also see Furuya, Akihagijô, pp. 74–5.
26 Carpenter, pp. 156–81.
27 Furuya, Akihagijô to sôgana no kenkyû, p. 170.
28 While sons of courtiers studying calligraphy under their fathers is standard practice, that Yukinari's daughter learned calligraphy from her father
is corroborated by an interesting exchange recorded in Eiga monogatari (A Tale of Flowering Fortunes). On their wedding day, Fujiwara no
Nagaie, the son of Regent Fujiwara no Michinaga, and Yukinari's daughter exchanged prenuptial poems. After reciting Nagaie's poem to his
daughter, Yukinari is said to have noted that the young man wrote in his father's handwriting style. For her response, Yukinari and his wife urged
their daughter to send a reply poem inscribed in her own hand. According to the Flowering Fortunes author, 'When Michinaga saw the poem, he
thought it might have passed for a specimen of Yukinari's own writing, altered just enough to suggest a youthful brush; and his admiration was
beyond description.' Translation from William H. McCullough and Helen Craig McCullough. A Tale of Flowering Fortunes: Annals of Japanese
Aristocratic Life in the Heian Period (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1980), Vol. 2, p. 483.
The author of Flowering Fortunes also makes a special point about how Yukinari's daughter on occasion fell asleep during calligraphy practice,
brush in hand, and sometimes had to be carried to bed by her attendants; see McCullough and McCullough, Flowering Fortunes, p. 484.
29 Komatsu Shigemi, in a significant departure from usual arguments speculated that the sections from the second sheet onwards were a copy of an
original Heian work copied in archaic form by Kamakura period Emperor Fushimi – a theory triggered no doubt by the fact that Fushimi's
handwritten seal is on each sheet at the seams, as is mentioned in the conclusion of this chapter. But it seems that these are indications of
ownership, not of the copyist's. And why Emperor Fushimi would do the copy on the reverse side of the Chinese text is not satisfactorily argued;
see Komatsu Shigemi, 'Akihagijô: Genpon no shutsugen' (Akihagijô: Discovering its Origins), Tokyo Kokuritsu Hakubutsukan kiyô, No. 20 (March
1985), pp. 7–52. In any case, Komatsu's argument was completely refuted by eminent textual scholar Kyûsojin Hitaku in a journal article of the
following year in 'Kana kohitsu (3) kotai kana san shu' (Ancient Fragments of kana; a Collection of Old Forms of kana). Kyûko, No. 10 (December
1986).
30 With thanks to Léon Chang for his assistance with the translation.
31 For an overview of the history of early kana texts, see Christopher Seeley, A History of Writing in Japan (Leiden: E.J. Brill, 1991), pp. 71–4. A
comprehensive chart of Chinese characters used as man'yôgana in provided in Tsukishima Yutaka, Kana, volume 5 of Kana no sekai (Tokyo:
Chûôkôronsha, 1981), pp. 41–3.
32 Kokinshû, Book Four, Autumn I, Nos 220–1.
33 Furuya convincingly argues that the first sheet was originally part of a bound booklet, and that the other sheets have emulated the four-column
format (suitable for book format) even though they were copied onto a scroll.
34 This argument is made, for instance, in Masuda Takashi, Nihon kinsei shoseki seiritsushi no kenkyû (Research in the History of the Development
of Early Modern Japanese Calligraphy) (Tokyo: Bunken Shuppan, 1996), 103. He proposes that this is evidence of a calligrapher performing
rinsho, in this case of a style of writing that is no longer current.
35 Yoshiaki Shimizu and John M. Rosenfield, Masters of Japanese Calligraphy, 8th–19th Century (New York: The Asia Society Galleries and
Japan House Gallery, 1984), pp. 49–50.
36 Furuya, Akihagijô to sôgana no kenkyû, pp. 208–14 deals with this subject.
37 Horie Tomohiko, 'Ryôkan and the Akihagijô', Museum (Tokyo National Museum), No. 169 (April1965). See also the recent catalogue of an
exhibition at Kyôto Bunka Hakubutsukan, supervised by Nagoya Akira, Botsugo 170 nen kinen ten: Ryôkan san (Master Ryôkan: Exhibition
Commemorating the 170th Anniversary of his Death) (Tokyo: Nihon Keizai Shinbun, 2000), especially Nos 43 and 44.

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Heian Period, Stanford: Stanford University Press.
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 Part III
Modern exchanges
 9
Beyond mimesis

Japanese architectural models at the Vienna Exhibition and 1910 Japan British Exhibition
William H. Coaldrake

An architectural model may be defined as a representation of a building made to scale and recreating the
appearance of its materials, style, structure, space and decoration. Mathematical correspondence between model
and architecture is achieved through the use of scaled measurements, typically one-fiftieth for a small model and
one-twentieth or one-tenth for a larger one. From this typical definition it may be argued that architectural
models are merely small-scale 'copies' of full-scale 'original' buildings. This would make architectural models a
case of mimesis, according to Michael Taussig's definition:
the faculty to copy, imitate, make models, explore difference, yield into and become Other. The wonder of mimesis lies in the copy drawing on the
character and power of the original, to the point whereby the representation may even assume that character and power.
(Taussig 1993: xiii)
In this definition Taussig specifically equates models with copies, reinforcing the generally held conception that
an architectural model is a scaled representation of a building and therefore derivative in character.
This study challenges this proposition using evidence from the consummately crafted architectural models made
under the auspices of the Meiji government for display at the international exhibitions in the later nineteenth and
early twentieth centuries. In this age before colour photography, film and television, and, of course, computer
graphics, architectural and engineering models were a highly effective way of communicating complex technical
details and making ideas tangible to the general public. Models proved an important vehicle for representation
and display at the international exhibitions from the very inception of the international exhibitions in 1851. At
the Crystal Palace Exhibition held in London, models were displayed for competition in two specific categories:
Class VII ('Building Apparatuses and Models') and Class XXX ('Sculpture, Models and Plastic Art'). According
to the official catalogue, there were models of windmills, a crane and ships, and representations of Strasburg
Cathedral and part of the roof truss of Hereford Cathedral. There was a large model of the docks and town of
Liverpool and even a model of an Indian temple, by then firmly part of the British Empire (see The Illustrated
Exhibitor, A Tribute to the World's Industrial Jubilee, 1851: vii, 14, 18).
The Japanese embraced the various categories for architectural models at the international exhibitions with
enormous enthusiasm. Forced from the 1860s to reinvent itself as a 'modern civilization' in order to resist the
colonizing pressures of Western nations, a long and rich tradition of architecture became for Japan a vital tool
for countering Western perceptions of Asian inferiority. The architectural model played a particularly important
role in this process. Hundreds were created in Japan for exhibition overseas, some small and delicate, some the
size of a building in their own right.
The focus of this study will be on models displayed by Japan at the Vienna Exhibition of 1873, the first
exhibition at which the Meiji state officially participated, and at the Japan–British Exhibition of 1910 held at
Shepherd's Bush, London. This exhibition marked Japan's acceptance as an empire of equal status to the British
Empire at the end of the Meiji period. This research has been made possible by the author's discovery of two of
the most important models from the Vienna Exhibition and six more models from the 1910 Japan–British
Exhibition. The models from Vienna are of a farmhouse and a regional lord or daimyô's palace. The models
surviving from the Japan–British Exhibition are one-twentieth scale representations of the Golden Hall and Inner
Gatehouse of the seventh-century Buddhist temple of Hôryûji, the Nara-period East Pagoda of Yakushiji, the
Heian-period Phoenix Hall of Byôdôin, and the Momoyama-period Karamon or Ceremonial Gateway from
Daitokuji. The sixth model is a one-tenth scale model of the Taitokuin Mausoleum, built in Edo in 1632 as the
tomb and chapel for the second Tokugawa shogun, Hidetada.
These models will be examined in relation to the written records to establish their technical character and
diplomatic context. On the basis of this architectural and written evidence it will be argued that Japanese
architectural models displayed at these two exhibitions do not support the concept of mimesis and the notion that
'to model' is 'to imitate' or 'to copy'. They were powerful and articulate creations in their own right.
The original Japanese terminology is critical for assessing the character and role of these models. In Japanese the
term now used for model is mokei. It consists of the character meaning 'to copy' or 'imitate', and for 'shape' or
'form,' hence meaning 'copied form'. This linguistic evidence seems to constitute a prima facie case to support a
claim that the architectural model in Japan is a copy. This is, however, entirely misleading because the term
mokei did not exist in the Japanese language until 1871 when it was concocted for the Japanese translation of
Samuel Smiles' Self Help (Smiles 1859; Nakamura 1981:142). Even then it meant 'verisimilitude', referring to
fabricating the appearance of a marble surface in a building using painted wood. Mokei had nothing to do with
architectural models for another thirty years. It was first used in the official rubric for models at the exhibitions
in 1903 for Category 59 of the Fifth Domestic Industrial Exhibition ('art and architectural design and models')
(Ôkuma 2004:3). The explanation for the absence of such a term in Japanese prior to the Meiji period is simple:
such models did not exist in Japan before Western influence in the Meiji period (1868–1912). The concept of the
model as a copy, implied by the direct correspondence between a model and an actual building in terms of
mathematical scale and appearance, that is, 'scaled representation,' had no known part in the long and rich
Japanese architectural tradition.
The reason that the term used for models did not include the concept of copying is that, historically, the practice
of making 'models' in Japan had little to do with making copies of anything. What we would now describe as
models were objects in their own right used as reliquaries, miniature shrines or altars. They were small versions
of generic building types. The oldest examples are haniwa houses of the fifth and sixth centuries, the houses of
village chiefs. These small clay houses were used to decorate the exterior surfaces of the monumental funeral
tumuli of the Kofun period (Shinkenchikugaku iinkai 1999:40–3). They were probably intended to act as an
offering of temporary shelter to the kami or Shinto deities when they came to earth, hence the open doors and
windows to allow easy access. They are works of votive sculpture as much as architectural modelling, possibly
influenced by the Chinese practice in the Han dynasty of making small representations of farmhouses in clay to
accompany people into the afterlife.
There was a strong tradition of using the pagoda form, or its antecedent the watchtower, as an object for worship
in China, for example in the Buddhist cave temples of Dun Huang carved from the limestone or sandstone of the
cliffs. In Japan from the seventh century, under Buddhist and Chinese influence, pagoda and temple halls forms
were used as altars to hold sacred objects. These were made in clay, iron or in wood. Many are more like
sculpture than architecture. Even in those cases in which architectural forms are represented accurately, this was
usually confined to the exterior only. One of the best-known examples is the small pagoda at Kairyûôji, dating to
c.730, convincing to the outside view but propped up inside by creative use of criss-crossing struts that do away
with any pretensions to architectural accuracy (Matsumoto 1990:19–20; Shinkenchikugaku iinkai 1999:134). In
the case of the mid-late-seventh century Tamamushi Shrine (zushi) of Hôryûji, only the roof is credible
architecturally. The one surviving example of a small pagoda dating from the Nara period that has a credible
architectural interior is found at Gangyôji. It stands an impressive 5.6 metres in height and was probably used as
the one-tenth scale 'model' for the temple's actual large-scale pagoda (Matsumoto 1990:20; Shinkenchikugaku
iinkai 1999:144, Figure 5.39). This is a model made as an original design exercise, not as a copy of an existing
building. In fact, it was used in the same way that Michelangelo made a wooden model of the dome of St Peter's
Basilica to experiment with structure and space. In both cases the smaller version was not a copy of a larger
building. Rather, the building was a large-scale representation of the model.
Apart from this one known exception, small buildings in Japan did not conform to the definition of a model as a
scaled representation of an actual building. They were archetypes, sculptural in character and ritual in purpose.
Each in its own way was an original performance both in its making and in its ritual function. These objects may
draw power from the outside reference points of building typologies, one of Taussig's criteria for mimesis, but
they were never copies of specific buildings. Smaller size did not diminish their independent stature as
individual creations. As James Dickey has argued in relation to Shinto shrines, 'it is the form rather than the size
that is important; spirit is not involved in size or interested in it' (Dickey 1994:151).
With this historical background in mind, we can turn to the two recently discovered models from the 1873
Vienna Exhibition. Here we find conformity with the tradition of models as archetypes, both in the terminology
used and the character of the surviving models.
The Weiner Weltausstelling, the 'Universal Exhibition 1873 in Vienna', as it was translated in official
publications (hereafter referred to as the Vienna Exhibition), was the first international exhibition at which the
Meiji Government officially participated. The Japanese saw the Vienna Exhibition as a crucial opportunity to
establish the standing of their government and Japan as a nation and a sophisticated civilization on the
international stage.
As with all the international exhibitions, there were strictly defined categories of objects for display and
competition. There were two main categories in which architectural models were called for. The official list of
objects displayed at the Vienna Exhibition reveals that Japan entered models of traditional buildings in both
categories.
The first group in which Japan displayed architectural models was Group 19, 'the private dwelling house, its
inner arrangement and decoration:
Models, drawings and finished buildings representing dwelling-houses of civilized nations; Drawings, models and examples of thoroughly
furnished apartments'.
(Universal Exhibition 1873 in Vienna, 1873:5)
The official Japanese catalogue (Tôkyô kokuritsu bunkazai kenkyûjo 1997:177) lists the following models as
displayed in Group 19:
19–1 Model of a Warrior Residence (Buke hinagata)
19–2 Model of a Merchant's Residence (Shônin jûka hinagata)
19–3 Model of a Merchant's Shop (Shôninten hinagata)
19–4 Model of a Merchant's Storehouse (Shônin dozô hinagata)
Model of an Aristocrat's Residence (Shokôtei)
The second group in which Japan entered architectural models was group 20, 'the farm-house, its arrangements,
furniture and utensils':
Finished buildings, models and drawings of farm-houses of the different nations of the world; Drawings, models and examples of peasant rooms,
furnished and fitted out with their furniture and apparatus.
(Universal Exhibition 1873 in Vienna 1873:5)
The official Japanese catalogue lists the following models (Tôkyô kokuritsu bunkazai kenkyûjo 1997:180):
20–1 Model of a Farmhouse and attached Horse stables (Nôka hinagata, Hiraya umaya-tsuki)
20–2 Farm Outhouse, Farm Storehouse (Mono-oki) (Nôka dozô)
The list again gives the workshop of Musashiya Kanekichi of Tokyo as the supplier.
It is highly significant that these models are called hinagata in the official list. Use of the term hinagata at
Vienna to translate 'model' (German: modelle) reflected a lingering sense of architectural models as archetypes,
not scaled representation of actual buildings. Hinagata was a term used extensively in the Edo period (1600–
1868) for the hinagatabon or 'pattern books' of architectural types. These books were printed in large numbers to
facilitate reconstruction of Edo after the Meireki Fire of 1657, particularly its daimyô yashiki, the palatial
residences of the powerful regional lords. The term comes into use in this sense when the master builders
published books of design in the mid-seventeenth century. Examples such as the Shôke hinagata of 1658 were
intended as pattern books or exemplars of ideal building design.
Two Japanese architectural models are preserved in the collection of the Museum of Ethnology in Vienna. The
first of these models consists of three main parts which, placed together, is 3.03 metres wide and 4.58 metres
long. The model represents the main ceremonial and residential buildings of a typical Edo city daimyô palace,
surrounded by outhouses and approached through an impressive gatehouse with twin guardhouses (Figure 9.1). A
label pasted onto the centre of the front gatehouse section identifies the model as '19–1 buke hinagata', leaving
no doubt that this is the daimyô palace model from the 1873 Vienna Exhibition.
The second model represents a farmhouse and associated buildings (Figure 9.2). It is in four separate parts, each
structure mounted on its own base: the main building with brilliantly 'downsized' straw thatch for its three main
roofs, and a separate storehouse, outhouse and stable. These match the four parts listed in the official catalogue
for display as items 20–1 and 20–2. The farmhouse is identical in every respect to the farmhouse model in the
photograph of the model taken before it was sent to Vienna. The model of the outhouse building also matches the
outhouse shown in the photograph. This section retains the original label from the Vienna Exhibition glued to the
front of the base, identifying it as '20–2. Mono-oki hinagata'.
Examination of the extant models revealed that they are generic types, not scaled representations of actual
buildings. The model of the daimyô palace compound is stylistically sanitized, devoid of any specific identifying
features except those indicating high status. The farmhouse, which would normally display distinct regional
characteristics, is a strangely generic building rather than one that can be identified with a specific part of Japan.
It is a form of chûmon-zukuri but with the shorter part of the 'L' shape strangely foreshortened. The emphasis is
on the high status of the owner by furnishing the building with a shoin reception room complete with tatami mats
and tokonoma and a formal genkan entrance for important visitors, not in creating a convincing regional identity
or association with any particular family.
These models were, therefore, archetypes in keeping with the traditional character of architectural models. The
model of the daimyô palace, in particular, was consciously created as an example of ideal form in order to
address the formal requirement for entries in group 19 for 'models … representing the dwelling-houses of
civilized nations'. This goes to the very purpose of the use of models by Japan at Vienna. It was to prove to the
West that Japan was a 'civilized' nation, but it still did so in terms of Edo civilization. Western-style architecture
would soon replace historical forms as the Meiji ideal of civilization.
There was to be a fundamental change in both the terminology and the character of Japanese architectural
models at the Japan–British Exhibition held in London a generation later in 1910. Models became precisely
scaled representations of specific buildings, not idealized types. For the first time at an international exhibition
at which Japan participated, the venerable term hinagata was replaced with the new Meiji term mokei, signifying
this change in character. In 1910 models of historical Japanese buildings were created in terms of the Western
criteria for model-making, that is, for scaled representation of actual full-size buildings. Even under these
circumstances, however, it will be shown that Japanese models were a complex phenomenon in which the
reference point to a building was incidental to their character and purpose.
In 1910 the Japanese set out to demonstrate to the British that they had become a modern empire with advanced
technology balanced by long and sophisticated traditions. Accordingly, numerous models were displayed of both
recent and past achievements. For example, the Imperial Japanese Department of Communications exhibited a
model of a brick and masonry post office with impressive arches and a miniature motor truck outside making
mail deliveries, an important symbol of modern communications and government services (Official Report of
the Japan British Exhibition 1910 at the Great White City, Shepherd's Bush, London, 1911:311). Another model
showed major civil engineering works used to stabilize the deforested hillsides surrounding the famous pottery
town of Seto (Official Report of the Japan British Exhibition 1910 at the Great White City, Shepherd's Bush,
London, 1911:307). Three one-twelfth scale models of dreadnoughts, the great strategic weapons of the years of
the arms race leading up to the Second World War, were also displayed to leave no doubt about the strength of
Japan's navy, a point not lost on the British as the Japanese had sunk the Russian fleet in 1905.
As the essential historical and cultural counterbalance to the representations of 'modern' Japan, the Japanese
government, through the work of the Imperial Commission and Count Mutsu Hirokichi, sponsored the creation
of a scientifically precise and superbly crafted set of thirteen scale models of traditional buildings (Figure 9.3).
The Official Report of the Exhibition explains that:
for the first time in the exhibitions in which it has taken part the Japanese Government undertook to illustrate all the different styles of Japanese
buildings in a complete set of models. The exhibition at the White City in this department was so complete that the whole history of Japanese
architecture was made comprehensive by means of elaborate and faithful reproductions of famous buildings of every description.
(Official Report of the Japan British Exhibition 1910 at the Great White City, Shepherd's Bush, London, 1911:169)
This use of a set of models was unprecedented in the history of the exhibitions. The Japanese presented a set of
models that included some of the most important works of the Japanese architectural heritage, particularly works
of Buddhist temple architecture (Office of the Imperial Japanese Government Commission to the Japan–British
Exhibition, 1910:44–7, Figures 195–211; Nôshômusho 1912:419–21). This was a representative selection in
terms of the understanding of the field and Japanese architectural history at the time. In the late Meiji period
there was a preoccupation with Buddhist temple architecture, with little attention to Shinto architecture,
strengthened by the growing opportunities for field work on Buddhist sites on the Asian mainland, including the
cave temples of northern China. No castle architecture and no daimyô palaces of the type shown earlier in Vienna
were included either. These had been demolished by the Meiji state as remnants of a discredited feudal regime
and to show them at London would have been counter-productive. Today, this selection would be viewed as
unbalanced, but it fairly reflected the cutting edge of architectural knowledge in Japan in 1910 and the
diplomatic priorities.
The reaction from architectural and craft specialists to these models was ecstatic. The Illustrated Carpenter and
Builder of 1 July 1910, stated that:
The student of architecture does not, as a rule, give much attention to the architecture of the Far East…(this is) to be regretted… The Japan-British
Exhibition at Shepherd's Bush affords students of architecture an opportunity of remedying to some extent any deficiencies of which they may be
conscious in their knowledge of an interesting phase of architectural history. The series of models exhibited in the Palace of Fine Arts are not only
remarkably fine examples of model making, but they show with much greater vividness than any pictures or descriptive writing the characteristic
design and construction of the ancient Japanese builders
(Mutsu 2002:98)
For all their technical and aesthetic brilliance, these models were to be surpassed by the model of the shogunal
mausoleum prepared by the city of Tokyo. This was a model of the Taitokuin Mausoleum, built in 1632 in the
city of Edo and one of the finest examples of Tokugawa architecture. In 1909, when the Exhibition was planned,
the mausoleum was the one of the most important architectural treasures of the city of Tokyo, spectacular for its
architectural flamboyance and the exuberant sculptures of dragons and tigers with which it was decorated. The
mausoleum was to be destroyed in the fire-bombing of Tokyo in 1945 but the model has recently been
rediscovered dismantled in storage in the British Royal Collection.
In 1910 the model was displayed together with the model of the city of Tokyo (Figure 9.4). The black-and-white
photograph showing it at the exhibition does not, of course, do justice to either its spectacular use of gold and
colour or its sheer size. It occupied an area equivalent to almost half a tennis court. It stood a commanding three
metres in height, including its specially prepared stand, so that visitors could look up under the eaves at the
ornamental sculpture in the same way they would have gazed up at the eaves decoration of the building. At a
scale of one-tenth of the original building, the model was two to three times larger than any of the models in the
historical set of thirteen models.
Paul Greenhalgh has argued that Japan's preoccupation with presenting itself as an empire was first expressed at
the Japan–British Exhibition in 1910 following victory in the Russo–Japanese War (Greenhalgh 1988:74). With
empire came the need to demonstrate understanding of the Western idea of scientific accuracy. Making models
that were precisely scaled and accurate in detail furthered this diplomatic end. The official report for the
exhibition makes a particular point of stating that, 'unlike previous models, these were scientifically accurate'
(Nôshômushô 1912:419).
The ideal of scientific accuracy was achieved by creating models representing actual buildings to scale, a
concept alien to the Japanese tradition of small architecture or of hinagata ideal types displayed at international
exhibitions until then. The municipal governments of Tokyo and Osaka went as far as producing scaled models
of their entire cities. The model of Osaka was 'on an exact scale' and included:
more than fifty different models of houses showing the different sizes and styles of architecture… So accurate was the scale and so faithful the
copy that any one living in that city could almost point our the exact location of his house.
(Official Report of the Japan British Exhibition 1910 at the Great White City, Shepherd's Bush, London, 1911:275)
It seems likely that the term mokei came into general use at the Japan–British Exhibition to describe this new
type of 'scientifically accurate' architectural model of actual buildings.
How was this scientific accuracy achieved? The model of the Karamon of Daitokuiji was returned to Japan in
1911 and is now preserved in the collection of the Tokyo National University of Fine Arts and Music (Figure
9.5). The front of the base proudly bears a bronze plaque that states in English: 'Restored and Directed by S.
Kameoka, Architect, Kyoto Japan. 1909'. Kameoka Suekichi was one of the architects responsible for preparing
the working drawings for making the set of thirteen historical models (Nôshômushô 1912:419–20). His use of
the title 'architect' establishes that he was trained in the Western-style architectural profession established in the
1970s as the tool for transplanting Western-style architecture as the built environment for the Meiji state. The
Western-style training he brought to the project was the measuring of the actual buildings represented and the
drafting of detailed working drawings from which the master carpenters made the actual model. In other words,
the original Japanese building is presented in this model through the medium of a Western architectural training
in order to meet the expectation of the Western audience in London for scientifically accurate models
representing full-size buildings to scale. A complete set of drawings for the Phoenix Hall of Byôdôin does
survive in the collection of the Tokyo National University of Fine Arts and Music. Although these are drawn to
one-tenth scale, and the surviving model from 1910 is to one-twentieth scale, the drawings confirm that the
practice of making detailed technical drawings of historic buildings was well established in the Meiji period.
They are labelled in English 'plan' section, elevation, scale, etc. Japan was consciously and conscientiously
adopting the international conventions for architectural drafting. These drawings were made as part of the
training in Western architecture at Tôkyô Bijutsu Gakkô, the predecessor to the Tokyo National University of
Fine Arts and Music. It was this training that enabled the creation of accurately scaled models for display in
London.
But these models should not be defined first and last as scaled representation. They were far more. The Taitokuin
Mausoleum Model in particular was stylistically and technically everything that the West had come to expect of
Japanese decorative arts, made using the gold and lacquer techniques which had such an impact on the West
when introduced a half century earlier on golden screens and ornamented lacquerware. It may have been
conceived as a model but it was a veritable tour de force of the Japanese architectural and decorative arts in its
own right. As the Official Report notes, it was 'very highly admired as a work of art, with its tiny bronze tiles
covering artistically shaped roofs and with the exquisite work in lacquer with which the whole structure was
decorated' (Official Report of the Japan British Exhibition 1910 at the Great White City, Shepherd's Bush,
London, 1911:275).
Similar praise was lavished on the smaller architectural models. Significantly, the Official Report states 'not only
do such models serve their prime purpose to show the different styles of architecture of Japan, but the
workmanship is so excellent that they are all interesting as works of art in themselves' (Official Report of the
Japan British Exhibition 1910 at the Great White City, Shepherd's Bush, London, 1911:179). Here we have first-
hand accounts revealing that the Japanese models were regarded by their intended audience as something far
more than simply scaled copies of actual buildings. They may have achieved their purpose of satisfying a
Western audience with their scientific accuracy in representing full-size buildings, but this role was transcended
by their standing as works of art and craft representing Japanese civilization as a whole.
The concept of mimesis, and its implication of copying, therefore, does not explain the phenomenon of Japanese
architectural models displayed at the 1873 and 1910 exhibitions. These models transcend, even defy, the label of
'copy' even though the 1910 exhibition models undoubtedly have actual works of architecture as their initial
point of reference. We have seen that these models offered their own vicarious excursion into the heartland of
traditional Japanese civilization as well as their own performance of traditional hereditary building practice in a
fresh act of creation to fashion objects that were admired as works of art and applied technology. They also
served as tools of diplomacy as handmaidens of empire. But the power they projected was not based on the
power of the buildings they represented, as Taussig's concept of mimesis would imply. Their international
audiences, belonging to the days of restricted travel, would not have even known the buildings to which they
referred, and, as we have seen, evaluated the models as objects in their own right, as surrogates of civilization
not architectural copies. Even the power and authority projected by these models was different from that of their
architectural reference points. It was national and imperial, rather than religious or shogunal, as in the case of the
Taitokuin Mausoleum model. In their use of architectural models the Japanese in 1873 and 1910 rejected the
demeaning international stereotypes of rampant Orientalism by attempting to control the construction of their
own identity.

