Much of what we know about women from this period is due to Sei Shonagon, the author of The Pillow Book anda lady-in-waiting to Empress Teishi in the middle Heian period, c. 1000. Sei’s book provides fascinating insights into Japanese life over a thousand years ago, particularly the role of women in Japan under the sh̄oguns. Sei Shonagon’s description of Empress Teishi playing the biwa , a stringed instrument like a lute, can tell us much about court life at the time (see SOURCES6 and 7 ). Empress Teishi died at the age of 25 in 1001 after giving birth to her second child. Other women described in The Pillow Book include: • farming women planting the rice fields and ‘wearing hats that look just like newly made serving trays’. They are singing a song about a bird, saying ‘it’s your chanting sets us planting!’ • ladies-in-waiting, who spend their time writing poetry, playing music and indulging in witty conversation • fisher girls with thin ropes tied to their waists diving out of boats to collect shellfish. Sei criticised the men who were singing and moving the boat while the women were gasping for breath • shaman chanting and praying to the spirits for a child’s
SOURCE6 The Japanese biwa was first developed in the eighth century. It derives from similar instruments found in Asia and the Middle East and is still played today.
health. During the sh̄ogunate period, the Japanese believed that bad health was due to evil spirits possessing a person’s body
• an old Buddhist nun ‘dressed in horribly grimy clothes and looking like a little monkey’. She begs for offerings and shocks the ladies-in-waiting by singing a rude song • a serving lady pouring water for the empress. Other female servants act as hairdressers, food preparers or nurses to the emperor’s children.
SOURCE7 An extract from The Pillow Book
There she sat, in a scarlet robe with quite indescribably lovely gowns and starched robes beneath, in layer upon layer ... the sharp contrast of her wonderfully white forehead, clearly visible at the side of the shielding instrument.
Geisha culture
SOURCE8 Practices such as the tea ceremony were an incredibly important part of a geisha’s role entertaining her clients.
The term ‘geisha’ means ‘art person’. In Japan, geishas are performing artists who entertain clients with various artistic skills. Their role, which emerged in the eighteenth century, involved being talented artists and conversationalists. Although some western scholars equated the geisha profession with prostitution, geishas were more accurately professional entertainers and independent businesswomen. Women managed the geisha houses and finances. Geishas traditionally did not marry and often entertained into their 70s and 80s. If a geisha married, she had to leave the geisha house. The refined culture of geishas, which developed during the Edo period, still exists in Japan today.
TOPIC9 Japan under the sh̄oguns 231
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