Attached is a google doc (I know, the company sucks) about the tayu, which I try to update regularly. Content found in my posts is also in this document! If you see information that is inaccurate, please DM me via this Tumblr blog, or email [email protected].
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Conversation, music, spiritualism, aesthetics, the Tayuu had a wealth of talents and gifts. They were considered supernatural beauties, bewitching castle-topplers, superstars across the land. But all these things are relative, are they not? Some Tayuu would cater to very niche interests, some others would be more universally prolific, and then we know of some who went down in history for their magic sex appeal or dainty feet. There is no barometer, there is no standard. All that ever mattered was her appeal to the men around her.
First and foremost to the owners of her contract, who would predict a shiny future from her babyface. Then from the aging patrons of her older sisters in the ageya, who would invest in the child's education, forming her path in a passive way. And when she started budding into adolescence, she would be deemed desirable after years of grooming. Legends and accounts have it, that the Tayuu would have acquired a catalog of talents and attributes unique to her or representative of her house, her name-line or current trends. She wore them like her expensive garments and over the top accessories. It set her apart from the noble wife, dutifully working towards her husbands financial success. From the obedient daughter, a pawn in bigger game. From the saintly mother, sacrificing her years to her sons, for the sake of the tribe. The Tayuu was not expected to sacrifice, work or go without, quite on the contrary, she was simply expected to be.
This made her the ideal woman. She was equal to the privileged man as he too was only expected to be and then to die in honor. And honor and pride are the main catalysts in the particular artform, which we will explore here.
A Long Tradition
In my posts about Tayuu, I tend to describe their existence as something like a cultural lighting in a bottle. A cumulation of societal circumstances that made this very small ripple in culture, big and yet tiny in historical context. But the phenomenon of Tayuu culture has been a long time in the making and gone through some incarnations over the centuries: From Asobi over the Shirabyoshi to the Tayuu, all were performers of the nobles in Kyoto. We will be only touching briefly on how there is a direct line to be drawn from the Shirabyoshi specifically to Tayuu traditions.
Shirabyoshi usually came of prestigious backgrounds, sometimes of noble or samurai lineages, persuaded into (or sometimes very willingly pursuing the trend of) training in dance, poetry and social games. They didn't operate from an okiya but led a transient life, called upon to entertain at events, which were usually spiritual or religious in nature. Their stay was dependent on how much entertainment value they provided for the lord and his large court. Even though Shirabyoshi were all the rage for a while, eagerly anticipated by ladies and lords alike, as their popularity grew, so did their numbers. Too many of these girls were trying to get into the palaces, some more talented than others. At one point the biggest houses had something akin to what we would call a "casting couch" today, where rigorous vetting excluded undereducated Shirabyoshi and sent them away.
But once inside the palaces, their ambition was to stay as long as possible, as they usually had no place to call home outside of the walls. So naturally two strategies emerged for the savvy Shirabyoshi: Cultivate her art and capture the attention of her audience that way, or become a Courtesan to a noble. Better yet, have his child and nestle in somehow, hoping that the prestige of the child's father would rub off on her. The most successful girls ticked all boxes. As history does, some rare Shirabyoshi managed to become highly demanded artists and they actually refused patrons. But let's face it, this was not the norm and as time passed, became even more rare.
One can see some parallels to Tayuu in that these artistic entertainers blurred the lines between business and pleasure as a way to bind themselves to men of influence. Also in that both Shirabyoshi and Tayuu travelled to the imperial palaces as specialists of their craft. But where they differ greatly is that the Tayuu's ability to refuse her patrons added to her prestige, while the Shirabyoshi would never have turned down a liaison when advantageous. She was her own boss and somewhat liberated, but also needed to fend for herself. During the romantic Heian era, this lifestyle had blossomed but in the following Muromachi era, the status of women particularly within the elite warrior class changed, due to emerging primogeniture and patriarchal, Confucian, and Buddhist influences that deemed women "impure". This would ingrain itself in Japanese culture for good.