Figure 9.1 Model of a daimyô palace made for display at the 1873 Vienna Exhibition. Main building for ceremonial audiences with interior sliding
screens visible. Museum of Ethnology, Vienna. Photograph by the author.

Figure 9.2 Model of a farmhouse with thatched roofs. Museum of Ethnology, Vienna. Photograph by the author.

Figure 9.3 The historical architectural models on display at the Japan–British Exhibition, London, 1910. Source: Nôshômushô (1912).
Figure 9.4 Model of the Taitokuin Shogunal Mausoleum on display in the City of Tokyo gallery at the Japan–British Exhibition, London, 1910.
Source: Nôshômushô (1912).

Figure 9.5 Model of the Karamon of Daitokuji, Japan–British Exhibition, London, 1910. The University Art Museum, Tokyo National Museum of
Fine Arts and Music. Photograph by the author.

Acknowledgements

The author wishes to thank for their assistance Professor Masato Satsuma of the University Art Museum, Tokyo
National University of Fine Arts and Music, and Dr Bettina Zorn of the Museum of Ethnology, Vienna.

Bibliography

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Manchester University Press.
Hendry, Joy (2000) The Orient Strikes Back: A Global View of Cultural Display, New York: Berg.
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Matsumoto, Shûji (1990) Chiisana kenchiku, Nara: Kokuritsu Nara bunkazai kenkyûjo.
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Nakamura, Masanao (1981) Saigoku risshihen, Tokyo: Kôdansha gakujutsu bunkô.
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Nôshômushô (1912) Nichiei hakurankai jimukyoku jimuhôkokusho, Tokyo: Toppan insatsu.
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Universal Exhibition 1873 in Vienna (1873) 'Classification and Divisions', Gaimushô Archives, Tokyo.
 10
Copying Kyoto

The legitimacy of imitation in Kyoto's townscape debates

Christoph Brumann

Copying, culture, and anthropology

As there is no shadow without light, there is also no copy without an original. Social/cultural anthropologists can
be argued to be biased towards copying by profession: their studies focus on the repetitive patterns in human
activitiy – culture and social institutions – and how we produce, and are influenced by them. Human beings
depend heavily on imitation: without copying ourselves, we would lack the consistency that allows us to see
ourselves as stable, distinct personalities; without copying others with unmatched alertness, we would have great
difficulty in communicating and acting efficiently among our peers, and even mere survival might be
impossible. Thoroughly cultural beings that we are, almost everything of what we say and do is copied in a more
or less conscious way, and if we were to think of a truly original way of doing all the things we do – starting with
how to tie our shoestrings – we would hardly get anything done at all. Even when we try to be original, we often
do so by copying an unlikely model. Rapping a scientific conference paper to the sound of a hip-hop track, for
instance, would probably be thought of as a creative (if questionable) idea, but its originality rests on imitation
out of context, rather than invention from scratch. Thus, while an innovative idea underlies every instance of
cultural change, claims of originality and authenticity are natural suspects to the anthropological gaze. And
instead of deciding themselves whether specific human creations deserve to be considered original, authentic, or
unique, anthropologists often feel more at ease on a meta-level, studying the social contexts of such claims.

The townscape disputes in Kyoto

Precisely this jump – or escape – onto the metal-level is what I will attempt in the following, considering the
debate on the townscape and architectural heritage that the people of Kyoto have engaged in. Particularly since
the 1980s, discussing the built environment has expanded beyond specialist circles, becoming a major pastime
for many inhabitants. Kyoto survived the war almost unscathed, with more than 90 per cent of the buildings still
being wooden and in traditional style. The former imperial capital's temples, shrines, palaces, and gardens are
the most famous collection of historical Japanese architecture, attracting millions of tourists and contributing
greatly to Kyoto's reputation as the nation's traditional centre and "spiritual home town" (Nihon no kokoro no
furusato). Since the 1960s, however, the city has been increasingly transformed, and the "bubble years" of
frenzied land speculation prior to 1991 saw modern structures shooting up everywhere. Almost everyone in
Kyoto sees the townscape in a critical condition.
Citizens have not kept calm about this: repeatedly, large-scale buildings projects have met with vociferous
opposition, resulting in the so-called "townscape disputes" (keikan ronsô). Height has been particularly
controversial, as Kyoto's vistas depend on the scenic hills surrounding the city. Thus, high-rise structures such as
the Kyoto Tower in the 1960s and the new railway station complex and the rebuilt Kyoto Hotel around 1990 were
ferociously embattled. The protests by citizens' groups, professional associations, political parties, and Buddhist
clergy, however, did not stop these projects, and while the desire for representative architecture has cooled down,
conflicts over manshon (high-rise condominiums, from "mansion") have, if anything, intensified. A sizeable
movement has also arisen for the preservation of pre-war architecture, both vernacular and Western-style.
Frequently, ideas about originality and copying, authenticity and spuriousness have become important in these
activities. Building on nineteen months of ethnographic fieldwork in 1998–99 and 2001,1 I will introduce three
such cases in the following. Then, I will attempt a social anatomy of copying architecture in Kyoto and Japan in
general, asking what is culturally specific about it and what is not.

The Pont des Arts affair

The first case is that of the Pont des Arts, a small Parisian footbridge over the Seine near the Louvre. A single
day after meeting French president Jacques Chirac in November 1996, the mayor of Kyoto, Masumoto Yorikane
from the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP), announced their joint decision to have a copy of that bridge built over
the Kamogawa river in Kyoto. Not only would this bridge answer the allegedly long-standing plea of local
residents for an additional connection, it would also create a new attraction for Kyoto's ailing tourist industry. As
the "French Year in Japan" and the fortieth anniversary of the sister city relationship between Paris and Kyoto
were scheduled for 1998, the bridge plan was approved by all the prescribed administrative bodies at an
exceptional speed.
From summer 1997 on, however, a massive protest movement arose, first in the form of meetings, symposiums,
and petitions, and then turning to demonstrations and to political measures such as lobbying for holding a
referendum about the fate of the bridge. After the French newspaper Le Monde criticized Chirac's bridge plan on
its front page (Pons 1997), Kyoto's newspapers also started to take up the theme. The opposition movement grew
larger than in earlier townscape conflicts, including an unprecedented number of women and young people and
also quite a few of the mayor's usual allies. Disappointing election results for LDP-backed candidates added to
Masumoto's plight so in August 1998, the unthinkable happened: a fully budgeted public work (kôkyô jigyô) was
withdrawn. The protest movement celebrated a victory that was given landmark character by mass media all over
Japan (Kimura 1999). As I have argued elsewhere (Brumann 2002), the bridge was scheduled to be built on
public ground, not on private property as in the earlier conflicts, so people felt less inhibited to speak out.
Even so, a smaller number of people would have protested were it not for the sheer number of problems
associated with the bridge project. Damage to the famous vistas of the wooden houses lining the river and the
distant Kitayama mountains, a negative influence on the nearby geisha quarter Pontochô (field site of Dalby
1983), or the character of the decision process aroused contention. Yet the fact that this was the double of
another, still existing bridge, and a foreign bridge at that, was most widely denounced, being targeted by the
simple slogan "gaikoku no hashi wa iranai" ("we don't need a foreign bridge"). The copy aspect also invited
suggestions to retaliate in kind, for example by the more than 800 prominent artists and intellectuals from all
over Japan who signed a protest petition. One compared the plan to o-chazuke (a rice dish – Kyoto's favourite
breakfast) served with mayonnaise; others asked if we could expect a five-storeyed pagoda right next to the Arc
de Triomphe or a copy of the Kinkakuji (the famous Golden Pavillon) on the Champs-Elysées as a return. A
poster transplanting Kyoto's Sanjô bridge into a Parisian scenery was also widely used.
It is somewhat ironic that the antagonists agreed that the planned bridge really was a copy. If alone for the
smaller width of the Kamogawa, the original Pont des Arts (Figure 10.1, top photo) and the bridge planned for
Kyoto (central images) look rather distinct. Confronted with resistance, the mayor played down the copy aspect,
announcing that the Kyoto bridge would not be strictly identical to the Pont des Arts but would rather be "based
on its ideals". In addition, he had several designs for the bridge walkway and illumination exhibited and put to
the vote of those interested, with the most "Japanese" design predictably winning. One professor of urban
planning I interviewed guessed that the bridge would have been realized without any problems had it not been
called a copy. Once Masumoto had ventured so far, however, the copy aspect could not be withdrawn entirely
without estranging the French side. And understandably, the protest movement had no reason to question that this
was a copy. After the mayor's triumphant re-election in April 2000, the plan to build a footbridge was revived: an
advisory council (shingikai) of experts met for more than two years, failing in the end to make up its mind
whether there should be a footbridge or not. Copying an existing bridge, however, was no longer discussed.

