A variation of *tenmokuyū 天目釉. A yellow-brown or liver-brown glaze…

Awataguchi 粟田口 kiln. Also called awatayaki 粟田焼. A ceramic ware that was made in Awataguchi, at the foot of…

A figured or diagonally-woven twill fabric.

1　The twill form, ayasoshiki 綾組織 or pattern of…

Bizen 備前 ware. Pottery made in the Inbe 伊部 village of Bizen Province, now known as Wakegun 和気郡 in Okayama Prefecture. The…

Also called chinkinbori 沈金彫. A technique developed in aizunuri 会津塗 that involves cutting a design into a…

Chasing. Carving patterns or letters with a chisel on metal work. A common technique is nanako-uchi 魚々子打 (fish-roe…

Carved lacquer. A generic term used for many carved lacquer techniques where layers of lacquer are applied to a thickness of…

1　Also written 反. A step. The level part or tread of a flight of stairs. When made of wood, the tread is…

A man's hip-length jacket, generally worn over other clothing or armor by high-ranking samurai 侍 from the late…

Also written 純子. Patterned damask weave. A thick and glossy silk variety of shusu 繻子 (satin), with the design made…

Hagi ware. A general name for pottery made in the Matsumoto, 松本, area of western Hagi City, and in Nagato Fukawa, 長門深川, in…

Lit. half arm. A sleeveless short undergarment for aristocratic men. From the Nara through the early Heian periods, …

Ch. Pingtuo. A technique in which thin sheets of metal are cut into decorative shapes and set in a lacquer base;…

Fire-cord design. A decoration used on ceramics. While appearing accidental, this is a method created by the special…

Iga 伊賀 ware. A stoneware ceramic made in Iga (now Maruhashira 丸柱 village), Mie Prefecture and in a few nearby villages. The…

Imari ware. A general term for porcelain from the Arita 有田 region of Saga Prefecture, but not including the Kakiemon 柿右衛門…

Lit. seal caddy. A tiered rectangular or circular container used originally for seals but later for medicines and other…

Lit. colored picture.

1　A metalwork term for the soldering of thin sheets of gold, silver, or other…

1　Paper dyed various colors using one of several techniques: sen'izome 繊維染 (raw fibers dyed before…

A lidded food container, usually layered and lacquered with decorations of sunken gold *…

Campaign jacket. A short garment worn over armor. Based on European prototypes introduced by the Portuguese at the end of…

Lit. superior cloth. A jōfu lightweight, fine hand-woven cloth made lightweight from delicate hand-twisted ramie…

Also called kaio'oi 貝覆. A shell-matching game played originally by nobles in the Heian period. A half clam shell…

Shell buckets. Paired octagonal wood-based lacquer-decorated containers with fitted inrōbuta zukuri 印籠蓋造 lids used…

A variation of *tenmokuyū 天目釉. A red-brown glaze which is often used on straight…

A flag, made in cloth and covered with gilt-bronze, used for the Buddhist abhiseka ceremony of sprinkling water on the head…

Also written 広東, 漢島, 漢渡, and 閑島. A fine silk striped woven material, perhaps named after the Japanese pronunciation of…

A stick type of hair ornament. It may be a single stick or fork-shaped stick. The handle end usually has decoration.…

A Chinese-style chest used to store clothes, arms, personal effects, sutra scrolls (in this case called kyōkarabitsu…

Lit. Chinese things. The term is especially common in *chanoyu 茶湯 to designate…

Karatsu 唐津 ware. A general name for the glazed, high-fired pottery made at kilns producing Korean style pottery grouped…

Also written 猟衣, 雁衣. Lit. hunting silk. Often translated as hunting robe. Originally a long, loose informal jacket worn by…

A plain weave fabric with designs developed in India and brought to Japan via Indonesia (where it is called ikat), then…

Also written 帷子. An unlined garment worn in summer since the Heian period. For court nobles, it was woven with cotton, hemp…

A popular simple, bold *kosode 小袖 design from the Kamakura…

Lit. shoulders and hem. The type of *kosode 小袖 decoration where…

Lit. gold Chinese leather. A kind of decorated leather with patterns created by painting, relief, or gold foil. Introduced…

It is also written 金間, 金磨, 金馬. A lacquer technique in which patterns are carved on black lacquer and filled in with red…

Gold brocade. Woven of patterns with gold or silver woof on a plain ground of hiraori 平織 (plain fabric), ayaori…

The Japanese name for the gold color added to Chinese wucai porcelain gosai 五彩, featuring a white-base with red,…

Kiyomizuware. One of the terms commonly given to similar wares produced by several local kilns and associated with the old…

A kind of bronze used in North China and Japan. It was known in Japan by the Muromachi period, with variants including …

Incense containers. Also called kōbako 香箱. Small, lidded containers usually made of lacquer or ceramic, and…

Bound resist. An early type of resist dying for textiles, along with wax resist rōkechi 臈纈, and carved wooden-block…

Lit. small pattern. A small-scale repeated pattern usually in a single color against a colored ground. Originally used…

Bridal trousseau. An Edo period daimyō 大名 bride brought to her husbands' home a lavish set of household…

Incense burner. Common materials are metal, pottery, horn, and lapis lazuli as well as various gems and woods. There are a…

Also read yanagui and written 胡禄. A kind of quiver which hangs from the right side of the waist with the arrowheads…

Lit: hip wrap. Part of the formal summer attire of elite warrior women, and placed over the *…

Lit. small sleeves. A modern generic name for all full-length garments made before the Meiji period. Originally a lower-…

Kutani ware. The term was used from around 1803, but only the original, ko-kutani 古九谷 (old Kutani) was…