Some centuries passed and with the advent of the pleasure quarters, the Tayuu got webbed into a finely tuned machine that upheld a whole industry. So the question is: How much say did a Tayuu really have to refuse?
Examples in Media And Real Life
Sano Jirozaemon Murdering A Courtesan - Tsukioka Yoshitoshi, 1886
Yatsuhashi
Yatsuhashi Oiran was a real person who was brutally murdered by a jealous patron in 1683 in the Yoshiwara. The Kabuki play “Kagotsurube Sato no Eizame” (The Bewitched Sword) is based on her life. But it is framed from the murderers perspective of course. Jirozaemon, a country merchant that had come to some wealth, falls in love at first sight with Yatsuhashi, during her parade in the Yoshiwara. His open mouthed, smallpox scarred face elicits a mocking smile from the majestic Oiran but later in the play, we see that Jirozaemon has managed to buy himself into her regular company at the Tachibanaya and was in talks of redeeming her contract for her to become his mistress. She rejects his offer, as her lover Einojo pressures her to do so, fearing her feelings for Jirozaemon were growing. Some months later, Jirozaemon returns to Edo, having left after the rejection, and he visits the Tachibanaya once more. An apologetic Yatsuhashi begs him for forgiveness once they are alone. He softly hands her a cup of sake to make amends. As she hesitates to accept, he states it will be her last drink and thrusts his sword into her, killing her in one blow.
The public ist meant to sympathize with Jirozaemon, as he was of their shared merchant class while the Oiran was known to not give them the time of day. And even though the murderer is framed as a wronged, well meaning country merchant, manipulated by gangsters of the seedy pleasure quarters, I find Yatsuhashi's story to be exceptionally tragic. One can see that the fate of an Oiran was to cultivate relationships with people she might have rejected at face value but then talked into entertaining by her boss. Then the man she loved, Einojo, who was certainly not going to buy her out of her contract, clearly put his needs before hers, as losing her to Jirozaemon would have granted her a secure life outside of debt to a brothel. And finally, as Yatsuhashi played her only card, openly rejecting someone without even giving any explanation or derogating him, she is punished with burning rage. She was let down by every man in this story and she had no escape.
Nishigiki
In 1810, one Nishigiki dared to refuse a customer so vehemently that it sealed her fate according to the book "Edo Culture: Daily Life and Diversions in Urban Japan, 1600-1868" where we get some insight into methods of torture of Yuujo. It's widely known, that some inhabitants of the Yoshiwara served their terms as convicted prostitutes so we do get a wide variety of women, from refined to rough and ready. Torture and murder were very much a part of village life and no one would bat an eye at the news of another girl getting her comeuppance in one way or another. Refusing a patron was certainly up there in the top reasons for punishment, along with stealing and fleeing through the gates.
I can't seem to find more on the martered Nishigiki, safe to say from the timeline, she was not a Tayuu but rather an Oiran. We can deduct that her case wasn't a big deal and simply got lost in the records. Just another girl that didn't make it.
I did manage to find a lineage of the myouseki in the Yoshiwara though. One very famous Nishigiki Oiran was immortalized by Isoda Koryuusai in 1776, which might or might not be the one we're looking for. It's not very likely though, as by the 1810s this Kishigiki would be in her 50ies and long past her prime to be able to refuse any Danna. Harunobu had not one but two Nishigiki as muses during the 1770ies. Then there is the 1830ies Nishigiki in full Oiran mode. So it's safe to say that the name was rather popular even after one of them faced a gruesome end. There is even a Nishigiki in kabuki and bunraku, whose contract is being negotiated over in the play. The protagonist is forced to come up with 200 ryo (something along 20–80 million modern Japanese yen), an unheard of amount, keeping in mind that a low-ranking samurai might earn only 3 ryo annually. It's so jarring to see one Nishigiki getting murdered for refusing a patron, while another Nishigiki is worth a lifetime's earnings.
From what we know of the rapid decline of Tayuu culture in the early 1800s, the battered Nishigiki was probably one of the very last women who dared to refuse a patron. The retribution was swift and brutal. Tayuu and certainly Oiran were not irreplaceable superstars any longer.