The Daiichi kangyô branch office case

Only a few months after the withdrawal of the Pont des Arts, it became known that the Daiichi kangyô bank
intended to demolish its Kyoto branch office. Erected in 1906, this third oldest bank building in Japan (Figure
10.1, bottom photo) was designed by architect Tatsuno Kingo (1854–1919), one of the founders of the trade
whose countless works also include the Central Station and the Bank of Japan building in Tokyo. To their
surprise, preservationists soon learned that the building would not disappear entirely. With the plot being located
in a section of Sanjô street that has been designated a kaiwai keikan seibi chiku ("townscape realignment area")
because of its numerous fine pre-war Western-style buildings, Kyoto City's Department of Town Planning had
managed to talk the company into rebuilding a structure with an identical exterior. The benefits for the bank
would be a modern reinforced-concrete building more resistant to earthquakes and the partition of the high
ground floor in two, resulting in an additional storey. Less happy than the town planners, however, were
researchers, several citizens' groups, and also Kyoto City's Cultural Property Office which had tried in vain (pace
Finn 1995:195) to get the bank's consent for protecting the building as a cultural property (bunkazai). None of
these opponents accepted the idea that the copy would be a full equivalent, and the general approach – denounced
as "replica preservation" (repurika hozon) – was widely criticized. Protest assemblies, petitions, media coverage,
and meetings with the bank's CEOs, however, failed their objective, and in May 1999, the old building was
demolished. Its copy is under construction as of 2003.
From the plans presented to the public, it is clear that this copy will be much closer to the original than that of
the Pont des Arts. And in contrast to the bridge, it will not be the double of an original that exists elsewhere but
the reconstruction of a previous, lost original in the same location. Few people in Kyoto question the general
legitimacy of such copying; the new Kinkakuji building that replaced the original lost to a fire in 1950, for
instance, is not a bunkazai but widely visited and admired. What is criticized is the deliberate destruction of an
original on the grounds that a copy is just as well. In contrast to the Pont des Arts affair, however, the Daiichi
kangyô case failed to develop broad public appeal, partly because of consent to the town planners' reasoning and
partly because the ground is privately owned. Also, the building was in Western style and thus, in a sense, a copy
right from the start, following the Queen Anne style that Tatsuno had seen in Great Britain (Finn 1995:194–5).
Today, such stylistic imitation is not publicly held against the Western-style buildings (yôkan) from the pre-war
period. Instead, they are celebrated as original works and protected as historical heritage whenever possible.
They are not perceived as particularly Japanese, however, as came out repeatedly in informants' remarks. And
accordingly, when asking informants to sort a set of building photos according to their personal preferences, I
found Japanese-style architecture of the same Meiji period somewhat more highly valued among Kyotoites.

The kyô-machiya renaissance

With the third case, we leave the field of single originals and enter that of a whole class of originals, that of the
kyô-machiya. Machiya means and is written with the characters for "town house"; any traditional urban dwelling
in Japan would be called by this name. Consistent with the historical rank of the city, Kyoto's machiya – the kyô-
machiya – are believed to be the best in terms of craftsmanship and refinement. The variant considered most
characteristic is that of the unagi no nedoko, the "bedchamber of eels": a whole series of interconnected
structures, interspersed with gardens, extend over the typically long and narrow plots, with the shop building
facing the street and the dwelling section behind. Larger families than today, live-in maids, and apprentices
might add up to more than twenty inhabitants in some cases. Less affluent houses had all rooms and functions
under a single roof, and lowest on the social scale were the apartments partitioned off within a single, elongated
machiya called nagaya ("long house"). Pronounced social distinctions reigned also within the houses: the rigid
hierarchies of the ie ("house") system prescribed in great detail who was to sit where, use which room, and enter
which entrance at which occasion. Stylistic uniformity was safeguarded by the fact that a single master carpenter
(tôryô) regularly inspected all of all the sometimes numerous buildings of a specific owner, calling in
specialized craftsmen if need be.
Kyoto's machiya survived the war intact, but afterwards, the tide turned against them. Under the onslaught of
new construction codes hostile to timber and of the Westernization of material culture, they became seen as dark,
uncomfortable, and unhygienic fire hazards; too cold in winter, too hot in summer, impossible to maintain at
cost, and unsuited to a modern lifestyle. While machiya were hidden behind Westernized mock façades at first,
demolition became the preferred treatment, particularly during the "bubble years". From 1983 to 1993 alone, the
number of pre-war buildings in Kyoto was halved,2 with more lucrative alternatives such as parking lots or high-
rise manshon replacing them. There are still almost 30,000 machiya in central Kyoto, but with about 1,000 torn
down every year, their days appeared counted until the new millennium.
In the 1990s, however, there was an astonishing revival of interest in these houses. Several hundreds of machiya
have been renovated for nontraditional commercial purposes such as galleries, restaurants, or souvenir shops.
The number of residents who have their old machiya remodelled into modern, comfortable homes is also
growing. Several citizens' groups uniting residents, architects, craftsmen, planners, researchers, and other fans
have formed, raising the general awareness of these houses and providing model renovations and mediation
services. Special openings, concerts, and exhibitions in machiya, as well as seminars and other social activities
featuring them, find a wide audience and are amply covered by the mass media. Hardly a month goes by without
a new book on machiya appearing. I never heard anyone doubt that these houses are important, represent what is
best about Kyoto, and should be preserved and revitalized. Effective action is lagging behind greatly, running
into an intricate maze of technical, social, judicial, and psychological obstacles (Brumann 2001a). For the time
being, this means that the machiya continue to disappear. Still, something like a landslide in public
consciousness has occurred within little more than a decade. To revalue the existing stock may be a natural trend
in an economic crisis, and the interest in vernacular architecture is growing nationwide. Yet even so, the Kyoto
machiya boom astonishes even its most long-standing supporters.

Original, altered original, copy, and citation among the kyô-machiya

A class of originals, such as the kyô-machiya, is somewhat different from a singular original, such as the Pont
des Arts in Paris or the Daiichi kangyô building. Contrary to them, the members of a class of originals – such as
Louis XV furniture, Art Deco lamps, English gardens, or pashmina shawls – can themselves be seen as copies.
This is because they follow an established prototype – existing in actual fact or imagined in the producer's mind
– and are cherished mainly for doing so, not so much for what is specific to them as individual objects. However,
not just any copy will do. The times, places, forms, materials, and/or methods for making a legitimate copy are
restricted, often to some period of time in the past. Although the single individual creator of most art works is
not required, the circle of legimitate producers may also be circumscribed; authentic Shaker chairs, for instance,
must have been made by Shakers. Often, there is a combination of such limiting conditions, each of which may
lack a watertight, unchallenged definition. This greatly increases the possibility of contested members of classes
of originals, and people will often disagree about how to distinguish the legitimate copies – the "original copies",
so to speak – from the illegitimate ones – the "copied copies" (e.g. modern reproductions of Shaker chairs).
The least contested members of the class of originals formed by the kyômachiya are pre-war, unaltered dwellings
constructed in traditional style (Figure 10.2, top left). In fact, the copy character is quite strong here, with façade
elements, general layout, and room order being largely standardized. Besides, the tatami, i.e. the rice-straw mats
covering the floor of buildings in traditional style, had a uniform size. Thus, it is usually possible to transplant
components from one machiya to the other. In addition, neighbourhoods would determine their own building
codes in the Tokugawa Era (1603–1868), with often rather detailed rules about façade design. Thus, while there
was considerable conspicuousness and experimentation in the streets of Kyoto at the start of the period (Salastie
1999:52), style and design had become rather uniform when almost all machiya had to be rebuilt after a large fire
in 1864.
Present-day architectural activity produces two types of deviations from these "original copies", and both of
them are contested, finding supporters as well as opponents. One consists of the alterations made when
renovating formerly residential machiya for commercial purposes. This often requires that rooms are combined
into a few large ones accessible to people in street shoes, so partitions are removed, crossbeams are cut and
tatami-covered raised floors are replaced by tiled floors at ground level. Façades are less likely to be changed;
here, replacing the wooden lattices (kôshi) on the ground floor or the barred window (mushiko mado) on the
upper floor with large window panes is most common. While this is often accepted as inevitable, more rejection
and even scorn is provoked when there are non-functional additions such as little turrets, stained-glass windows
(Figure 10.2, top right), or gaudy colours. These make the buildings cute (kawaii) and more conspicuous,
enhancing their commercial potential, but they are certainly out of touch with received ideals. Nobody denies
that these buildings once were kyô-machiya, but for some critics, they can no longer claim to be so now.
The second deviation from the intact "original copies" is produced by people who challenge the tacit but
widespread assumption that the period for building authentic machiya has ended with the war. Instead, they claim
to create new machiya, "machiya for the 21st century", as one newspaper advertisement phrases it. The president
of the small company behind the advertisement said that he knows full well that what he proposes is rather
distinct from traditional machiya, being in essence a modern prefabricated house (Figure 10.2, centre left). Still,
as someone who laments the current disarray of the townscape, he takes up the traditional emphasis on linearity
and uses some timber. While many see this as an insufficient marketing ploy, this is less so in the case of the
houses built by a kimono dealer and self-taught architect. He constructs a traditional timber frame with a
terracotta-tiled roof, using Japanese wood exclusively; interior finishings also follow traditional patterns. The
number of posts is greatly increased for earthquake safety, however, and such amenities as a concrete foundation,
floor heating, sliding sash windows, and modern bathroom units are also included. In this architect's eyes, many
current machiya renovations invest too much energy in worn structures that would have been replaced without
much ado by a new machiya in the past. After all, wooden houses do not last forever, freshly processed timber
has always been preferred to old wood, and for the tradition to continue, new machiya must be built sooner or
later. One can either see this architect's buildings as copies of the "original copies" which are a thing of the past,
as do those purists who question his kyô-machiya claim. Or one may consider them as the latest products of a
line of tradition that was only temporarily interrupted, as the architect himself prefers to do.
More frequent than both the refashioned original machiya and the selfdeclared new machiya is another type of
buildings constructed since the 1990s. These incorporate design elements of the machiya style without claiming
to be machiya themselves, built as they are with modern construction materials and methods, often without any
wood. Most of them are offices, shops, or condominiums, meaning that they dissociate the machiya style from
the single-household residential function with which it is traditionally combined. In some cases, the copied
elements are not more than superficial decorations and provoke corresponding censure. This is particularly so
when a machiya-style entrance graces a high-rise manshon for which authentic machiya are likely to have been
demolished (Figure 10.2, bottom photos). In other cases, however, there is a more widely acknowledged attempt
to engage the city's architectural tradition (centre right). What we have here are citations; while copying from
the originals, these houses – in contrast to the self-declared "new machiya" – do not claim to be copies explicitly.
Informants readily discuss the virtues and vices of all these approaches, but any rivalry is overshadowed by the
general difficulty of preservative action. Cost-effective as manshon and prefabricated houses and powerful as the
huge corporations behind them are, they continue to dominate Kyoto's construction market. Correspondingly,
there is more tolerance than could be expected between the proponents of the different machiya approaches, with
most of them prefering even a deficient renovation to demolition.

Wood, theme parks, and Disneylandization

Which social forces are present in these cases, and in what way do they unite, or divide, people? And what causes
the light-heartedness with which copies are proposed as genuine enrichments of Kyoto's townscape? As a first of
three major points, let me explore the general status of originals and copies in Japanese architecture.
There is a widespread notion that in Japanese architecture, originals are less highly valued than in Western
countries. "The Japanese aesthetic does not have the concerns over authenticity versus replication so prevalent in
much of the West; nor is the 'patina of age' …so revered", writes one preservation specialist (Larkham
1996:261), and another speaks of "a culture that admires ancient forms and skills but shuns old buildings (save
for sacred shrines) as furukusai – so old they stink" (Lowenthal 1996:19). Guichard-Anguis offers a more
differentiated view, stressing the emotional attachment to craft objects used in the tea ceremony; these receive
names and become intimately connected with their owners and histories of use (2000:101–2, 107–13). Buildings,
however, are a wholly different matter, she says, and "extending protection to them requires a logic – of their
intrinsic cultural value – that is foreign to the way the Japanese conceive of their cultural heritage" (118).
Buildings do not comprise more than one fifth of the "national treasure" category, and there is not a single
construction specialist among the many traditional craftsmen who have been designated "living national
treasures" (106). Consequently, she sees what limited preservation efforts exist as prompted by foreign influence
(119).
When I interviewed a senior official in the Department of Town Planning – supportive of the Daiichi kangyô
replication – he professed adherence to the "Ise jingû faction" (Ise jingû-ha) of cultural preservation. This most
important Shintô shrine is reproduced every twenty years on the one of two adjacent plots of land that is
currently unoccupied; after completion, the original on the other plot – itself a copy of an earlier building on the
first plot – is dismantled. This procedure goes back to the seventh century at least (Coaldrake 1996:39), is
legitimated with Shintô conceptions of purity, and helps to train new generations of craftsmen at effective
intervals. Wooden architecture cannot be preserved in the same way as stone architecture in the West, the official
told me, and it makes more sense to transmit the building techniques than to retain the original material.
European preservation specialists, such as Larkham3 or those quoted by Guichard-Anguis (2000:99–100), seem
to take this as a quintessentially Japanese approach to preservation, entirely distinct from the one followed in the
West. Copies suffice to achieve a sense of continuity in Japan, they suggest.
A buildings specialist from Kyoto City's Cultural Property Office objected, however. In his eyes, there is a large
gap between the painstaking, highly ritualized and tradition-embedded copying employed at the Ise jingû and the
mere gluing of a couple of tiles to the façade of a completely modern building to give it the appearance of a lost
original. And indeed, for the sheer amount of work and resources needed, I find it difficult to assume that the
periodic rebuilding of a single,4 albeit important, shrine has had such a large influence on general ideas about
construction in Japan. Rather, it is indicative of a far broader problem, the impermanence of the predominant
building material. Attitudes to copying architecture in Japan, I believe, have been shaped much more by this
precondition than by a general disrespect for material – as against spiritual – continuity.
Wood is abundant in densely forested Japan and can be cut more easily into desired shapes than stone. It is
therefore ideally suited to the solid but not totally rigid structures of posts and penetrating crossbeams that are
the best one can build against earthquakes without using steel and concrete. Wood is flammable, however, and
this risk is greatly increased when – as an inevitable consequence of high population density and urbanization –
there are other wooden buildings nearby.5 Consequently, until well into the Meiji period, Japanese cities had to
live with frequent fires that often consumed them almost entirely, dwarfing the Great Fire of London (Kelly
1994). In some of the livelier quarters of the capital Edo, the average number of conflagrations reached two per
decade (Satô 1985:23). So common were these catastrophes that urban architecture was largely adapted to them:
in a way, the expectation of permanence was transferred from the residential and commercial buildings
themselves to their annexes, the fireproof warehouses (dozô or kura) with their massive mud walls. During
conflagrations, these structures were filled with all valuables and then sealed with clay while no effort was
wasted on saving the dwelling. Firemen too would be busy tearing down adjacent houses to prevent the flames
from spreading, rather than trying to extinguish them directly (Brumann 2001a). In Kyoto's central districts,
every building predating the last great fire of 1864 is a warehouse. Humidity and termites are additional dangers
to timber frames, and these also increase greatly when neighbouring buildings are not properly cared for.
Western architecture, when entering the country, did little to change continuity prospects, given that – by
adopting such vulnerable materials as reinforced concrete – it had already ceased to produce its most durable
structures. As a result, the life expectancy of dwellings in Japan has actually decreased: ordinary manshon and
prefabricated houses (purehabu) are not meant to last beyond the generation that builds them.
Still, not every wooden buildings stood in cramped conditions, and I find it difficult to believe that the enormous
investments of material and labour into elite structures, such as the Tôdaiji temple complex in Nara (Coaldrake
1996:77–8),6 were made without any care for continuity. Nowhere in the world have wooden structures lasted for
nearly as long as in Japan: those of the Hôryûji temple near Nara date back to the seventh or eighth century, and
the oldest existing wooden town house has also stood since 1607 (Nishi and Hozumi 1996:85). Knowledgeable
informants tell me that the bulk of a carpenter's work used to consist of repair and maintenance jobs;
constructing a new building was a rarity. Neither are modern preservation concepts entirely alien to Japan. While
there was little regard for architectural heritage after the Meiji restoration, given also that much of it consisted
of Buddhist temples, a national law for the protection of old temples and shrines was enacted in 1897, not more
than fifteen years after the British Ancient Monuments Protection Act (Larkham 1996:37). Today, famous
ancient buildings are no less widely visited, admired, and celebrated as national heritage than their counterparts
in Western countries, and one of the few objects that almost everyone in Japan uses almost daily – the ten-yen
coin – displays a picture of one such edifice, the "Phoenix Hall" (Hôdô) of the Byôdôin in Uji. Fire and typhoon
damage to the Jakkôin main hall, the Murôji pagoda, or the Hakusa sonsô villa made front-page headlines during
and after my fieldwork in Kyoto, and photos of the firefighters' exercises on "Bunkazai Fire Protection Day" (26
January, chosen in memory of the day when the wall paintings in the Kondô hall of the Hôryûji were lost to fire
in 1949) invariably appear there too. It seems, though, that the standards established for elite architecture have
not been extended so generously to vernacular structures; those have been torn down quite matter-of-factly for
most of the post-war period. But so they have been in Europe and North America when functionalist modernism
held sway, prior to the heritage boom that did not start before the 1960s. If the architectural heritage of Western
countries was of similarly perishable material, similarly difficult to modernize, and if there were a similar
scarcity-generated pressure on land, I doubt that attitudes and practices relating to preservation would be all that
different.
Wooden buildings appear to have had another important consequence, however. When timber-frame components
become worn or damaged, it is easier to take out and polish or replace them than in the case of stone or concrete
buildings, particularly if they are assembled in the flexible way of traditional Japanese architecture that relies on
elaborate joinery rather than nails. Traditional structures can even be dismantled entirely and reassembled in a
different location, a common occurrence throughout history. Roofs – particularly those covered with thatch or
bark – and mud walls must be redone with greater regularity and in a more thoroughgoing way than those of
Western buildings. Nonetheless, all this does not endanger the idea that the building itself is continuous.
Similarly, for building activity to count as renovation (kaichiku) – less strictly regulated than new construction
(shinchiku) – only one half of the original building must be retained. European practices have not been so
different on closer inspection; medieval cathedrals, for example, have been patched and mended continually
from the day they were supposedly completed. On average, however, the proportion of original material will be
larger than in Japanese buildings of a similar age. I think that architectural originals in Japan have never been
treated with indifference, but since they are so rare, young, and slowly evolving – rather than fixed – entities
anyway, seeking continuity in style and appearance rather than substance and turning to values other than age
suggests itself. The periodic rebuilding of the Ise jingû is a particularly elite and religiously loaded
manifestation of this tendency. To see it as a prototype for all preservative action in Japan, responsible for some
deepseated indifference to originals, however, is exaggerated.
I think that a number of other phenomena had a larger influence on copying bridges, banks, and machiya-style
elements in Kyoto. In particular, the Pont des Arts idea would never have come up without the backdrop of the
theme parks since the mid-1980s. The mother and still biggest success of them all, Tokyo Disneyland, displays
imitations of foreign architecture, and in some of the gaikoku mura ("foreign villages") – the theme parks
dedicated to a specific foreign country (Hendry 2000) – copying is brought to perfection, sometimes by
employing expert craftsmen and building materials from the original locations (23, 41–42, 155–6). Educationally
minded as places such as "Glücks Königsreich" or "Huis Ten Bosch" (21–5, 39–44) like to present themselves,
they stand on a continuum with museums that – in their effort to make the temporally or spatially distant more
palpable – place originals side by side with reconstructions and replicas, such as Little World (an open-air
museum with vernacular architecture from all over the globe) and Meiji mura (another open-air museum of pre-
war Western-style structures) in Inuyama or Minpaku (the National Museum of Ethnology) in Suita (143–5, 157–
8, 159–63). The Ôtsuka museum in Shikoku relies entirely on high-class reproductions on ceramic tiles for its
tour de force of global art history (Cox 2002). Although not all of these institutions are equally successful, it is
still difficult to imagine that they fail to have an impact on the millions who visit them. Seen against this
backdrop and the regular demands for a têma pâku in Kyoto, it seems that the Pont des Arts plan offered the
unique possibility to build at least a token gaikoku mura, the best that could be had in the absence of
undeveloped fringe areas or coastline.
Recreational though the emphasis of the plan was, however, the bridge would have been copied at a public site,
not within the confines of a private commercial venture. Thus, it has to be seen also in another context, that of
the "Disneylandization" of public space diagnosed by Nakagawa (1996). Since the mid-1980s, telephone booths
in cello shape, public toilets looking like tangerines, or kôban (police boxes) with the appearance of a kappa
goblin's head have sprung up all over Japan. In the case of larger structures, this trend mainly takes the form of
copying older styles of Western or traditional Japanese architecture, such as by disguising a rural railway station
as a traditional country house with thatched roof. In the prefabricated housing market as well, "Early American"
and similar styles have flourished (119–23). Nakagawa reports that in the 1970s, such simulacra used to be
restricted to the netherworld of "love hotels", brothels, and pachinko parlours, with the Statue of Liberty on the
roof being such a popular gadget that it acquired a wholly different connotation in Japan. Tokyo Disneyland
made such replication respectable (16–21), however, and when local administrations pursued the laudable goal
of making public facilities more approachable (shitashimareru), they had nothing to turn to but the theme park
approach and its supreme value of being "cute" (kawaii). The general disenchantment with functionalist design
and architecture, the weakened condition of local communities and styles, and the lack of interest on the side of
architects who – themselves spured on by post-modern playfulness – have turned to designing residential and
commercial architecture, instead of the public realm, has left no alternatives.
The ubiquity of copies in public and educational contexts, I think, explains why Kyotoites are less outraged by
the Daiichi kangyô replica plan and by machiya-style garbage incinerators than might be expected. Still, a copy
is not perfectly acceptable, given its referential field of leisure and playfulness, of provinciality (most instances
of "Disneylandization" are found in small towns and villages), even of sleaziness. Besides, the heyday of
"Disneylandization" seems to be over, with the figures of cases per year rising and dropping in an almost perfect
parallel with "bubble period" land prices.7 So Kyoto's mayor might have been more successful had he proposed
his plan a few years earlier, in a less urban and culturally sophisticated place, and at a less famous location with
a lesser claim to being a muchloved "original" itself. Copying as such wasn't the problem; doing so at this
specific place and time, however, invited resistance.