Sutra box. Although usually rectangular these come in many shapes, having a lid and sometimes a foot. Typically the material…

Kyoto ware. General name of the ceramic wares of Kyoto (except *rakuyaki…

Sutra cylinder. A container for the Buddhist sutras placed in the sutra mound kyōzuka 経塚: cylinders of circular,…

Round chip box. Also called wagemono 綰物 (bent round object) or himono 檜物 (cypress object). A…

Lit. "sprinkled picture." A technique which originated in the Heian period for lacquer ware decoration in which designs are…

Mashiko ware. A modern pottery type made in Mashiko 益子 village, Tochigi prefecture. The Mashiko kiln was started around 1853…

Celebrated fabrics. Cloth chosen and admired by tea adepts and other elites from the 14th to 17th century. Most are *…

Mino 美濃 ware. A general name for ceramic wares made in the town of Tajimi 多治見 in old Mino Province (now the south-eastern…

Wood picture. Also called mokue 木絵. A technique of wood decoration, called hirazōgan 平象嵌 (flat inlay, see…

Also written 魚子, 斜子. Lit. "fish-roe."
1　A pattern of small dots thought to resemble fish-roe, and…

A miniature sculpture that is ties to a portable tiered container *inrō 印籠 worn…

Brocade. A general term for a variety of flat multicolored, woven-pattern fabrics. Recently it suggests silk woven with an…

Bank or climbing kiln. Built on a slope, this efficient type of kiln originated in China and was introduced to Japan from…

*Noh 能 costumes. Also called nō-ishō 能衣装. Cloth articles worn in Noh…

Oribe 織部 ware. Produced mainly from 1600 to the 1630s, this high-fired pottery juxtaposing rich fluid glazes with abstract…

Lit. "big armor." The most formal type of armor for high-ranking samurai 侍, it was loose-fitting defensive…

1　A shell, especially mother-of-pearl, inlay technique commonly used for lacquer ware *…

Raku 楽 ware. A light weight ceramic ware developed in Kyoto in the Momoyama period and particularly prized in the…

The technique whereby bamboo strips are woven into shapes and coated with lacquer. Also called kagoji 籠地 (basket…

Lapis lazuli. Vaidurya in Sanskrit. Originally it meant lapis lazuli or emerald, but from the Six Dynasties period Chinese…

Also written 佐波理. An alloy of copper containing less than ten percent tin, lead and zinc and of a pale yellowish color. It…

Sanage 猿投 kilns. A group of old kilns in an area stretching from the western area of modern Nagoya 名古屋 city to the northern…

Satsuma 薩摩 ware. A general name for pottery and porcelain made in Satsuma and Ōsumi 大隅 in Shimazu 島津 fief (modern Kagoshima…

Seto 瀬戸 ware. Pottery made in Seto city and nearby areas of modern Aichi Prefecture. The Seto area was the center of pottery…

Reliquary. A container for the bones of the Buddha *shari 舎利 placed in a stupa or pagoda. In…

Tie dye. A name for a resist-dyeing technique and the fabric made by it. Shibori 絞 designates a huge variety of…

Shigaraki 信楽 ware. Sueki 須恵器 ware was made in this clay-rich area from early times, but a distinctive ware fired in…

Ch: si'erhu. A jar with four lug handles (loop ears) around the mouth or neck of the jar, the handles may be round…

Shino 志野 ware. One of the best known of the Mino wares *minoyaki 美濃焼, first…

Lacquered leather. Untanned skins of cow, wild pig or deer are softened by soaking, wrapped around a mold to dry in the sun…

A satin textile woven with colored woofs to form a pattern, originating in Ming China. As more than seven colors were used,…

Blue-and-white ware. A white pottery with indigo patterns. On the surface of white pottery, mainly porcelain, designs are…

Openwork. A method of decoration in which a design is cut out of a plain surface. While sukashibori refers to…

Rubbed metal foil. A decorative technique for textiles in which metal foil is impressed on a design first drawn in paste.…

Takatori 高取 ware. Made in Chikuzen 筑前 Province (modern Fukuoka Prefecture) of northern Kyūshū 九州, the Takatori kilns were…

Tanba 丹波 ware. Also called tachikui-yaki 立杭焼. One of the Six Old Kilns, a general name for a type of sueki…

Beating gold. Also called tanzō 緞造, uchimono 打物, tsuikin 鎚金 and kaji 鍛冶. A…

Lit. "hand box." Introduced from China as a comb box before the Heian period, they were popular with court women through the…

Chinese Tianmu tea bowls. Black-glazed stoneware bowls, with a conical shape, small foot and thin walls, divided into types…

A stand for a *tenmoku jawan 天目茶碗. Tenmoku 天目 stands were imported from China…

A black glaze used on straight-sided conical teabowls known as tenmoku ware *tenmoku…

Tea contest. Competitive parties featuring taste and classification of tea developed by Heian period aristocrats and wildly…

Tokoname 常滑 ware. A rugged, reddish brown stoneware produced from the 11th century in and around the town of Tokoname in…

Also written 当世冑. Contemporary helmet. A type of Japanese helmet based on southern barbarian *…

Also written 鍔. Sword guard. Tsuba protect the hand and balance the sword. In the Edo period when samurai…

Lit. "flowers at the crossing dyeing." A Muromachi period hybrid, decorative textile technique of combining tie-dyeing and…

An unbelted woman's outer garment worn over the *kosode 小袖 on formal occasions…

Lit. "lacquer coating." Lacquerware is also called shikki 漆器 (lacquerware) or nurimono 塗物 (coated things…