Takao II
When discussing superstars, we cannot go without mentioning the famous Takao II of the Yoshiwara. Date Tsunamune, the young daimyo of Mutsu, decided to buy her contract, which was immensely costly due to her unprecedented popularity as a Tayuu in the pleasure quarters. Her boss ludicrously asked for her weight in gold. As the patron obliged, Takao's sleeves were secretly weighted down with lead, causing her weight to increase to some 70kg. Nevertheless, the contract was bought and a devastated Takao was sent on her way to become the daimyo's mistress in his estates. Poor Takao tried to drown herself in her despair, leaping from the boat she was being shipped in, this being one story. Another version cites that when she refused her new master, her fingers were broken one by one, a day at a time. After the 10th day of rejection, Tsunamune murdered her with his blade.
So, exactly where was her right to refuse a patron? If not THE great Takao, who else might have had the pull to reject an undesirable suitor? Where does this idea come from that these girls, teenagers essentially groomed into sexual servitude, would have had the wherewithal to say: "no, i don't wanna".
Reading Between The Lines Of Tayuu Propaganda
These examples are obviously very extreme, hence all the legends and media around tragic heroines. Oftentimes kabuki and bunraku playwriters used the Courtesan to demonstrate that there is virtue to be found in the most rotten milieu, be it in the form of a stoic and devoted whore, or a lowly John saving up a year's wages to get a hug from a famous Oiran. Among all these tales of love suicides and murders, there were many, many rituals and steps that went beforehand. Lest we forget that the pleasure quarters was built upon rules and laws designed to control the money flow. The art of refusing patrons was very much a tool to get interests up and make or break a popular Courtesan. But we also try and view these rules and regulations in a different light.
In the early years of the pleasure quarters, visitors were of the samurai class, visiting with retainers and associates. Even feudal lords would grace the district and bring with them their retinue. As we know, the merchant class found unprecedented social mobility around this time, replacing the samurai as the purchasing powerhouse. The growing masses found that even though they had the funds, there were degrees of accessibility to more successful ranks of women. They got blocked from mixing with higher class women. Noble Patrons profited from a more luxurious experience that made them feel superior to the lower classes, the brothels gained reputation and prestige through association with the ruling classes. But we are still talking about a tiny pool of people affected in this, as even during its golden age, Tayuu were counted in double digits among the two thousand working girls in the Yoshiwara. So here and there, some admissions for very rich merchants were made to see Tayuu and Oiran. But the culture clash was inevitable.
Just as often as Oiran and Tayuu tradition gets blurred into one another, there is one main factor that separates them: Location.
About Mawashi And That Pesky Contract
There used to be Tayuu in the Yoshiwara, and those were the top rank of Oiran, or the top rank of any given ranking system. At some point, the last Tayuu of the Yoshiwara extinguished and there were only Oiran left. Tayuu in the Shimabara and the Yoshiwara were groomed and educated from childhood to fit the mold. BUT in the Yoshiwara, there were cases of Courtesans rising up to Tayuu rank out of the blue. In Kyoto though, they stuck to the tradition of growing a Tayuu. There is no chance in hell, that a merchant of any kind would have had access to a Tayuu in Kyoto in all earnestness. Just because she was already "promised" to some patron that had invested in her education via her Onesan. So the concept of "refusing a patron" would have been inevitable, as she was ideally already locked into a patronage from the very start of her career, the patron only chomping at the bit for the girl to come of age. Raising a Tayuu was a big deal, a big investment and a big part of high culture in Kyoto.
Now if a new Tayuu had one or two (or even more) interested Danna waiting for her to "open shop", she was essentially already refusing patrons by default. The okiya would see to it, that the girl got to officially meet her patron through the three-meeting rituals we keep reading about everywhere, the one the Oiran hijacked as a means to bleed the patron dry. This is where the myth of "refusing first timers" comes from. And it made sense in Kyoto, where even the most money minded okiya would protect their assets by introducing them to trusted clients before sending them off to far away estates.