Professional creativity and the evaluation of copies

Still, while there is evidence for a somewhat greater tolerance for replicas and copies compared with that found
in Western European countries, all these building proposals also aroused passionate opposition. This raises the
question, What makes some people support copying while others oppose it? I found one variable to be
consistently related to attitudes on copies, and this is a professional relationship with creativity and its products.
Half a year after the withdrawal of the bridge, I sent a questionnaire on the Pont des Arts affair to all members of
one citizens' group that had tried to initiate a referendum about the bridge plan; one half – 124 members –
responded. In one question, I asked informants to express how severe they found each of the problems associated
with the bridge (Table 10.1). The replica aspect turned out the one item that most strongly divided this group of
opponents, with responses clustering at the extremes of either seeing "no problem" or a "very big problem". I
then transformed the verbal scale into numerical values from 0 to 4. It turned out that the only independent
variable to have a statistically significant correlation with the perceived seriousness of the replica problem was
whether people have a job that is related to art, architecture, design, fashion, or some other profession that, in my
phrasing of the related question, tries to beautify everyday life. People who have such a creative profession are
more critical of the replica aspect than those who do not. This relationship narrowly misses standard significance
levels when controlling for gender, age, and Kyoto upbringing (with p rising from 0.028 to 0.063) but is still
strong enough to suggest a systematic explanation.8
In a second survey, I distributed more than 400 questionnaires concerning the townscape to acquaintances and
audiences at public lectures shortly before I left, receiving it back from 210 who live or work in Kyoto. In one
question, I asked informants about their assessment of the Daiichi kangyô replica plan, offering them the
alternatives of finding it "good", "bad but better than plain demolition", or just "bad". Acceptance of the plan
extended even to leading townscape, anti-Pont des Arts, and machiya preservation activists. Again, however,
there is a statistically highly significant correlation (p = 0.005, dropping to 0.003 when controlling for age,
gender, and Kyoto upbringing) between a profession related to arts and crafts, and the idea that the replica plan is
"bad" (in either formulation). There is a whole series of questions on which the creatives deviate in a statistically
significant way from the non-creatives (Table 10.2). These points suggest a dislike of copies (the first two) and a
concern for historical originals in architecture and their protection (the next five). The last two points can also be
interpreted as a concern for Kyoto as a whole remaining an original or becoming so again, by retaining its
narrow streets and natural rivers.
In a third test, I handed 90 photos of commercial and residential buildings in Kyoto over to my informants or had
other people do so. I then asked informants to sort the photos into ranked groups according to the quality of the
depicted buildings as Kyoto architecture and encouraged them to employ a personal angle. In a statistical
analysis using a slightly modified form of cultural consensus analysis (Romney et al. 1986, 1999), I was
surprised to find a very strong common taste component – a joint rank order – accounting for 54.6 per cent of the
total variance. Every individual sorting is closer to this rank order than its reverse, and 162 of the 170 sortings
are significantly correlated. It can therefore be taken to represent a Kyoto architectural consensus. It turns out
that Kyotoites prefer old to new architecture and – somewhat less strongly – Japanese to Western-style buildings.
Well-tended pre-war machiya stand on top, followed by renovated machiya and pre-war Western-style
architecture. Next comes modern architecture that takes up machiya elements, beating modern Western-style
architecture, including the works of such celebrities as Andô Tadao or Isozaki Arata.9 The least valued
architecture, aside from neglected structures, are the high-rise manshon. Contrary to my own and also to some
informants' expectations, the existence of a rival architectural taste such as a strong preference for modern
architecture among groups of informants could not be confirmed.
Looking at the influence of a creative job or creative professional education on the ranks assigned (again,
controlling for age, gender, and Kyoto upbringing), there are indeed a number of houses where the preferences of
the people so qualified deviate in a statistically significant way (p 0.05) from those of the others. The buildings
that are better liked by the creatives can all be seen as originals, comprising avantgarde architecture by Andô
Tadao and Maki Fumihiko (Figure 10.3, top row), pre-war yôkan (central row), and two machiya with relatively
unassuming façades (bottom row). In contrast, the buildings significantly less liked by the creatives have a
strong copy aspect, including a high-rise building that plays with the forms and colours of classical antiquity
(Figure 10.4, top left) and modern structures and renovations that incorporate machiya style elements in a
somewhat ostentatious, non-standard way (remaining photos).
The driving force that produces these independent findings, I think, is the ideology of the unique work that has
become part of the ethos of the creative professions. Most informants active within the latter have chosen the
Western rather than the traditional Japanese variants; thus, they have been exposed to the Western post-medieval
ideals of the uniqueness of artist and work. Moreover, traditional Japanese and Chinese art also had much respect
for the individual creator. People trained in these pursuits are presented with original works as ideals to emulate
and can therefore be expected to value originals more highly than ordinary people will do. It appears that
professional education – be it by explicit instruction or by the informal acquisition of a professional habitus and
world-view – plays a significant role in determining people's views on architectural copies.

Cultural property protection versus town planning

The third important factor for the assessment of copying is closely related to the second; in a way, it is a logical
extension, developing different attitudes to copies into two different ways of looking at the city and its
preservation. Initially, the registration and protection of historical buildings in Japan concentrated on elite
architecture. From the 1970s on, ordinary residential buildings were also included, not only by the state but also
under the various supplementary schemes set up by local governments. However, only a handful of kyô-machiya
have become bunkazai. Under Japanese law, registration requires the consent of the owner, but in the case of
residential and commercial architecture, this is rarely given because of the many practical restrictions. Also, the
financial value of house and land is greatly reduced. Town planning in Japan had not occupied itself with
preservation until the 1970s, and the legal reform between 1968 and 1970 even improved conditions for modern
development (Hohn 2000:82–4). Town planning officials in Kyoto, however, saw the city's historical appearance
as endangered. Thus, adding to the "landscape areas" (Kyoto City's translation for fûchi chiku) that had been
designated since the 1930s on the city's fringes, they introduced a new type of zone called bikan chiku ("aesthetic
area"), imposing restrictions on forms, materials, and sizes of any new construction in specific areas of central
Kyoto. Moreover, a small number of particularly beautiful streets with characteristic styles were singled out for
more far-reaching measures, including funds for the restoration of modernized buildings to their original
appearance. This latter scheme was taken up on a nationwide scale in 1975, and today, there are almost 60 (Hohn
2000:88, note 185) "historical buildings preservation zones" (dentôteki kenzôbutsu-gun hozon chiku, or denken
chiku for short) all over Japan, both in rural and urban locations.
The new protection schemes of the 1970s did not require the perpetual "freezing" (tôketsu hozon) of classical
bunkazai protection. While they often preserve existing originals in practice, new buildings that only look old
are not ruled out, and in the denken chiku Gion shinbashi – a former geisha quarter – traditional-looking façades
may hide modern interiors completely. Criticism of the somewhat theatrical quality of such preservation as well
as the accompanying gentrification processes can sometimes be heard. Still, the denken chiku attract many
tourists and are also seen in a favourable light by many Kyotoites. Legally, the designation of denken chiku
became part of the Cultural Properties Preservation Act (bunkazai hogo-hô). The rationale for this was that
protection does not refer to single buildings but rather to a characteristic ensemble. However, denken chiku in
Kyoto are administered by the Department of Town Planning, not by the Cultural Properties Office.
It will be remembered that these two institutions had very different opinions on the Daiichi kangyô replica plan,
with the former having come up with the idea while the latter rejected it. In another instance of tension, the
Department of Town Planning came up with its own protection programme for what it calls rekishiteki ishô
kenzôbutsu ("buildings of historical design") in 1999. This scheme promises similar repair subsidies to those of
standard bunkazai protection, but all that is asked for in return is the retention of the historical design. New
structures – often those that incorporate vernacular elements – have been selected alongside old buildings, and
replacing the latter with a new one looking alike would not endanger the designation. With this step, the
inclusion of modified originals and copies does not even have to be justified by their belonging to an ensemble
that includes originals; instead, a traditional look is sufficient for receiving public recognition and funds. The
buildings expert of the Cultural Property Office was sceptical of the plan and feared that bunkazai protection will
become even more of an uphill battle now.10
The growing influence of town planners on the preservation of built heritage in Japanese cities11 means that
protection schemes are tinged by their professional philosophies. Town planners in Japan are as likely to be civil
engineers as architects, and even the curricula of the latter have been dominated by technical rather than artistic
and historical education. Therefore, the single historically authentic building does not have a supreme value in
their professional consciousness. The contribution of façades to some larger whole – the townscape – counts
much more, and for this purpose, originals are not required.

Conclusion

In my reply to the comments received on a Current Anthropology article (1999) in which I had stressed the
virtues of the anthropological concept of culture, I recommended that anthropologists, instead of "writing against
culture" in Lila Abu-Lughod's (1991) deconstructive sense, should engage in researching against culture. This
means that when explaining the phenomena we find in some society different from our own, we should only
resort to that society's culture after all consideration of individual peculiarities and transnational or even
universal commonalities has failed, putting culture in its place (Brumann 1999: S23). The previous analysis
should be read as an exercise in this spirit.
Without doubt, the status of copying in Japanese architecture is influenced by factors that have socio-historical
genealogies that are nationally specific. The periodic renewal of Shintô shrines and the theme parks and
"Disneylandization" of public facilities probably do not have full equivalents in other societies. On the whole,
however, I think that two universal or transnational factors are more important. One is the use of wood for
construction, in a densely settled country. This premise makes buildings less likely to last and more likely to be
mended frequently, making originals younger and more relative in their originality. This will certainly reduce the
gulf between originals and copies, protecting particularly the well-crafted copies from the contempt with which
they are often treated elsewhere. A second, differentiating factor are professional ideologies: people who make a
living by creating aesthetically pleasing artefacts reject copies more vehemently than others, applying the
ideology of the unique, individual creation that governs the art world. Bunkazai protectors with their education in
art history are no different. In the protection of historical architecture, however, these have been superseded by
town planners, people who lack an art historical focus and are therefore more tolerant of imitation.
There are indications that this opposition stems from truly transnational cultural strands. The fate of the
Schloßplatz (Palace Square) in Berlin, for instance, has been intensely debated since 1990. Formerly, this used to
be the site of the baroque Stadtschloß (Town Palace) of the Prussian kings, but after the palace had been heavily
damaged in the Second World War, Soviet troops demolished it in 1950. In the 1970s, the modernist Palast der
Republik (Palace of the Republic) was built in its place, being used for all kinds of representative and
entertainment functions and also as the national assembly of the German Democratic Republic. Heated debates
about how to fill this central, representative square – retaining the Palast der Republik? rebuilding the
Stadtschloß? constructing something new?– have been heavily tinged by political symbolism. Beyond this and in
a parallel to Kyoto, however, architectural historians and cultural property specialists almost unanimously called
for preserving the only remaining original, the Palast der Republik. Arguments for recreating the Stadtschloß, by
contrast, often emphasize its contribution to larger wholes, such as the ensemble it forms with surviving nearby
buildings of the same period or the vanishing point it provided for the Unter den Linden boulevard that
approached it in a straight line of several kilometres, all the way from the Brandenburg Gate. Not surprisingly,
many town planners leaned to this side.12
Such cross-societal parallels should caution us against too facilely postulating a uniquely Japanese approach to
authenticity and copying. In the field of architecture, a lot is not so different after all. For further inquiry,
pursuing the social life of originals and copies out of more durable materials, such as metal or ceramics, could
provide illuminating comparisons. But for the time being, it will be wise to keep in mind that copying in Japan
must not always be so Japanese.
Table 10.1 Questionnaire reponses of Pont des Arts Referendum Group members to question on the problematic points of the Pont des Arts plan (n
= 124)
None (= Small (= Middle (= Large (= Specially large Total Mean Standard
0) 1) 2) 3) (= 4) value deviation
Decision process 1 0 8 28 83 120 3.48 0.93
Influence on townscape 1 6 7 40 69 123 3.35 0.91
Influence on the free space between the two 5 4 17 39 57 122 3.09 1.11
existing bridges
Influence on Pontochô atmosphere 4 8 17 55 36 120 2.83 1.12
Western-style design 11 11 13 33 50 118 2.71 1.42
Construction costs 6 11 26 26 48 117 2.69 1.35
Replica of already existing bridge 18 11 11 30 47 117 2.51 1.55
Proposal from abroad 15 16 22 29 33 115 2.25 1.47
Steel and concrete as building materials 16 15 30 25 30 116 2.18 1.43
Bridge pillars dangerous obstacle to water flow 15 19 36 25 20 115 1.98 1.34
Influence on public safety 16 28 28 26 16 114 1.82 1.33
Necessity 34 13 26 18 25 116 1.77 1.54
Question: What did you personally consider as most problematic regarding the Pont des Arts plan? Please mark your assessment of the following
problem items' seriousness by circling either "none" (mu), "small" (shô), "middle" (chû), "large" (dai), or "specially large" (tokudai).

Table 10.2 Townscape opinions of people with creative professions (n = 85) compared with people with other professions (n = 125)
Demolition and same-style reconstruction of Daiichikangyô bank building
Good (Neither) Problematic/bad
Creative No 65 11 49
Yes 28 6 51
93 17 100

Withdrawal of Pont des Arts plan

Bad (Neither) Good
Creative No 14 8 103
 Yes 3 9 73
17 17 176

Machiya preservation and revitalization

Requiring owner's consent (Neither) Public issue
Creative No 33 3 89
Yes 12 2 71
45 5 160

Wooden façades and exteriors

Unimportant (Neither) Important
Creative No 20 67 38
Yes 9 33 43
29 100 81

Protection/revitalization of pre-war Western-style architecture

Unimportant (Neither) Important
Creative No 13 46 66
Yes 4 21 60
17 67 126

Law permitting forced preservation of historical buildings if owner is compensated

Undesirable (Neither) Desirable
Creative No 20 31 74
Yes 8 12 65
28 43 139

Controlling exterior design of new buildings

Unimportant (Neither) Important
Creative No 9 48 68
Yes 3 21 61
12 69 129

Wide street spaces as on Oike street

Important (Neither) Unimportant
Creative No 30 50 45
Yes 10 29 46
40 79 91

Revival and renaturation of inner-city rivers

Unimportant (Neither) Important
Creative No 21 54 50
Yes 6 28 51
27 82 101
Figure 10.1 Pont des Arts original and Kyoto copy; Daiichi kangyô bank building.

Figure 10.2 Original and copied machiya.

Figure 10.3 Buildings particularly liked by creatives.

Figure 10.4 Buildings particularly disliked by creatives.