Just like the Shirabyoshi before her, the Tayuu would make her way to her Danna's place but she had a whole circus of attendants in tow: Kamuro, Shinzo, her secretary, her lantern bearer, sitting in a palanquin or carriage etc. This was pricey and the costs needed to be negotiated in advance, naturally this was not an impulse buy for a first timer. Same with the Oiran Dochu later on. This was too high a risk to simply offer on credit and the bosses of ageya and okiya knew this very well. They wanted the big fish.
When a deal was negotiated for a Tayuu's exclusive or semi-exclusive patronage with a client, it was not to buy her out quite yet. The girl was kept in the okiya and worked by hosting her patrons, educating herself and educating the new generation of Kamuro, paying off her investment and debt. Her life was paid at least once or many times over if she had a few insanely rich patrons but it was never enough. So even a kept Tayuu might have had days where she might have refused her Danna right?
Again we need to look into the dynamics of noble culture in Kyoto and how different it was from Yoshiwara.
If an Oiran was booked many days or even weeks in advance, may it be by loyal patrons or persistent and rich first-timers, would that be considered a refusal if she simply had no time? When a popular girl was double or triple booked, she would simply not attend her meeting with one patron in favor of another and send a sick note. Or she would meet that one rich guy and slip out to write letters for the other dude waiting. One very common trick was to send the ugliest Shinzo in to keep him entertained. While the rules stated that the Shinzo was off limits, it usually was her initiation into entertaining a patron one on one. And it would have been considered bad manners to complain about the Oiran being AWOL just as much as not paying for that Shinzo's unrequested services. By the way, this trick with sending in the Shinzo was called Mawashi and the Shinzo was then the Mawashikata. The custom had been established among lower ranked whores, who needed to work many Johns simultaneously, jumping from futon to futon. Sure, this angered the clients, but it was just the game of booking a popular girl. Even if she just showed up for a short while, you had the bragging rights. This custom made its way up the ranks to the Oiran over time as efficiency grew more important for them too.
Let's imagine how Kyoto's fine elite would have dealt with rejection. The type of Tayuu you mingled with was representative of your own refinement. If you were important and wealthy enough, she would not let you jump through unnecessary hoops. But just as well, she would meet her patrons at eye level to some degree, as was expected. A good Tayuu would never be as rude as to leave her patron waiting and if she did, an elegant daimyo would never make a scene. He would never let any hint of unsophistication slip, as this grave faux-pas would lead to refusal of services. He would handle her with more care than most women would have dared to dream of experiencing at that time because she was not his belonging, like a wife or a daughter, but rather a service provided by an okiya.
Since we're discussing real people and real emotions though, it's not as black and white of course. Nonetheless, the Tayuu's experience was unlike anything any other woman in Japanese society would have known and made for a rather comfortable and desirable lifestyle.
Honor and Dignity Of The Samurai
So if everything was so cozy and comfy, how did we get all these stories of patrons harming the Courtesans after experiencing rejection? For this we touch on the subject of the importance of honor as a cornerstone of samurai life. Among the vital values imbedded into their identity were dignity and self-restraint just as much as saving face through honor. Just as much as a Courtesan hurling herself from a boat into the river seems a bit excessive, it was representative of her samurai ideal. Just as much would the samurai rather kill her by his own blade for insulting him. As she was a woman, there was no duel to preface this settling of scores. She was already considered beneath him by Confucian teachings, what difference would it had made if she was dead or alive. Certainly there was no coming back or reconciliation. It was simply not how things worked. A Courtesan mingling in these circles already knew what was in store for her, it was part of daily life.
Whose Right Is It Anyway?
Essentially, the art of refusing a patron was privy to the brothel owners only. It was never the right or the privilege of the Tayuu nor the Oiran. She was only an instrument, a toy, she was merchandise. The irony of attributing the "right to refuse customers" to a Tayuu that never got to choose her patrons in the first place is cruel. A girl working in a brothel or okiya would be either disciplined or tortured into meeting the man that brought the most profit for her house. If she was bought out, she was now her new husband's doll to destroy at will. Her death would not have caused a scandal big enough to warrant more than a slap on the wrist for her samurai murderer. And the story of Jirozaemon, who got so welcomed into the teahouse just to kill the girl he had fallen in lust with, is a great example of how money did the vetting.