Notes

1 Fieldwork was funded by a post-doc fellowship from the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science (JSPS) held at the National Museum of
Ethnology (Minpaku); for data analysis, I have held a habilitation scholarship from the German Research Association (DFG) permitting a leave of
absence from my teaching duties, granted by the Department of Anthropology, University of Cologne. I am grateful to all these institutions, to my
academic host, Nakamaki Hirochika, and to informants far too numerous to mention for their hospitality and support. Responsibility for my
findings rests with me alone.
2 See www.city.kyoto.jp/sogo/seisakukikaku/vision21/midrep/san-5.html
3 "Japan is a notable case where the regular demolition and rebuilding of key national monuments, particularly Shinto shrines, is a widely accepted
historical and religious tradition" (1996:261).
4 A limited number of other shrines have followed similar procedures, but nowhere has the practice been sustained into the twentieth century
(Coaldrake 1996:42).
5 Even with contemporary fire-fighting technology, one out of five buildings burning down in Japan catches fire from the one next door (Sato
1985:124).
6 The number of cooks who prepared meals for the construction workers alone exceeded 1,000 at peak periods (Coaldrake 1996:77).
7 Nakagawa himself doubts a connection, but the figures he presents – with a sharp peak in 1992, one year after the peak in land prices – speak for
themselves (2000:196).
8 P indicates the probability that a given distribution of variables is produced entirely by chance; its maximum value is 1. I should add that
Pearson's correlation coefficient assumes normally distributed interval variables, a condition that is violated by the dichotomous variables ("creative
job", "gender", and "Kyoto upbringing", each with values 0 and 1 only). Particularly when partial (i.e. controlled for the influence of independent
variables) correlations are to be calculated, however, I know of no alternative procedure. In any event, my results should be considered as strong
indications of a systematic association, not as mathematical "proof".
The relative weight of the "proposal from abroad" and the "Western design" problems – the proportion of the total number of "problem points" of
an informant going to these particular items – are strongly correlated with the relative weight of the replica problem; clearly, the three problems
form a single cluster for many informants. Only the replica problem, however, has a strong correlation with a creative profession, so it is indeed
this aspect, not the foreign origin, that troubles the creatives. (Since I introduced myself as German, "proposal from abroad" and "Western design"
may have been picked less frequently than if a Japanese researcher had asked these questions.)
9 I employ "Western style" in the same way as the Japanese use the equivalent term yôfû, meaning any building that does not use timber and the
forms of traditional Japanese architecture. This includes buildings by Andô or Isozaki although in Western architectural circles, these are sometimes
seen as "Japanese".
10 The introduction of state-level tôroku bunkazai ("[self-]registered cultural properties", i.e. listed on the owner's initiative) in 1996 are expressive
of this. This category is backed neither by legal restrictions nor by financial support, building on its prestige value alone.
11 Nakagawa Osamu (personal communication) reports that when volunteering for surveying the condition of pre-war Western-style buildings after
the Kobe earthquake, he was surprised to learn that it was the town planning departments that had the relevant information about, the location of
historical buildings, for example, not the bunkazai specialists.
12 Following the expert committee that, with a majority of a single vote, had recommended reconstruction, the German parliament decided to
rebuild three of the four historical façades and important parts of the interior within an otherwise modern building in July 2002. Depleted public
funds both in Berlin and at the federal level, however, are likely to delay implementation.

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 11
Copying cars

Forgotten licensing agreements

Christopher Madeley

Introduction

The contributions to this volume reveal that copying within Japan, and between Japan and other countries, takes
numerous forms and serves various purposes. However, in the Western mind, copying by the Japanese is usually
associated with the apparent ease with which the Japanese copy Western technological products, and carries the
implication that such copying is illicit. This chapter will examine such copying, or technology transfer, and will
focus on the case of the Japanese firm Ishikawajima, which entered the motor vehicle industry in 1918 by
producing cars and trucks under licence from a British firm, Wolseley Motors Limited. During the 1950s and
early 1960s Isuzu Motors Limited, a descendant of the motor vehicle manufacturing division of Ishikawajima,
again turned to a British company, Rootes Motors Limited, to upgrade its motor vehicle manufacturing
capabilities under a second licensing agreement.
While the propensity of the Japanese to copy the products of the West was commented on by Western observers
during the nineteenth and twentieth centuries and even before, recent studies have highlighted the Western role
in facilitating Japan's industrialization. As the account of the copying of firearm technology discussed by Cox in
the introduction to this volume reveals, the successful manufacture of the gun by the Japanese in the mid-
sixteenth century required not only a desire on the part of the Japanese to copy this device, and broadly similar
levels of technology and craftsmanship in Japan to make this possible, but also the cooperation of the Portuguese
visitors. The same is true in the case from the motor vehicle industry which forms the focus of this chapter, and
in a host of other industries where the free flow of information in published form, the work of Western teachers
and instructors in Japan, the study of Japanese students and personnel in the West, the dispatch of Japanese
government missions to Western countries, Japan's participation in international exhibitions, the example of
Western companies operating in Japan, the formation of joint ventures between Japanese and overseas firms, and
the manufacture of Western products in Japan under licence by Japanese firms were indispensable in enabling
the Japanese to adopt Western technology. However, knowledge of the West's contribution to Japan's
industrialization and modernization has had little impact on the popular perception of Japan as an illicit copier of
technological products.
This chapter will be divided into four sections. First, I will examine Western, in particular English-language,
accounts of Japan as a copier of the West in the modern period. I shall then review the West's contribution to the
industrialization and modernization of Japan as described in English-language studies. I shall then move on to
examine the role of Western, in particular British, firms in the development of the Japanese motor vehicle
industry. Finally, I shall draw a number of conclusions. I shall seek to demonstrate that, though it is frequently
assumed that the Japanese illicitly copied Western products, many products were manufactured under licence
with the full cooperation of Western partners.

The Japanese portrayed as copiers

Adas (1989) examines the evolving status of scientific and technological achievement in measuring the gap
between developed and developing societies, and its use by the developed societies of the West to affirm
superiority over less developed peoples, many of whom became colonial subjects. Adas suggests that when the
technological gap between Western European society and the societies it came into contact with through
exploration and trade was not so great, Western perceptions of those societies' religions and beliefs, morals, and
social organization were used as yardsticks to judge their relative state of development. However, as the
technological gap between the industrialized West and the rest of the world increased during the eighteenth,
nineteenth, and early twentieth centuries, a society's state of technological achievement came to be the principal
indicator of its perceived development, or lack of development, in Western eyes. Though recognition was given
to a society's past contributions to technological development where these were known, such as in the case of
China, it was a society's current state of development which counted the most. A society such as China, which
was credited with such major inventions as gunpowder and printing in the past, was perceived as having
stagnated by nineteenth-century Western observers. Western faith in science and technology as indicators of
progress was only shaken by the First World War, which proved that science and technology could also be used
to unleash death and destruction on a vast scale, and by the rise of non-Western industrial and military powers
such as Japan, which revealed that the West no longer had a monopoly over science and technology and the
wealth and power they could create.
Western descriptions of Japanese copying follow the progression suggested by Adas, from uncritical description
in the first days of contact, when mastery of technology was not seen as an important indicator of social
development, through admiration in the mid-nineteenth century, when Japan was compared favourably with
China, to warning in the late nineteenth and twentieth centuries, when Japanese development came to be seen as
a threat to the West. Though some writers doubted the ability of the Japanese to adopt Western technology,
copying was generally noted as an ability of the Japanese. In view of this, it is not surprising that the popular
image established today is that of Japan the copier.
The copying of Western technology in the form of guns by the Japanese was one consequence of the first contact
between Japan and the West. Perrin notes that 'the Arabs, the Indians, and the Chinese all gave firearms a try well
ahead of the Japanese, but only the Japanese mastered the manufacturing process on a large scale, and really
made the weapon their own' (Perrin 1979:8). The Japanese ability to copy was reported by Western observers at
that time. Linschoten describes the Japanese as 'cunning workmen in all kind of hardie workes, they are sharpe
witted and quickly learne any thing they see' (Massarella 1990:68). The manufacture of weapons in Japan was
observed by Cocks of the British Factory at Hirado in Japan, who wrote that the Japanese 'made as formall
ordinance as we doe in Christendom, both of brass and iron' (Massarella 1990:187). However, according to
Massarella, 'Cocks had changed his mind about Japanese skill in casting ordnance by the time the examples were
sent back on the Hosiander even if the English and Dutch continued to experiment with the casting of firearms in
Japan' (Massarella 1990:187). Thus, while on the one hand the earliest contacts between Japan and the West
produce reports of the prowess of the Japanese in copying Western technological products, on the other hand,
these are tempered by the observations of those familiar with those products through close contact over a longer
period.
The next period of contact between Japan and the West began with the opening of Japan to trade and diplomacy
in the middle of the nineteenth century. Both Yokoyama (Yokoyama 1987:23, 64–5, 80) and Lehmann (Lehmann
1978:134) note that copying formed part of the image of Japan transmitted by Western writers at that time. The
Times report of Lord Elgin's 1858 mission to Japan states 'that very propensity to imitate and adopt the
appliances of civilization, so foreign to the Chinaman, is so strongly developed in Japan' (The Times 1858:7). The
same writer goes on to predict 'the Chinaman will still be navigating the canals of his country in the crazy old
junks of his ancestors when the Japanese is skimming along his rivers in high-pressure steamers, or flying across
the country behind a locomotive' (The Times 1858:7). This view was not shared, however, by Sir Rutherford
Alcock, Britain's first envoy to Japan. 'This is not a country in which men of this generation may ever hope for
the luxury of express trains' (Alcock 1863:456). Alcock visited a mine in Hokkaido and was asked to report on
how the exploitation of the mine might be improved by the Governor of Hokkaido. 'He was told we undoubtedly
possessed great advantages in scientific knowledge and the use of steam-engines; but he gave no indication of a
desire to resort to such means' (Alcock 1863:277).
However, the view that came to predominate was one of the Japanese as avid copiers of the West, and this image
was conveyed through magazines, books, and official reports. Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine noted 'how
quickly they adopt the appliances and inventions of a more advanced and enlightened civilisation than their own'
(Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine 1863:404). Robert Fortune made a similar point.
To adopt everything foreign which they suppose to be useful, however different it may be from what they possess
themselves, and to make themselves masters of the mode of working it, is a marked feature in the character of
the Japanese people (Fortune 1863:9)
By 1879 it was possible for the traveller Anna Brassey to write:
They have learned nearly all they care to know from the foreigner. We have seen many of the European engineers of Japanese vessels, and they all
agree in declaring that the natives learn to imitate anything they see done with wonderful quickness.
(Brassey 1879:361)
Visitors to Japan also commented on the copying of Western consumer products. One such visitor was Isabella
Bird:
In two villages I was interested to see that the small shops contained lucifer matches, cotton umbrellas, boots, brushes, clocks, slates and pencils,
engravings in frames, kerosene lamps, and red and green blankets, all but the last, which are unmistakable British 'shoddy', being Japanese
imitations of foreign manufactured goods more or less cleverly executed.
 (Bird 1880: Volume 2, 29)
Miss Bird railed against the counterfeiting of food and drink products:
I was annoyed to find several shops almost exclusively for the sale of villainous forgeries of European eatables and drinkables, specially the
latter… I saw two shops in Yamagata which sold champagne of the best brands, Martell's cognac, Bass's ale, Medoc, St Julian, and Scotch whisky,
at about one fifth of their cost price – all poisonous compounds, the sale of which ought to be interdicted.
(Bird 1880: Volume 1, 269)
According to Miss Bird:
Of the manufacture of forged labels and imitative compounds of the most nauseous or unwholesome description Tôkiyô is the centre, and it has
reduced systematic forgery to a trade… Are we to class these forgeries as among the signs of manufacturing progress in Japan?
(Bird 1880: Volume 2, 195)
Holtham comments on 'the wonderful good faith with which the consumer accepts a forgery of a foreign trade-
mark displaying half the letters turned the wrong way about, or upside down, or into some other letter altogether'
(Holtham 1883:353). According to Howe: 'In the 1890s foreign complaints about Japanese pirating of Western
patents and trademarks made the subject an important element in the treaty revision negotiations' (Howe
1996:260). However, in 1908 Sir Henry Norman, MP was still able to write:
In commercial matters the Japanese have exhibited their imitativeness in the most extraordinary degree. Almost everything they have once bought,
from beer to bayonets and from straw hats to heavy ordnance, they have since learned to make for themselves. There is hardly a wellknown
European trade-mark that you do not find fraudulently imitated in Japan.
(Norman 1908:356–7)
Japanese copying was also noted in official circles, as the following extract from a 1931 British government
report, under the heading 'Copying of Machinery', illustrates:
The encouragement of copying is less commendable. Many instances could be cited where dubious methods have been adopted to obtain technical
information from foreign concerns for the benefit of the Japanese maker. The practice of copying is so developed that even any catalogue or
circular of particular excellence produced by a foreigner will be immediately copied and used, a Japanese name being substituted, the text being
translated into Japanese.
(Department of Overseas Trade 1931)
Thus the image of Japan as a copier was firmly established by the twentieth century, and if it was transmitted in
writing, it was probably also spread by word of mouth by Western visitors to and residents of Japan who left no
published record of their impressions. While the observers cited above noted the Japanese propensity and ability
to copy the West, they had less to say about the role of the West in facilitating Japan's industrialization. Recent
academic studies have highlighted this role, however, and it is to a review of these that we now turn.

The role of the West in Japan's industrial and technological development

English-language studies of the contribution of the West to Japan's industrial and technological development fall
into several categories. Some deal with particular historical periods, others with the role of particular countries
in aiding Japan's development, and others with particular industries or individual companies. There are also
accounts left by specialists who taught various skills to the Japanese. During the Meiji Period the Japanese
government and private concerns employed many foreign specialists in a variety of fields. According to Jones:
In the period as a whole (1868–1912), the number of foreign employees was well over three thousand in all areas of government. The five or six
thousand suggested by yatoi William Elliot Griffis (1870–74) is too large if applied to foreign employees in government and perhaps too small if
private foreign employees are included.
(Jones 1980: xv)
Jones further comments that while the employment of overseas experts by developing countries has become
standard practice, 'Japan was the first of the late modernizers to use such aid on a large scale' (Jones 1980: xiii).
The lives and experiences of foreigners who contributed to Japan's development and industrialization have been
examined by Pedlar (Pedlar 1990), while Checkland (Checkland 1989) focuses on Britain's contribution to the
development of Japan during the Meiji Period (1868–1912). The same theme is taken up in the series entitled
Britain and Japan: Biographical Portraits (Nish 1994, 1997; Hoare 1999) for the Meiji, Taisho (1912–1926), and
Showa Periods (1926–1988), while Hunter and Sugiyama (Hunter and Sugiyama 2002) cover the period 1600–
2000, with a particular focus on the twentieth century. Yuzawa and Udagawa examine foreign businesses
operating in Japan before the Second World War (Yuzawa and Udagawa 1990). Molony's study of the
development of the Japanese chemical industry reveals that the securing of overseas licences for key processes
and the successful exploitation of those licences were important factors in the development of that industry
(Molony 1990:125–39). Fukasaku devotes a chapter of her study of Mitsubishi Nagasaki Shipyard to technology
transfer (Fukasaku 1992:43–61). The importance of licensing agreements and foreign assistance in the
establishment and development of the aircraft industry in Japan is noted by Sekigawa (Sekigawa 1974:12, 15–25,
31–34). While Anchordoguy's study of the Japanese computer industry focuses on the attempts by the Japanese
government to foster the development of a domestic computer industry from the 1950s, it also reveals the
importance of access to overseas technology in the development of this industry. 'MITI concluded that Japanese
companies could not even get off the ground in the field of computers without legal access to IBM's basic
patents' (Anchordoguy 1989:22).
As the above quotation suggests, not all copying of Western products by Japanese companies took place within
the context of formal agreements between Japanese and overseas firms. Yet Allen suggests that even in the case
of illicit copying of products, Westerners played a role in certain cases. His remarks refer to the 1930s.
'Immediately after the fall of the yen large numbers of buyers from European and American importing houses
and chain stores came to Japan with samples which they induced the local manufacturers to copy' (Allen
1954:208). Allen gives a number of examples which he states are based on personal inquiries made in Japan
during 1936, including canvas shoes, cotton gloves, glassware, woollen hoods, and straw hats. 'Samples of
Western bicycles, gramophones and toys found their way into Japanese workshops and small factories, and these
became very active in fulfilling the orders of the foreign merchants who supplied them' (Allen 1954:209).
While many observers emphasized the speed and skill of the Japanese in copying, people actually responsible for
teaching did not always find it so. Checkland describes the problems faced by Edmund Morell in building the
Tokyo to Yokohama railway thus:
The young samurai who were to assist him wore their two swords and their sandals: the swords disturbed the magnetic measuring instruments and,
in violation of law and custom, had to be laid aside, and the sandals were hopeless in the mud of a construction site.
(Checkland 1989:48)
Of the same railway line Brunton had this to say.
The construction of this line, the pioneer of railways in the Far East, was, perhaps, not unnaturally, attended by a series of the most unfortunate
mischances and mistakes… The main cause for this somewhat deplorable condition of affairs was that the European staff engaged to direct
operations, headed by Mr Cargill, the General Director, supinely permitted the interference of the native officials with their operations. Completely
and entirely unacquainted with the system necessary for the proper and economical demonstration of such a work, but self-willed, self-satisfied,
and overbearing (when allowed to be), the Japanese required to be firmly led; as was clearly exemplified by the Railway Works, in order to avoid a
complete disorganization of operations.
(Beauchamp 1991:35)
British railway engineer E. G. Holtham was also critical of the Japanese working on this railway:
It was only by getting the Japanese authorities to introduce piecework with a progressively declining scale of payment that I could succeed in
approaching the efficiency of labour elsewhere. My native assistants were some of them of a dreamy temperament, and considered the first thing
necessary in all calculations involving inches, was to reduce every dimension into decimals of a foot, to six places of decimals at least; and then
resorted to books of logarithms to throw some light upon their subject. In this way about a week was required to ascertain how many bricks went to
a given sized wall.
(Holtham 1883:202–3)
Writers such as these saw little in the behaviour of the Japanese to suggest that they were expert copiers.