For the girl's owners, refusing a client was about the coin, for the girls it was a matter of life and death. I often think about how we trust our guts when meeting new people, but the Courtesans didn't have that privilege. They had already grown up desensitized to the leering gaze, to the screams of pain in the walls, to the blood on the tatami. In this sense Tayuu would be considered the epitome of the perfect woman because she was majestic yet submissive. And the submission started with the owner of her contract, who did all the thinking for her. She might have had the forum to interject as opposed to the working girls next door that couldn't catch a break, running from one mattress to another while wiping on the way with their tucked in paper rolls. But what difference would her word have made?
One can see how it might have been a point of contention for the affected men in the story. Of course from their point of view, this was an alien concept, something to make a huge fuss about because it was a rejection of men. Through the lens of Confucian ideals, this was a hard pill to swallow. But it's also very interesting that the art of rejecting patrons was attributed to the girls and not their bosses ultimately. This game was for men to suppress other men while suppressing women
Refusing is a form of resistance. And any type of resistance and autonomy was a form of luxury for these women and children. The fact that it is regarded as such an important aspect of Tayuu culture is almost laughable, like holding on to the last match in a snow storm.
A Monument Bearing Chiyojo's Haiku At Kukencho Cherry Blossoms at Night - Matsukawa Hanzan (1818-1882)
The Tayuu And The Merchant -
A Story About The Tayuu Of Osaka
Osaka is a city of merchants. Vibrant, industrious, rough and ready. Not as refined as stuffy old Kyoto, nor as polished as high and mighty Tokyo. Osaka embraces anyone and everyone and prosperity is just around the corner of one of its famous canals. The ideal breeding ground for a quiet revolution, where the underdog had the last laugh. This particular underdog story isn't about the Tayuu though. It's about the group of people that caused her demise: The merchants.
While Japan's pleasure quarters were being established in the background, we move our attention to many little storehouses, taking up business storing rice for the local Daimyo. The grains were the noble samurai's main income and the service akin to having an account at a bank. With time, the merchants operating the storage houses added money lending, trading and speculation to their services, growing their enterprises in sophistication and infrastructure alike. After the first rice exchange was set up to broker on future harvests all over Japan, Osaka rose up to become the economic hub of the country. The merchant class had traditionally enjoyed little prestige, they did not produce nor fight, but slowly the access to samurai wealth made their businesses very lucrative.
Japan was experiencing times of peace during the Edo period, which brought prosperity to the budding middle classes, but also made the fighting class scramble for income. Samurai don't work, their wealth is dependent on bounty and taxation. Still, they were expected to live lavish lives of luxury as dictated by Confucian ideals. To remedy this need for cash, the samurai turned to high-interest loans, racking up debts with the merchants in their little storehouses. Even though the noble samurai despised this intimate symbiosis with a class beneath them, openly showing hostility and disdain, they gradually lost ground to the merchants in terms of influence. Some of them gained unparalleled social mobility, receiving official appointments and even marrying into samurai status. This was a revolution in Japanese society that had been previously impossible.
The shift of wealth to the middle classes sent ripples through society, essentially creating Pop culture in its truest sense: Art for the masses. Disseminated through new food, folk music, woodblock prints, Kabuki and Bunraku, an Osakan specialty. High art? Not so much. It was widely known that Osakans are stingy, lewd, vulgar and direct, absolutely not the stoic and learned ideal of the samurai. Nobody expected a nouveau riche store owner reading Chinese classics or contemporary intellectuals any time soon. Should he have been interested, well too bad: It was prohibited!