Technology transfer in the car industry

A number of English-language writers have examined the relationship between the Japanese and overseas motor
vehicle industries. While Duncan, (Duncan 1973:56–7, 59, 72–3), Shimokawa, (Shimokawa 1994:7, 110, 130)
and Genther (Genther 1990:19, 79–83) give satisfactory, albeit brief, accounts of the British contribution to the
development of the Japanese motor vehicle industry, Chang's (1981:12–13) account of the history of the motor
vehicle manufacturing division of Ishikawajima is erroneous in part, and Cusumano (Cusumano 1989) and
Halberstam (Halberstam 1986) focus on the American contribution to the exclusion of the British. Writers who
have examined the history of the two British firms, Wolseley Motors Limited and Rootes Motors Limited, that
participated in licensing agreements with Ishikawajima and Isuzu Motors Limited respectively give little or no
account of those agreements. Baldwin's (Baldwin 1995:19) brief account of the links between Wolseley and
Ishikawajima is inaccurate, while Nixon's (Nixon 1949) history of Wolseley contains no mention whatsoever of
the licensing agreement with Ishikawajima. Only the briefest accounts of the licensing agreement between Isuzu
and Rootes are contained in the Rootes company histories by Robson (Robson 1990:34) and Bullock (Bullock
1993:181–2). Production and financial records pertaining to the agreement between Wolseley and Ishikawajima
survive, however, as does the diary of the British motor engineer seconded by Wolseley to Ishikawajima during
the 1920s (Hoare 1999:195–211). Details are also given in the published company histories of both Ishikawajima
(Ishikawajima 1961) and Isuzu (Isuzu 1957). It is on these records, the diary, and the Japanese company histories
that the following account is based.
The Ishikawajima shipyard was founded in 1853 by the Bakufu with the aim of producing Western-style ships in
Japan, and in 1854 began the construction of the Asahimaru, the first Western-style sailing ship made in Japan.
In the same year staff of the shipyard were sent to Yokohama where they inspected an American warship, and to
Nagasaki where they learnt shipbuilding from the Dutch. From the outset, therefore, Ishikawajima's purpose was
to manufacture Western products in line with a policy of developing skills in Japan to promote import
substitution and achieve selfsufficiency in capital goods, and from the outset the shipyard received Western
assistance in fulfilling this purpose. In 1862 Ishikawajima began building its first steamship, the Chiyodagata,
and in 1864 the company's chief engineer was sent to Holland to see shipyards as well as to purchase machine
tools. Based on its experience in manufacturing steam equipment for ships the company began to diversify. In
1879 it sold its first lot of boilers and accessories to the silk-reeling industry in Gunma and Nagano prefectures,
and in the same year the company employed its first foreign member of staff, Archibald King, as a shipbuilding
specialist. The company acquired its first licence for a foreign product in 1881, the light railway system designed
by the Frenchman Decauville. The range of products manufactured by Ishikawajima in Japan expanded rapidly to
include among others iron bridges and bank safes (1883), mining machinery (1885), highspeed generating
machinery, Pelton turbines, railway coaches and air compressors (1892), Hotchkiss shells (1894), lifting cranes
(1898), and submarines (1901). Many of the above products were the first of their kind to be manufactured in
Japan rather than imported. In 1912 Ishikawajima entered into a contact with Sir William Arrol's company of
Glasgow that gave Ishikawajima access to Arrol's designs and materials.
During the First World War Ishikawajima made record profits. However, company management realized that
Japan's favourable trading conditions would end once the war came to a close, and they sought to invest some of
this profit in diversification. Land transport was identified as an area of future growth, and Ishikawajima decided
that it would seek to enter the motor vehicle industry. Ishikawajima did not feel confident to enter the motor
vehicle industry alone, however, despite its previous experience in manufacturing a wide range of industrial
products. The company thus sought a foreign partner with which to enter into an agreement. At the same time the
company purchased a Fiat car in order to see if it could produce a copy of this vehicle without assistance. This
turned out to be more difficult than the company had expected. Three months were spent in drawing the plans of
the vehicle, and it was not until a whole year had elapsed that the copy of the Fiat car made by Ishikawajima was
able to run. In the meantime, Ishikawajima had been in negotiation with two overseas companies, Fiat and
Wolseley Motors Limited, the latter was at that time a subsidiary of the British armaments manufacturer Vickers
which was represented in Japan. As the royalties requested by Wolseley were lower than those requested by Fiat,
Ishikawajima decided to enter into a licensing agreement with Wolseley. Under the terms of this licensing
agreement drawn up on 6 November 1918, just before the end of the First World War, Ishikawajima acquired the
rights to manufacture the Wolseley A9 type car, the E3 type light car, and the CP type truck, as well as exclusive
sales rights for the Orient. The agreement provided for Ishikawajima staff to travel to England to study car
manufacture, and the provision of patterns, plans and materials. In addition, a member of Wolseley staff was
seconded to Tokyo to help establish car manufacture in Japan. Ishikawajima was to pay Wolseley a royalty of
£8,000 each year for a period of ten years, a total of £80,000, irrespective of sales or profit made on the car
manufacturing operation in Japan, for these manufacturing and sales rights.
In December 1918 a group of six Ishikawajima staff left Tokyo for Birmingham, where they spent over six
months. Their journey to Britain took them via the United States, where they visited the Ford and other factories
in Detroit. On the way back to Japan they purchased machine tools in the United States according to a plan drawn
up for them by Wolseley, with a view to establishing a motor vehicle manufacturing plant with an annual
capacity of between fifty and one hundred vehicles. In 1920 the plant was established in Fukagawa-ku in Tokyo,
and on 9 August 1920 Wolseley engineer Albert James Penniall arrived in Tokyo to oversee the production of the
first vehicles. It is not clear which components of the Wolseley cars manufactured in Japan were produced in the
Fukagawa factory, however. Wolseley production records show that a total of approximately fifty E3 and A9 car
chassis were sold to Ishikawajima, which corresponds to the number of complete but unsold vehicles destroyed
in the Great Kanto Earthquake of September 1923 according to Ishikawajima company history. In addition the
Ishikawajima account of the manufacture of these vehicles focuses on the difficulty of achieving a satisfactory
finish to the bodywork, the excessive labour required on this pushing up the cost of the Wolseley cars so that
they were no longer competitive with imported American cars then on the market in Japan. This would suggest
that Ishikawajima imported completed chassis from Wolseley in Birmingham and built bodies upon them.
However, photographs of the interior of the Fukagawa factory show the machining of engine components,
engines being assembled, and completed engines on test, while Penniall's diary records both the fitting of bodies
to chassis delivered from Britain and the manufacture of complete cars in Japan (Figures 11.1–11.4). Thus it
seems that Ishikawajima first imported components from Britain and subsequently manufactured complete cars
in Japan. Wolseley engineer Albert James Penniall had this to say about his Japanese colleagues: 'As regards the
works, it looks as if it will take 12 months or more to get out one car, as things go very slow out east, tomorrow
will do style of thing.' In this prediction he was entirely correct, as it was not until 31 December 1921 that he was
able to write: 'We are making good progress at the works, on the 26th December we took our first car made in
Japan on a satisfactory road test.' Over three years had elapsed since the signing of the licensing agreement on 6
November 1918. According to the Isuzu account, however, the first domestically produced Wolseley was not
completed until a year later in December 1922. This presumably refers to the production of a car by a purely
Japanese team without Penniall's assistance, and means that Ishikawajima took over four years to produce a car
domestically from the signing of the licensing agreement with Wolseley.
Though Ishikawajima was able to manufacture Wolseley cars under licence in Japan, it was not able to sell them.
As noted above, imported American cars were less expensive, and they also had a better reputation.
Ishikawajima found itself in financial difficulties and was unable to pay Wolseley the royalties that had been
agreed, though part payments were made. The stock of unsold cars was destroyed in the Great Kanto Earthquake
of September 1923, bringing Ishikawajima's car manufacturing to an end. Ishikawajima had also purchased the
rights to manufacture and sell the Wolseley CP type truck, however, and as the Japanese army offered a subsidy
per vehicle to manufacturers who could build a truck to a given specification, the company turned its attention to
the manufacture of this vehicle. Plans were received from Wolseley, along with two complete trucks. One of the
two trucks was dismantled to serve as a model for production, and the other was loaned to a Tokyo bus company.
When the first dismantled truck and the factory were destroyed in the Great Kanto Earthquake, the second truck
was returned from the bus company and dismantled in its turn to serve as a model. In March 1924 the first
Ishikawajima-built Wolseley CP-type truck was completed, and passed the trials to qualify for the Japanese army
subsidy. Details of the subsidy are contained in Genther (Genther 1990:20). It comprised not only a
manufacturing subsidy but also an additional subsidy, a purchasing subsidy and a maintenance subsidy.
Consequently, the market for domestically produced trucks expanded in Japan, and Ishikawajima was able to
capture a major share of this market. A total of 583 one-and-a-half ton CP-type trucks and one-ton CG-type
trucks and buses were manufactured between 1925 and 1928, exceeding the original production target of a
hundred vehicles per year, and representing over half of Japan's domestic production in those years. Nor were
Wolseley motor vehicles the only products manufactured under licence by Ishikawajima during the 1920s. A
1923 advertisement describes the company as 'Manufacturing Licensees of Woodeson's Patent Water Tube
Boilers, Clarke Chapman and Co.'s Patent Pumps, Wolseley's Motor Cars, Zoelly's Marine Steam Turbines, and
Mitchel's Luffing Crane' (Takenob 1923: xxxi).
In 1927 company director Masao Shibusawa was able to annul the licensing agreement with Wolseley, and from
then on Ishikawajima began to manufacture vehicles based on the designs it had obtained under licence from
Wolseley. The name 'Wolseley' was replaced by the name 'Sumida' after the river in Tokyo adjacent to the
factory. In 1928 the Sumida CLtype mobile searchlight vehicle was produced and fitted with a four-cylinder CL-
type engine. This was based on the Wolseley four-cylinder CP-type engine, but had an increased power output. A
six-cylinder A6-type engine was also manufactured. The company made armoured, six-wheel, and halftrack
vehicles derived from the Wolseley CP-type truck. During the 1930s and 1940s the company was involved in a
series of mergers with other Japanese motor vehicle manufacturers and changes of name, taking its present name
Isuzu Motors Limited in 1949.
During the 1950s a number of European and American motor vehicle manufacturers expressed an interest in
establishing production facilities in Japan. However, the Japanese authorities wished to avoid a repetition of the
situation during the 1920s and 1930s, when vehicles produced at the Ford and General Motors factories in Japan
cornered the Japanese market, and made it very difficult for Japanese domestic vehicle manufacturers to do
business. In view of this, the Japanese Ministry of International Trade and Industry imposed a number of
conditions governing the entry of foreign firms to Japan.
It would allow foreign firms to enter the market only through technical tieups with existing chassis makers… First, small European cars were more
suitable than large American cars. Second, MITI supported the use of foreign currency allocated for the import of cars for the import of parts
instead… Third, the Japanese company should try to obtain the right to sell the knock-down cars in Southeast Asia. And fourth, if parts were
initially imported, they should eventually be made completely in Japan.
(Genther 1990:81)
Four licensing agreements for the production of complete vehicles were agreed under these conditions in the
early 1950s, between Nissan and Austin of England, Isuzu and Rootes of England, Hino and Renault of France,
and Mitsubishi and Willys Overland of the United States. 'In addition, there were thirty tieups with foreign
makers approved for the auto parts industry between 1951 and 1963' (Genther 1990:89). A further condition
established in October 1952 stated that 'Within five years of the initiation of the technology contract, at least 90
per cent of parts must be produced domestically' (Genther 1990:89). The agreement between Isuzu and Rootes
was announced on 21 February 1953. In addition to receiving the sole right to import all types of vehicles
manufactured by Rootes Motors Limited into Japan, Isuzu acquired the right to manufacture the Hillman Minx
passenger car and Commer delivery van, starting with assembly of cars delivered in completely knocked-down
form from England, but progressing to complete domestic production, as required by MITI. The royalty fee was
£25 per vehicle, though the first 2,000 vehicles were exempt from this payment, plus a one-off payment of
approximately £50,000. The latter was not remitted to Rootes in England, but used by Rootes to establish a sales
company for Rootes products in Japan. Isuzu also put up a further sum of over £50,000 towards this sales
company, which was called Yamato Motor Company Limited. Its profits were not remitted to England. After the
first five years either party could terminate the licensing agreement by giving one year's notice, otherwise the
agreement would continue for twenty-five years.
The first Hillman completely knocked-down parts arrived in Japan on 2 September 1953, and the first vehicle
was assembled on 28 October of the same year. On 28 October 1957, exactly four years later, the first car made
completely of Japanese components left the production line. Some 51,789 vehicles were manufactured under the
licensing agreement between 1953 and 1964, when their production came to a close (Cusumano 1989:10). The
speed and scale of production achieved by Isuzu under its licensing agreement with Rootes thus stands in stark
contrast to that achieved by Ishikawajima under the agreement with Wolseley. Similar techniques were employed
to achieve the transfer of technology in both cases, however. Rootes provided plans, components, and technical
personnel to Isuzu in Japan, and planned the layout of the factory in Japan where the vehicles were assembled
and then manufactured. Isuzu and other personnel went to Britain for training. In addition, British personnel
served as directors of Yamato Motor Company Limited. Subsequently, Isuzu manufactured cars derived from the
design it had purchased from Rootes, and, combining this with its own expertise, put on the market in October
1961 the Bellel, the first car to be produced in Japan with the option of a diesel engine. Licensing agreements
continued to be important for the Japanese motor vehicle industry, however. According to Duncan, 'there were
approved in 1969 some seventy licensing agreements relating to automobile parts' (Duncan 1973:105). In 1993
Isuzu announced that it would stop making passenger cars and specialize in commercial and recreational
vehicles. Therefore, it can be said that the agreement between Wolseley and Ishikawajima and the products made
under that agreement had a more lasting effect on the company's development than did the agreement between
Rootes and Isuzu.

Conclusion

In 1880 Isabella Bird noted that 'Many Europeans ridicule Japanese progress as "imitation"' (Bird 1880: Volume
1, 9). However, it was writers such as Bird who established the view of the Japanese as copiers firmly in the
Western mind. The Japanese certainly imitated Western products illicitly during the nineteenth and twentieth
centuries. However, as far as complex industrial products were concerned, their manufacture in Japan would not
have been possible without the cooperation of manufacturers from the West who possessed the relevant skills,
know-how, and patent rights. Howe refers to 'the eagerness of the West to supply what Japan was seeking' (Howe
1996:328). Far from being illicit, technology transfer frequently took place within the context of formal
licensing agreements, and the case of Ishikawajima, Wolseley, Isuzu and Rootes in the motor vehicle industry
forms no exception. Products manufactured under licence were acknowledged as such by their Japanese
manufacturers, and the licensing agreements generated income for the overseas licensors. The Japanese
authorities played a role in determining which products would be manufactured under licence, and which firms
would manufacture them, by introducing relevant legislation. Technology transfer was difficult in the early
stages of Japan's industrial development, but became easier over time, and licensing agreements were one
method adopted by Japanese firms to develop their skills. However, there was no guarantee that a Western
product manufactured under licence in Japan would be a commercial success. There also had to be a market for
the product. Japanese motor vehicle firms that participated in licensing agreements acknowledge the fact in their
published company histories, while the histories of their British partners make little or no mention of these
agreements. This may be a further reason why the Japanese are perceived as having copied illicitly from the
West. Today, the roles have been reversed, and Japanese industrial products and practices serve as models for
others to emulate.
Figure 11.1 A Wolseley light car in Japan

Figure 11.2 A Wolseley CP-type truck manufactured by Ishikawajima

Figure 11.3 Unpacking Hillman Minx car body panela

Figure 11.4 Hillman Minx cars outside the Yamamoto Motor company in Tokyo

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 12
Hungry visions

The material life of Japanese food samples

Rupert Cox

A common, not to say ubiquitous sight in contemporary urban Japan are the window displays of restaurants and
cafes that present 'samples' of their menus to inform and attract passers-by to the culinary pleasures that may be
had within. The English derivation of the Japanese term 'sample' carries the implication that a portion of the
original dish of food made and served in the shop's kitchen has been removed and re-presented here. This display
method broadly follows the pattern of food presentation established by arcades and department stores in Europe
and America in the late nineteenth century (Friedberg 1993). It is a method of display continued today mostly by
the purveyors of fresh and dried goods, confectioneries and pâtisserie.
However, in the Japanese case, even a cursory inspection of the average window display makes clear that these
'samples' are copies, made in workshops not kitchens, composed of inedible substances such as wax and silicone,
and comprise for the most part dishes that cooked or raw have been prepared in a state that is ready to eat from
the plate. As such, these commoditized forms appear to be designed and displayed for their visual effects rather
than for their material origins and suggest that they are made as part of a symbolic system for composing objects
into signs of themselves.
It is in this theoretical vein that they have been interpreted by cultural theorists like Masao Yamaguchi who sees
in the arrangement of objects in Japanese shop window displays the operation of a Japanese 'art of citation'
(mitate) (1991:58). This is 'a technique' which may be used to highlight the concealed features of objects 'of
ordinary life' and link them with 'mythological or classical images' (ibid). In the case of food sample displays,
the hidden links are with the ritual presentation of food at religious ceremonies and within the sacred spaces of
graves and family butsudan ('ancestral shrine') where it is symbolically consumed by the gaze of worshippers
and by the presence of divine entities. Similarly, there are connections being made with the aesthetic
appreciation required by guests of the tea ceremony who may place as much value on looking at the specially
prepared food (kaiseki ryôri) as eating it.
These associations of sample food are made possible by copying in the sense of 'citation' (mitate), a term which
for Yamaguchi means a practice of revealing the invisible aspects of an 'object' (mono) through accentuating its
visible characteristics. It is a practice that links shop window displays with strategies of exhibition making in
museums and even the performance of classical theatre. This 'poetics of exhibition' may 'extend the image of an
object' to 'transcend the constraints of time', such that here the natural process of decay which would render the
display of actual prepared food dishes quickly unappealing to the viewing public, is slowed down and even
frozen for a while (ibid).
A question that follows from this interpretation is what these processes of making visible, which reveal these
latent qualities in an object like a food sample, might be? Roland Barthes in his ambitious work Empire of Signs
proposes that we should think of the preparation of Japanese food as an activity analogous to graphic techniques
of representation such as writing and painting, which inscribe the surface of things and lack depth, a 'center', or a
'heart', because: 'everything is the ornament of another ornament: first of all because on the table, on the tray,
food is nothing but a collection of fragments' (1982:22). For Barthes, as for Yamaguchi, the visibility of food
samples on display are a function of representational practices that inscribe and quote from archetypes. They are
forms of writing that achieve a more tactile relationship with the originals they signify than techniques like
photography, but are, I would argue, at least one step removed from the messy materiality of the object itself.
The questions I wish to ask about samples derive from these studies but aim to examine what vision means in
particular contexts of making and looking at samples. That is: how may vision be employed and through what
means, in the process of creating samples and what does this tell us about the kinds of spectatorship that are
envisaged as taking place among customers who view the displays that samples end up as? These are questions
partly about ethnographic detail, but they also aim to extend our understanding of the copy from an act of
production and an object of consumption, to considering the copy in terms of a relationship between visual
likeness and material presence (Belting 1994). In this way, I intend to show that the value of the copy in Japan is
linked to both the creation of visual displays and forms of spectatorship as well as processes of material
composition and decomposition.
According to the oldest and largest sample company in Japan – Iwasaki Foods – the idea of making replicas
began in 1937 when the company founder, Mr Yagoro Iwasaki, observed the impressions made by melted wax
that had dropped to the floor from candles on his family butsudan (ancestral shrine). In what he retrospectively
describes as a moment of insight, he intuitively understood that he could use wax to make all kinds of different
impressions, but particularly model likenesses of food. Although it is not stated, the association with food at this
particular moment may have been due to its immediate and familiar presence on a shelf of the butsudan. But
there is also a question about the kind of observation that sees such images and commercial possibilities in an
everyday accident. The narrative of discovery through observation in this religious and familial context has
interesting correspondences with the accidental but equally fortuitous discovery of an industrial method by
another successful Japanese inventor, Masahito Ohtsuka, president of Ohtsuka pharmaceuticals.1 The method
that he innovated of transferring painterly images onto ceramic boards was inspired by an encounter at a
cemetery in St Petersburg, with the photographic portraitures of the deceased, embedded into gravestones. In
both of these frequently quoted accounts of discovery there is an identification with the contemplative and
intimate atmosphere provided by the respective religious contexts and the kind of attentive looking that leads to
a moment of realization. Such an attitude of attention and dedication is, as we shall see, reproduced in the
working conditions and practices of those who make the samples.
Following his moment of revelation, Yagoro Iwasaki came to the district of Sumiyoshi in Osaka, a big center of
food production and distribution and began a 'food model' (sokuhin môhei) business. In the period since the war,
the business has spread and become successful. In Japan today, sokuhin môhei or as they are now known, 'sample
foods' are a 150 million dollar industry and can be found in 86 percent of restaurant window displays in Japan.
There are two types of sample foods: one made of wax the other of silicone. Both methods involve gelatin molds
which are made by pouring the gelatin over the food itself. The mold is then peeled off and placed in a fridge
overnight to harden. Hot wax or silicone is then poured into the mold and while the substance is still warm and
pliable it is shaped manually and then later, color is added, also by hand. The silicone method was developed in
the early 1980s so as to produce a less fragile copy, although it tends to lose its color faster than wax models. As
coloring fades and restaurant menus change with the seasons, these acts and technologies of copying that create
the models become processes without ends, continually repeated. Some restaurants therefore choose to rent their
samples from Iwasaki at a cost of perhaps 100 or 200 yen per item per month.
Once the models become old or redundant, which is usually about every six months (in some cases they go soft
as the display cases are outside and in direct sunlight), they can be easily replaced from a stock of about 5,000–
6,000 ready-made, 'standard' (kiseihin) samples. New items on the menu usually require a special 'made-to-order'
service, where a mold is taken from food brought freshly prepared into one of the Iwasaki workshops. This time-
consuming and expensive method of creating samples was described to me2 on a visit to one workshop in Kobe
as more 'real' than the stock models because of the physical contact made with freshly made food, but
nonetheless of no less value as a 'sample' for display. Iwasaki employees went on to say that 'good samples' were
made using sketches and photographs and fresh food from the restaurant was unnecessary for this purpose.
The technical processes for manufacturing samples outlined in the above description indicate that the copying of
food into another medium involves processes that cannot be fully accounted for in terms of economic criteria
and abstract constructs such as 'commoditisation'. These terms would suggest the instrumental application of
labor and rational methods of production, whereas what we find in sample workshops are not factory conditions
and technologically determined methods of reproduction, but rather the atmosphere and practices of an artist's
studio. The Iwasaki workshops I have visited are small in scale, accommodating between ten or twenty people in
each 'office'. The people who work in these offices are mostly arts college graduates and they arrange their
working space according to personal needs and preferences. To the uninitiated observer, the work surfaces,
covered in the detritus of past and ongoing creations – sketches, photographs, half-finished or discarded
'samples' and paint pots – seem chaotic and are very far removed from the public image of ordered efficiency in
a Japanese factory, especially one making items with such apparently instrumental purposes.3 When I enquired
about this with the supervisor of the 'office' he explained that the employees are selected because they had a
passion for 'creative activities' that involved 'working with their hands'.
The objects produced in these 'offices' are then the result of social and material processes that accord very much
with Alfred Gell's interpretation of art works as agents in a network of relations that includes persons and things
acting as persons.4 Talk of the 'agency' of the object in this case means the efficacy of the sample as a copy that
bears the visual likeness and material presence of the food dish it stands in for, qualities which are contingent
upon the nature of its associations and relationships within the network. The network at issue comprises the
socio-spatial dynamics of the workplace and the passage of the sample from 'office' to shop window and thence
to the dustbin. Gell's ideas are useful here because they allow us to focus attention on what is going on with the
object as regards its copied-ness, in the stages of its creation, display and destruction, bringing to the fore:
'agency, intention, causation, result and transformation… [seeing art as] a system of action intended to change
the world rather than encode symbolic propositions about it' (1998:6 in Knappet 2002:100).
In other words, it provides interpretative space for thinking about copies, not as passive receptacles of pre-
existing or invisible concepts, made visible for display purposes, but as active entities within a social and
material nexus of relations. The movement of the sample into and through different networks is conditional on
the phase of its life-cycle and reflects different levels of its signification as a copy.
It is treated as a sign and, in the theorization of signs as 'icons', 'indexes' and 'symbols' by Charles Pierce (1932,
1955), that the particular stages and shifts of the sample as copy can become clearer. Pierce distinguishes
between the 'icon' that operates visually, through perceived likeness to its referent; the 'index', which has a causal
and contiguous relationship with its referent, based on physical contact, but displays no essential observable
similarity; and the 'symbol' which, like language, operates without any necessary visual or material connection
to its referent.
Using these terms we might expect that the sample is made in the 'office' to act as an icon, operating in the shop
window through its visual effects to provide information and be a symbol of the shop's aesthetic and perhaps
even reverent attitude towards the preparation and service of the real food within. The only proper indexical
relationship in this case will be at the moment of aromatic and tasteful consumption by the customer who eats
the 'real thing'. The suggestion of an indexical relationship between real food and the creation of the sample
potentially confuses the important separation between the production of a 'copy' and the consumption of an
'original'. However, in this case, such a confusion of categories is precisely the point and indeed the art of the
sample, showing that these terms are not discrete and that the character of the copy blurs the distinction between
the visuality of the image and the materiality of the object.
The reliance upon the visual evidence from photographs and sketches at the conception and planning of a sample
suggests both an iconic and an indexical relationship between the original foodstuff and the copied image. The
fidelity of the appearance of the image to its referent, whether through the method of drawing by hand or by
virtue of the exactitude offered by camera technology, is valuable as a point of visual reference. But the images
are also indexical because they bear the physical traces of the process of their manual creation and this also has
value for it demonstrates that there is a substantive and human connection to the material nature of the food
original.
This recognition of the composite character of the sample derives partly from debates in semiotic art theory
about the evidential status and claims of photography, but is most clearly illustrated in the discussion about
'skeuomorphism' in material culture studies (Knappet 2002). The term skeuomorphism comes from archeology
and is used to refer 'to the manufacture of vessels in one material intended to evoke the appearance of vessels in
another material' (Knappet 2002:109). Most of the information on skeuomorphs comes from middle Bronze Age
pottery groupings of Minoan Crete which are often ceramic copies of metal vessels. The ceramic copies are
made in a different manner from the metal originals, just as wax and silicone samples are made differently from
the food dishes they imitate. However an indexical connection exists because of the use of molds. Molding is a
process that reproduces the marks of the surface and the shape of the original and also leaves a physical residue
from the hands of the artisan who finally sculpts and adds color to the sample.
The artisans who make copies are well aware of this composite process and at what stages in its life-cycle they
find meaning and value for themselves. One woman told me that the aspect of work she enjoyed most was that
'little space' in the molding and coloring processes where she could be creative. The whole method of production
favors this kind of personal interpretation over assembly-line precision and is not expected to change in the
future because, as the manager put it to me, 'We are making samples here, not cars.' The manager also described
how, over the last fifteen or twenty years, they had occasionally received visitors from China and Korea who
thought they would be able to imitate the same quality of reproduction in setting up sample businesses
themselves. In every instance they failed, he said, because 'Only the Japanese have this kind of "skill" (te-saki)
…and only Japan does this in the whole world.' These statements locate the making of samples within a well-
known and much analyzed discourse about 'Japanese uniqueness' (Nihonjinron) and by so doing favorably
compare the techniques of manufacture to more well-known crafts. As such, these rhetorical claims about
samples can well be described as part of the 'inventions' of tradition and nationalist myth-making that
characterize modernity in Japan. However, there is a danger in applying this deconstructive thesis too
dogmatically, for it runs the risk of dismissing samples as insincere forms of fakery and of underestimating the
material outcomes of the technical and social processes of copying food into samples.
One important outcome, arising from the indexical nature of the process of production of the sample, is a
positive link to the reputation of the establishment that has gone to the trouble of having such a sample made.
Like the skeuomorph from Minoan Crete, which could operate as an icon of an elite group even in its 'spatio-
temporal absence' (Knappet 2002:110), the merging of iconicity and indexicality in the act of creation results in
an object that can act as a reflection of the status and prestige of the institution that the original is associated
with. Of course, the reverse may be true also, that the lack of indexicality shown in the use of generic stock
samples can act as an indication of the establishment's absence of status.
The capacity of the 'material' – or, to use Michael Taussig's terminologies, 'physiognomic' or 'tactile' – qualities
of the copy to borrow from the powers of the original by acting together with its iconic or visual aspects can be
construed as a kind of 'magic' (1993). The magic in question is of two kinds: 'sympathetic' and 'contagious', a
distinction made originally by James Frazer (1890) and extended in the work of Taussig and Gell, which refers to
the special power to affect a thing by its imitation or through making actual contact with it. Both kinds of magic
are at work in the creation of samples, for the artisan operates through a sensuous engagement with the surface
and contours of the original in the making of molds (on the occasion that a new sample is required), as well as by
the visual scrutiny of the lines of graphic reproductions made by photography and drawing. These sculptural and
visual skills required of the artisan may be said to have developed as a consequence of technologies of
reproduction, such as the molding and photographic processes. They involve a re-organization of the senses of
touch and vision, which may reproduce the primitive (and yet modern) magic that comes from a sensuous
apperception of objects.5
Is it possible or sensible, then, to think of these artisans as magicians, exercising through mimicry the power of a
copy to act and draw upon the qualities of the thing that is copied? Certainly, they are not magicians in the sense
that Taussig mostly describes, in his examples from the Cuna Indians, who use the power of the copy to
ironically subvert and counter the colonial regimes of authority beneath which they labor. There is one sense in
which the mimetic acts that create samples are rooted in this kind of radical alterity and may through imitation
exercise influence over the network of relations of which the original is an index. This is the instance when a
foreign dish, such as a French 'signature dish' like steak tartare, is copied into the form of a sample and with it
potentially the world of French cuisine with all its associations of social distinction and taste are 'domesticated'
into an essentially 'Japanese' form.6 The capacity of such reproductions to subjugate and re-make foreign
elements (that are themselves copies) into an image of Japanese taste is located in the skeuomorphic acts that
turn lumps of painted wax and silicone into aesthetic objects.
This transformative power is built on the sympathetic magic of imitation and can be construed in Marxist terms
as a kind of commodity fetishism, that is as a mimetic embellishment of the object, re-framed in the Japanese
context for ostensibly ideological ends. However, such a definition as this rests on what are ultimately false
dichotomies between an indigenous 'Japanese' way of copying and global processes of manufacture and
modernization, and therefore does not acknowledge the capability of material culture to combine a wide range of
ideas and practices.
What I have tried to show here is that the material emphasis in copying food into samples is a good place to
investigate the nature and significance of the relationship between conceptions of the copy as an object or
commodity and copying as intangible knowledge embodied through the re-organization of the senses, which
mimetic technologies engender, in the skilled bodies of the artisans. The sensory organization, through which the
sample as copy is arranged as a form of display in shop windows and by which its success as an attraction to the
eyes of the passer-by may be estimated, is also a form of 'tactile visuality'. However, what the phrase means here
in the process that leads to 'consumption' of the sample is not quite the same sense as the tactile visuality that
characterizes the mimetic processes of making samples, for, unlike the largely sedentary situation and fixed gaze
of the office artisan, this sensory apperception is part of the mobile, fleeting and sometimes predatory vision of
the street walker, who is 'window shopping' (Friedberg 1993).7 It is the kind of vision that is restless and
glancing, but may on occasion reach out to its object almost as a form of 'extromission', so as to claim
possession of it.8 It is, in short, a hungry vision.
How, then, are samples made to attract the eye and excite the appetite of the busy, fast-moving Japanese urban
dweller? One noted feature of sample displays is the often riotous combinations of the colors of the different
foods on view, an effect that is heightened because of the reflections that the painted surfaces create behind the
glass of the shop window. It is a revelatory effect that bears comparison with the enjoyment had by diners in
removing the wrapping from their food, and appreciating the loud explosion of color (shikisai), just prior to
eating it (Hendry 1993:27). The idea of 'wrapping' (and 'unwrapping') is a potentially useful metaphor here, for it
allows us to think about the application of paint and the orderly placement of samples in the space behind the
shop window, in terms of the layering of Japanese society in levels of politeness and respect. However, it is not
an entirely adequate metaphor, for the implication is that there is always something to be revealed beneath the
surface features of the sample, and that in their display there is a progression of meaning and intent as the layers,
carefully contrived by their creators are unwrapped by the customer, who looks through the window, enters the
shop and finally, authentically, consumes their meal.9 In the sample display, everything on offer is immediately
on view and nothing is understated or suggested by a partial absence, as is the case with forms of display that
aim to express well-known Japanese aesthetic values like wabi and sabi. It is a style of display borne out of a
historical relationship between Nihonga painters and department stores, such as Takashimaya in Kyoto and
Mitsukoshi in Kyoto (Sapin 2004). The cross-over of painters to work in different media in the late nineteenth
century led to new techniques and forms of commercial design, but also a new 'visual vocabulary' with, for
example, intensely detailed idealizations of flora and fauna (Sapin: 2004:334). The application of this modern
vocabulary with its attention to the minutiae of detail in displaying objects 'naturalistically' encourages a
discursive and fragmentary kind of looking and has the effect of making it difficult for the spectator to know
where to fix their gaze. This is also a revelatory kind of looking, a multi-sensory experience of discovery in itself
and not contingent upon the meanings to be uncovered by the ingestion of the actual food.
What we have here in this explicit and brash display of multiple colors and formal orderings, designed to halt the
movement of passers-by, is an 'aesthetics of repetition' and therefore the expression of a kind of kitsch.
Conventionally, kitsch is referred to by mass-culture theorists as a populist, derivative style, one that borrows or
unashamedly steals from high-culture, representing in essence a modern failure of the creative imagination
(Binkley 2000). A different interpretation of kitsch, apposite to understanding the visuality of sample displays is
that it is a distinct and unique style 'which employs the thematics of repetition over innovation' and 'a preference
for formulae and conventions over originality and experiment' (Binkley 2000:131). By identifying as 'kitsch' the
positive affirmation of an aesthetic sensibility which finds expression in the repetitive emulation of food, I mean
to indicate that the combination of visual likeness and material presence in sample displays is a problem of
modernity at large and not entirely peculiar to Japan.
The modern attitude I am describing here refers to that urban flânerie, the wandering gait and gaze of the late
nineteenth-century window shopper, for whom the metropolitan displays of goods and commodities are
especially designed, and which Walter Benjamin makes the subject of his 'Arcades Project' (Buck-Morss 1989).
In this study, Passagen-werk, Benjamin locates the beginning of the industrial age in the iron and glass arcades
of 1820s Paris. He calls the commercial spectacle of these new spaces 'dream houses of the collective' and 'fairy
grottoes' and sees in their endless reproduction of cultural forms the fated dreams of capitalist utopia (Buck-
Morss 1995:4–5). Benjamin's analysis of the Paris arcades is a compelling thesis for understanding the place of
Japanese samples in environments that are their architectural legacy, because it focuses on the ways in which
their visible presence in window displays, is both a celebration of modernity's excess and a reflection of the
faded and congealed dreams of commodity capitalism.
Samples are made to be seen and, in being seen, are consumed, and in this material process of making visible, it
is not the invisible, transcendent aspects which are revealed but the very substances by which they are composed,
showing themselves in states of decomposition and disintegration. They are therefore objects destined to
perpetually repeat themselves, reflecting, perhaps in the shine and shimmer of their colored surfaces the
insatiable appetites of a consumer society.
It is when samples lose their glister and begin to gather dust that their value as commodities and as icons of
aesthetic order and social distinction begins to fade. In the course of this passing and the movement of the
sample towards decay and a condition of ruination, the artisanal network of relations and sensory organization of
mimesis by which it was made become evident. It is an exposure of the creative process that is described by
observers who look at the shop window display and invariably pass on by, as 'sad' (kawaî so), for it diminishes
the magical effects of the skeuomorph. There is no pleasure to be had in observing the ruins of a sample display;
neither nostalgia nor the Zen-inspired reverence for the 'withered' and rustic aspects of the material world are
appropriate because the object has moved beyond any stabilizing network. This is a point which Tim Edsenor
makes clear in writing about 'waste matter':
This erosion of singularity through which the object becomes 'unmanufactured' remembers the process by which it was assembled: the materials
that were brought together for its fabrication, the skilled labor that routinely utilized an aptitude to make similar things, the machines and tools
which were used to shape it. The object's abrupt loss of the magic of the commodity – that it is a self-evident, separate thing of worth and value –
seems to confirm Julian Stallabrass's observation that 'commodities, despite all their tricks, are just stuff' (1996:175).
(Edseonr 2005:320)
Samples may end up by being products as 'just stuff', but in the process of their creation and display they are also
the stuff of which modern dreams may be made. These are the reflected dreams of a society which values the
efficiency and disposable convenience of the station lunch box (ekiben) but may treat it as a symbol of Japanese
seasonal and local custom (Noguchi 1994:317). In a society whose work patterns are characterized by speed and
movement the existence of the sample, even to display ekiben, is a reminder of just what a serious business
copying may be.
After my visit to the Osaka office of Iwasaki Foods, I accompanied the manager who had arranged my visit to a
sushi restaurant for lunch. As we sat at the counter watching the chef prepare our food, he commented that what
was missing in sample food but present in this, another form of display, was the smell of the food and the sense
of direct human contact over the restaurant counter. He said that this contact, initiated when you receive the
shibori or hot face towel and consolidated by the presentation of the food itself, anticipated and enriched the
whole experience of eating. It is my guess that these statements also convey something of his passion for the
potential of sample foods to communicate a sense of the human artistry, warmth and 'touch' involved in their
creation and display. Sample foods are not valued as replacements for actual or real food and they certainly do
not substitute for the eating experience, but they are made and displayed to encourage a certain gustatory
pleasure in looking, and through that tactile visuality achieve a likeness and presence that surpasses their mere
role as sources of information.
Samples are made through processes of copying, to be appreciated as copies and not as literal facsimiles of
originals of the real thing. The sketching, photographing, molding, coloring and arrangement of samples are
creative acts that show how seeing by artisans and spectators is a material (and materialist) matter. This kind of
rapacious vision reaches out to touch and possess its object, and demonstrates that samples may act not only as
icons of consumption, but as indexes of the sensory imagination.