The ruling class saw it necessary to distance themselves from this growing mass of bought influence, so sumptuary laws were put in place in the early 1600s. The focus was on restricting consumables like silk, gold, dyes and swords and weapons were made exclusive to the samurai to clearly show who's boss. However these restrictions applied just as much to the spreading of ideas, knowledge and a redefined sense of self. To the noble Samurai, there was scarcely a more alien thought than the concept of merchants being their equal in status. Bad enough that they had all this money that was rightly theirs anyway. Whenever a new law was set to keep the plebs from becoming too cocky, a fashion came up to get around it like a game of whack-a-mole. The most insidious way to keep the merchants down, was to keep them uncultured and keep them entertained with stupid, vapid noise. For centuries, only the privileged classes were granted the leisure to study, create and play on a level of refinement that separated them from the people beneath them. This was to change with the redirected money flow.
Now, simple folk enjoyed some free time too and their tastes shaped a very different fare. To get the most out of this increased consumerism while keeping some type of order in all the debauchery, new pleasure districts were designated. Private forms of prostitution like streetwalking, bathhouses, teahouses etc., got raided and shut down. Public prostitution in brothels however found their legitimacy through taxation. Edo, Kyoto and Osaka made efforts to group existing and new brothels in one spot and walled them in along with restaurants, taverns, theaters and artisan workshops. Usually these new quarters had one, maybe two gates and a moat around them, managing the flow of visitors and prohibiting unauthorized exits, creating little microcosms of pleasure and despair.
Contrary to Shimabara's elitist flair and Edo's excesses in the beast that was the Yoshiwara, Osaka's Shinmachi had an undeniable "Business first" attitude. Established during 1616-1628, it quickly became a place to socialize professionally and close a deal. Safe to say that a lot of money was made in these places and the atmosphere of intoxicating financial success with girls and booze gave Shinmachi a very specific bourgeois flavor. It wasn't that important if you came from a noble family, all that mattered was that you could pay for the next round. The middle classes were partying like it was 1599! And the samurai too, having nothing to do in these peaceful times, visited the pleasure quarters hidden in palanquins, hiding their face under big straw hats. All on credit of course.
Kyoka Anthology On Life Of Shinmachi Pleasure Quarters In Osaka - Saito Shuho, 1803
Yuugiri, The Big Bang Of Osaka
Not a lot is known yet about Osaka Tayuu-culture apart from the legends around Ougiya Yuugiri (1652?-1678), one of the Big Three, and apparently the first Tayuu of Osaka after her Okiya moved from Kyoto to Shinmachi. Yuugiri was an instant star, having gained some notoriety in the Shimabara prior. There is no source to clearly confirm she was indeed the first Tayuu in Osaka. But it's an interesting statement that made me wonder about how Tayuu came to be in Osaka.
A quick recap on how Tayuu are made: Their education starts as early as possible, sometimes at 3 years old but usually around 5 or 6, for them to learn as many high arts as possible by the time they can debut at around 13 years old. There is another discussion to be had, whether a teenager can actually be the source of real spirited entertainment, but it's for another day. The title of Tayuu was reserved for the highest accomplishments among the girls of a brothel and their reputation was of highest importance. Tayuu trained the subsequent generations of Tayuu themselves, the brothel supplied the resources. Some of these houses focused on Tayuu exclusively which in turn added to the value of their girls. Their names were known far and wide and associated with high art, so the time invested in grooming these children was part of their prestige. Unlike the lowlier ranks of girls processing many clients a day, the ideal of a queenly Tayuu, just budding in her physical maturity yet able to hold a conversation, was exactly what the samurai wanted in a counterpart. It was very different from the dutiful and quiet, invisible wife at home. In the ageya, the samurai wanted to meet their match.
Let's face it: Even though Tayuu are fabled as rare creatures of great genetics and big investments by their creators, there are just as many stories of Tayuu simply getting promoted after being discovered or scouted. Katsuyama, one of the most influential Tayuu of all time, started her career in a bathhouse, where she was discovered while offering her services outside of official regulations. Promoted to the rank of Tayuu due to her unique style, she was certainly not groomed to be one from childhood. Safe to say the term "Tayuu" is not a nationwide seal of equal quality, on the contrary, regional variations were their USP. In a generous narrative, there might have been similarly talented and spirited working girls in their own definition of Tayuu, but Shinmachi wanted to be on the same page as Yoshiwara, Shimabara and Maruyama. It was a point of pride for the inhabitants to keep up or excel in lifestyle and culture, an indication to the Osakan's new sense of self.