Notes

1 This comparison is based on conversations with the president of Ohtsuka pharmaceuticals during fieldwork in 2000. The research was supported
by a grant from the Economic and Social Research Council.
2 The description of the 'offices' where sample foods are made and details of the founding and operation of the company Iwasaki foods are based
on field research in 2000.
3 For a detailed ethnography of the kind of workshop environment that I am describing here, see D. Kondo's excellent Crafting Selves: Power,
Gender and Discourses of Identity in a Japanese Workplace' (1990) University of Chicago Press.
4 Gell (1998) and Latour (2000) have both commented on the deep-rooted idea that humans and things inhabit separate worlds and proposed that
they occupy networks of relations which are being constantly adapted and changed. Therefore, the agency of individuals and objects is widely
dispersed in time and space.
5 Taussig defines the mimetic faculty as: 'the ability to copy, to imitate, to yield into and to become other in such a way that the copy draws power
and influences the original' (1993: xiii).
6 For a detailed discussion of the idea of 'domestication' as a concept which may explain the modern incorporation of foreign commercial elements
into Japanese society, see Tobin (1992:27).
7 Friedberg's thesis is that the architecture of modern cities, with the development of department stores, cinemas and transport systems, engendered
a new spatiovisual perception among its residents, a way of looking and interacting with the world that she calls 'window shopping'. The particular
analogy is between the window screen and the cinema screen. I am grateful to Ellen Schattchneider for this reference.
8 'Extromission' and 'Intromission' (its inverse) are two medieval conceptions of sight that preceded the work of Descartes and were overturned by
the Cartesian revolution. They remain significant because as Elkins (1999) has argued they are a common-sense way of thinking about the
possessive character of sight.
9 Another aspect of sample display which has a certain affinity with the way that color is used, adding to its 'loud' effect, is sound. In busy urban
neighborhoods in particular there are recorded announcements at the entrance ways to shops played repeatedly and sometimes at volume, inviting
and welcoming potential customers.

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1912'. Journal of Design History, Vol. 17, No. 4: 317–36.
Sato, Yuriko (1999) 'Japanese Aesthetics of Packaging. The Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism, Vol. 57, No. 2: 257–65.
Schefold, Reimar (2002) 'Stylistic Canon, Imitation and Faking. Authenticity in Mentawai Art in Western Indonesia'. Anthropology Today, Vol. 18,
No. 2: 10–14.
Seligman, L. (1994) 'The History of Japanese Cuisine'. Japan Quarterly, Vol. 41: 165–79.
Taussig, Michael (1993) Mimesis and Alterity: A Particular History of the Senses. Routledge Press.
Tobin, Joseph J. (ed.) (1992) Re-Made in Japan: Everyday Life and Consumer Taste in a Changing Society. Yale University Press.
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 Index

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Abu-Lughod, Lila 228

accuracy in copying 58
Adams, Henry 71
Adas, Michael 5, 240
Ariwara no Narihira 152, 153
Akihagijô, the 157–8, 178, 183, 186;
recensions of 173–5;
Wang Xizhi letters in 163–8, 177, 181, 182, 192
Alcock, Rutherford 241
Allen, G. C. 244–5
Amagasaki Akira 55–6, 57, 58
Amanô Yasugawara cave 11
Anchordoguy, M. 244
apes 4
appeasement rites:
ritual puppetry 41–3
Arima seminary 118–19
Atomu 7
automata 6
Awaji puppetry:
Amagoi Sanbasô 47;
Dôkumbô mawashi 44–6;
kami-okuri Sanbansô 46–7;
kotobuki Sanbasô 46;
revival of 48–9;
Sanbasô symbolism 47–9

Bailey, Justice 10, 52–3

Bann, Stephen 6
Barreto, Manuel 114
Barthes, Roland 14, 258
Baxandall, Michael 80
beards 83
Beauchamp, C. R. 245
beauty 10, 11
Beckham, Victoria 61–2
Bell, Catherine 131
Bellel, the 251
Belting, Hans 258
Benjamin, Walter 9, 22, 53, 265
Beyonce 59, 65
bikan chiku 227
Binkley, Sam 264
Bird, Isabella 242, 251
Blacker, Carmen 15
Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine 242
bo (tracing) 159
Borgia, Francis 124
Borja, St Francis 120
Bourdon, Léon 114
boxes, wooden: inscriptions on 132–3
Britain and Japan:
Biographical Portraits 244
Brower, Robert 147
Brunton, R. H. 245
Buddhism 10
buildings, wooden:
Kyoto 221–3
bunkazai 228
Bunshuku:
and tea bowls 132
Burger, William 140–1

calligraphy:
Chinese influence 160–1;
scripts 162
Can Cam 62–4
Chang, Léon 192
characters 188–9
Checkland, O. 242, 245
China:
influence on calligraphy 160–1;
Jesuit seminaries 116;
pictorial devices 116
chinkon 23
Chôjirô 130
citation, art of 257–8
Cleary, Thomas 192
clocks 6, 125
Collins English Dictionary 52
commodities 8–9, 260, 263, 265–6
copiers:
Japanese depicted as 240–3
copyright 51–2;
and original 52–5
Costa, João Paulo 111
Crystal Palace Exhibition (1851) 199–200
culture of imitation 8
Cuna Indians 262
Cusumano, M. A. 251

Daiichi kangyô bank:

reproduction of, Kyoto 216–17, 225–6, 228, 233
Daily Mail 59–60
dance 27–9
Darwin, Charles 4
denden chiku 227–8
dentôteki kenzôbutsu-gun hozon chiku 227–8
Department of Overseas Trade, British Government report 242
Descartes, René 267
Directory for the Practice of Exercises 124
Dógico 125
dôjuku 114
Dôkumbô Denki 44–6
Duncan W. C. 251
Dürer, Albrecht 71

Ebisu, deity 44–6

Ebisu-kaki 45
Edsenor, Tim 265–6
Eiga monogatari 193
Elgin, Lord:
The Times report on 241
Ekken Kaibara 57
Elkins, James 12, 267
Enomoto Yazaemon 78
evangelization of Japan 111, 112
exhibitions 8;
Crystal Palace Exhibition (1851) 199–200;
Japan-British Exhibition (1910) 204–8, 210, 211;
Vienna Exhibition (1873) 202–4, 209

Fabre, Jean-Pierre 124

fairs 8
Fiat car 247
firearms 5, 239, 241
fires 222–3, 237
flags 81, 82, 83
folding screens 123;
cartographic 118, 119, 120–1, 122
"forces of reproduction" 136
Fortune, Robert 242
Frazer, James 14, 262
Freer, Charles Lang 135
Friedberg, Anne 257, 262, 267
Fujiwara no Mototoshi 149
Fujiwara no Seishi 151
Fujiwara no Shunzei 146, 147–8, 152, 154, 185
Fujiwara no Teika 146–7, 152
Fujiwara no Yoshitsune 145–6, 149
Fujiwara no Yukinari 163, 165–6, 171, 173, 193;
sôgana of 186, 187
Furuya Minoru 165, 171, 193
Fushimi, Emperor 166, 193;
Kaô of 180

Gell, Alfred 260, 262, 267

Genther, P.A. 249, 250
Gibson, William 7
Glamour 59, 61–2
Go-Suzaku-in 150, 151
Go-Tona-in 148
Gombrich, Ernest 107
Greenhalgh, Paul 206
Guichard-Anguis, Sylvie 220–1
guns 5, 239, 241

Hanafi Zakiya 6
Handa Masao 51
Hanegawa Chinchô 76, 104
Hanegawa Tôei Michinobu 75–6;
Chôsenjin Ukie 71–4;
genealogy 93–101;
history 79–81;
perspective 92–3;
sources 89–92;
subject 81–8;
Ukie 71, 72
hanken 51
Harootunian, H. D. 107
Hearn, Lafcadio 7
Hendry, Joy 53, 56–7, 58, 264
Hillman Minx 250, 253, 254
hinagata 13, 203
hinagatabon 203
Hon'ami Kôetsu:
Kaga Kôetsu tea bowl 134–5
Holtham, E.G. 243, 245–6
Howe, C. 243, 251
Huainan honglie binglue jianggu 163–4, 165–6, 179, 192
Huainanzi 163–4, 165–6, 179, 192
Hunter, J. 244

Ichinokura, Mr 26, 29
Iijima Tachio 164–5
Ikuta Kumiko 55
imitation 213
Inace of Loyola:
Spiritual Exercises 124
Independent on Sunday 60
individualism 61–2;
restriction of 157
industry:
car 246–52,
Western influence 243–6
Ise jingû, Shinto shrine 221, 223
Ise monogatari 153
Ishikawajima 239, 246–50;
see also Isuzu Motors Limited
Isuzu Motors Limited 239;
see also Ishikawajima
Iwasaki Foods 258, 266
Iwasaki Yagoro 258;
food models 259–60;
Iwasaki Foods 258, 266
iwatobiraki (Opening the Rock-Cave Door) 10, 23, 24

Japan-British Exhibition (1910):

architectrual models 204–8, 210, 211
Jesuits:
Arima seminary 120;
evangelization of Japan 111, 112;
seminaries 116
JJ (magazine) 58–9
jôdai yô 173
Jones, H.L. 244
Jôtoku-ji screen 118
Jingû, Empress 106

kabuki 58
Kaempfer, Englebert 105, 106
Kaga Kôetsu tea bowl 134–5
Kage Seiichi 57
kagura 23–6;
Ayauchi Kagura 28, 29;
Hayachine Kagura 22, 26–31;
Ishihatooka Kagura 28–9, 34, 35, 36, 37;
Kamozawa Kagura 35;
Omoto Kagura 32, 34
Kameoka Suekichi 207
kami uta 22
kanbô 114, 125
Kanda festivals 79, 80, 81, 83, 87
Kanzaburoo Nakamura 55–6
Karamon of Daitokuji:
architectrual models 207, 211
kata (form) 55–6, 57–8, 131
katachi 55
Katô Chikage 174
Kawase Takehito 57
Keinyû:
head of Raku house 132
Kenshô 146
Ki no Tsurayuki 146
kirishitan art 121
kitsch 264–5
Kiyotaka Miyazaki 57–8
Knappet, Carl 260, 261, 262
Kokin wakashû 169–70, 185
Kokinshû, poetry 144, 146
Kokugaku 174
Komatsu Shigemi 166, 173, 193
Komg Shizhong tie 162
Konishi Jin'ichi 157
Korean visit to the Shoguns 77–8
Kumakura Isao 56
Kunaikyô 150
Kyô-machiya 217–20, 234
Kyong Son 108
Kyoto:
Pont des Arts affair 214–16, 225, 230, 233;
reproduction of Daiichi kangyô bank 216–17, 225–6, 228, 233;
townscape disputes 213;
townscape questionnaires 225–7, 231–2, 235, 236;
wooden buildings in 221–3
Kyûsojin Hitaku 166

Lamarre, Thomas 163

Lanting xu,
calligraphy script 162
Larkham, Peter J. 220
Latour, Bruno 267
Law, Jane Marie 10
learning by copying 56–8
Ledderose, Lothar 136
Lehmann, J. 241
literary borrowings:
contrastive feeling 150–1;
inclusion of personality 153–4;
narrative structure 151–3;
quotation 148–9;
structural patterning 149–50
Lowenthall, David 8, 15, 220

ma 1
machiya (town houses) 13;
Kyoto 217–20
magazines 52;
Can Cam 62–4;
Glamour 59, 61–2;
JJ 58–9;
'Moe' feature 60–1, 66;
More 60
magic 14, 262–3
mai (sacred scenes) 114
"Makanai tojin" (Itcho) 106
Mansie, Sami 150
man'yôgana 168
Man'yôshû, poetry 144, 168
maps 116–17;
see also folding screens, cartographic
Martins, Pedro 120
Masahito Ohtsuka 259
Massarella, D. A. 241
Masuda Takashi 194
matsui vase 132–3
matsuri 23, 24, 25, 33, 86
Mikohidari school:
poetic tradition 146, 147
Miller, Peter 192
Minamoto no Michitomo 154
Minamoto R. 55, 56
Miner, Earl 147
minzolu geinô 10, 48
Mitsukoshi Department Store 64
mo (tracing) 159
models, architectural 199, 201–2;
hinagata 13, 203;
Japan-British Exhibition (1910) 204–8, 210, 211;
Karamon of Daitokuji 207, 211;
pagodas 201–2;
Taitokuin Mausoleum 206;
Vienna Exhibition (1873) 202–4, 209
models, food 259–60
'Moe' feature 60–1, 66
mokei 13, 200–1
Mona Lisa 53
More (magazine) 60
Moreira, Inácio 118
Morrell, Edmund 245
Morris-Suzuki, Tessa 5, 6
môsha 12
Murakami Takao 53
Mutsu Hirokichi 205

Nadal, Jerome:
Evangelicae historiae imagines 124
Nakagawa Osamu 224, 237
Nakamura Sôtetsu 133
Nakata Senryûshi 137
namban byôbu 118
Namban-ji, temple 113
Necromancer trilogy 7
Niccolò, Giovanni 120
ningyô see puppetry, ritual
Nishinomiya shrine 44
Norman, Henry 243
Nôshômushô 206
Nossa Senhora da Assunção, temple 113

Oda Nobunaga 113

Oguni Seikichi 30
Ôhi Chôzaemon 134
Okumura Masanobu 89, 90, 93, 101, 102, 104;
Festival Procession 91;
Sakai-chô Fukiya-chô shibai-machi ô-ukie 90
Ono no Michikaze 163, 165, 169, 170, 173;
sôgana of 183
Omotesenke school 136
onna-de 169
Opening the Rock-Cave Door (iwatobiraki) 23
original:
and copy 52–5
originality 61–2
Orvell, Miles 8, 9
Oxford English Dictionary 53

Pagini, Catherine 6
pagodas 201
Palast der Republik, Berlin 229
Paltrow, Gwyneth 59
Panofsky, Erwin 101
Paris arcades 265
Pedlar, N. 244
Penniall, Albert James 248
Perrin, N. 241
perspective 101–2
Philips, Quitman, E. 76–7
Pierce, Charles 260–1
Pinto, Mendes 4–5
poetry:
allusion techniques 145;
Kokinshû 144, 146;
Man'yôshû 144, 168;
Mikohidari school 146, 147;
Rokujô school 146;
Six Dynasties 144;
Yamato 145
Pont des Arts:
Referendum Group questionnaire 230;
reproduction of, Kyoto 214–16, 225, 230, 233
puppetry, ritual 10, 40–1;
appeasement rites 41–3;
Awaji 44–50;
ritual uses of 43–4;
Usa Hachiman Hôjô-e 41–3

raku 12
Raku workshop 130, 132, 136;
Catalogue of Raku Vessels 134–5;
Collected Raku Ceramic Secrets 137–8;
Kaga Kôetsu tea bowl 134–5
Reader, Ian 15
Reigen, Emperor 173
"relations of reproduction" 136
Ricci, Matteo:
world maps 116–17
Richet, Charles 4
rin (freehand copying) 158–9
Rokujô school:
poetic tradition 146
Rootes Motors Limited 239, 246, 250, 251
Ryôkan, Priest 174, 184

Sakka Fumio 51, 52

Salus Populi Romani (painting) 120
Sangluan tie 162–3, 176
Sanno festivals 80, 85, 86, 87, 106
Sanseki 163
Sapin, Julia 264
Schaffer, Simon 6–7
Schechner, Richard 21, 22, 26
Schloßplatz, Berlin 229
Sen no Rikyû 129–30, 133;
death marked by Sen schools 131
Sen schools 130;
anniversaries marked by 131–2;
tea masters 136–7, 138
Sen Sensô Sôshitsu 134
Seven Exercises 131, 139
shamanism 24, 47–78
Shand, Alexander Innes 7–8
Shibusawa Masao 249
Shinkenchikugaku iinkai 201
Shinkokinshû 145
Shinmura Izuru 77
Shoguns:
Korean visit to 77–8
silk 112
Singleton, John 1, 3, 131
Six Dynasties period:
poetry 144
skeuomorphism 261, 262
Society of Jesus see Jesuits sôgana 168–73, 183, 186, 187
sôkô tenboku 159
Stanley-Baker, Joan 191
Storia dell'Introduzione del Cristianesimo nel Cina 117
Sugiyama S. 244
Sumida CL 249

Taitokuin Mausoleum 206;

model of 207–8
Taizong, Emperor 162, 173, 192
Takenob Y. 249
Tanaka Keiji 54
Tanaka Keiko 57, 60
Tanegashima 4–5
Tarde, Gabriel 53–4
Tatsuno, Sheridan 2, 14
Taussig, Michael 2, 4, 6, 199, 202, 262, 263, 267;
on Cuna Indians 263;
mimetic faculty 267
tea:
bowls 130, 132;
and Bunshuku 132;
schools 130–1;
see also Sen schools technology 6–7, 9, 53;
car industry 246–52;
Western influence 243–6
Tenry collection 94, 96, 97, 98, 99, 100
Teppo Ki 5
Tetsui films 7
The Times:
Lord Elgin in Japan 241
theme parks 223–5
Three Traces 163
Tierra del Fuego 4
Tôjin 78–9, 82, 82, 102, 105
Tôkaiji, Buddhist temple 108
Tokyo Disneyland 223, 224
Tooyama Tsutomi 54
Torii Kiyohiro 89, 104;
New Year at Suruga-chô 89
Toyotomi Hideyoshi 129
trance 24
Tsujimoto Masashi 57
Tsukamoto Shinya 7
Tsukamoto Takashi 61

Ukie (Hanegawa) 71, 72

Uma no naishi 149
unagi no nedoko 217
Unter den Linden, Berlin 229
Usa Hachiman Hôjô-e:
ritual puppets used in 41–3
utsushi 76–7

Valery, Paul 7, 139

Valignano, Alessandro 118;
Advertimentos 113
VanKeerberghen, Griet 192
Vienna Exhibition (1873):
architectural models 202–4, 209
Virgin Mary, cult of 120

Waal, Frans de 4
waka 12, 144
Wang, Eugene 162–3
Wang style 161–3
Wang Xizhi 161;
letters in the Akihagijô 163–8, 177, 181, 182, 192;
Sangluan tie 162–3, 176;
see also
Wang style
Watanabe Yumiko 148
Wenders, Wim 1
West, the:
role in industrial and
technological development 243–6
Westwood, Vivienne 54–5
Wolseley Motors Limited 246, 247–9;
Wolseley CP type truck 249, 253;
Wolseley light car 252

Xavier, Francis 112–13, 114–15, 120

Yamada Shôji 51, 53, 56, 58

Yamaguchi Masao 24, 58, 257, 258
Yamato:
poetry of 145
Yamato Motor Company Limited 250, 251
Yasujiro Ozu 1, 14
Yokoyama Shigeru 53–4, 54
Yokoyama T. 241
yueyi lun, calligraphy script 162
yûgen 12
Yukichi Fukuzawa 51

Zeami Motokiyo 56, 57

Zhiyong 161–2