Over the course of a couple of decades the pleasure quarters had come a long way to something we might compare to Las Vegas today. It was a machine, fueled by grooming and abusing children, spitting them out relentlessly as more got brought in from the countryside and slums. Even prohibiting slave trade in 1587 did nothing to stop the cruel procurement of girls for the brothels. Kamuro went in at a defenseless age and came out as shadows of their own potential. Expected to earn their keep as young as 10 years old, one can only imagine how the pleasure quarters must have looked from their perspective. It's insane to think that these children were considered the epitome of sex by their contemporaries, romanticized in novellas and prints. Woodblocks make them look all doll like, erasing any characteristics, they do a fine job of hiding the fact that the portrayed Tayuu might be just 14 years old.
Osaka Tayuu In Media
Yuugiri was described in 1682's "The Life Of An Amorous Man" as the ideal Tayuu, being beautiful, meek and wise. All other Osakan working girls mentioned, are either referred to as Courtesans or in a more derogatory manner as Harlots. In the same book the term Tayuu is reserved for just one other Courtesan in Kyoto, keep in mind that Yuugiri was from Kyoto originally as well. Texts don't state it outright, it is the suspicious silence around Osaka Tayuu that questions if they were even comparable to their counterparts in Edo and Kyoto. And most interestingly in retrospect, is the insignificance of identifiable Osaka Tayuu in Ukiyo-e or in this case, Kamigata-e, during their golden age up until the early 1700s.
Shozan-Dayu From The Higashi Ougiya Accompanied By Rikimatsu And Miha - Senritei Yabutora (act. 1818-30)
Courtesan Ukihashi From The Uemuraya Brothel - Hiroshige, Ando or Utagawa, ca 1821
One reason for this, is the considerably smaller market in Osaka compared to Edo, where woodblock art flourished and produced a prolific amount of images of the floating world. Kamigata print scholar Matsudaira Susumu (1933-2000) estimated the bulk of all media was consumed regionally, seldom exported and subsequently destroyed by fires, wartime disasters etc. Additionally, he states that the favorite subjects of Osaka-style print are waitresses and maids, teahouse-girls, Kabuki-actors and people you might meet on the streets, which probably didn't sell as well outside of their core audience. We could speculate that popular artists and painters simply didn't have access to Shinmachi Tayuu, similarly that there was no demand for these out-of-reach birds of paradise among the plebs. The rare Osaka Tayuu seem to shroud themselves in mystery, which is very Tayuu-coded at least.
Where would a new patron turn to for information on Tayuu, if he was planning to shoot his shot on his next visit in Shinmachi? Most common are the Saiken, guidebooks on a certain district, on Courtesans, their qualities, prices etc. Some Hanamachi had their own, some were compiled together while there are also texts comparing and ranking the different Yuukaku. In one of these, the "Guide to the Quarters of the Land" (Shokoku Irozato Annai), published in 1688, at the height of enthusiasm in the pleasure districts, we read that out of 983 registered Courtesans (again, that same catch all term) there are only 7 Tayuu in Shinmachi. That number sounds somewhat reasonable compared to Shimabara's 13 Tayuu at the time. That would mean that there were only a handful of patrons with the financial pull to keep Tayuu afloat. Some sources count up to 2200 working girls in all of Osaka, so the numbers may vary for Tayuu too.
To Meet A Tayuu In Shinmachi
Reading between the lines of historical context of societal changes at the time, we might gather that the Tayuu in Shinmachi must have had a more lax standard in accepting patrons. The idea doesn't seem too crazy: To refuse a nouveaux riche merchant for an impoverished but important aristocrat seems out of character for an indebted Tayuu, if not her boss, specially in Osaka. However the cost to socialize with a Tayuu was still out of reach for most. The brothel owner's syndication dictated the exact cost for a night with a Tayuu and this included the two palanquins taking them from the the ageya to the brothel, costs of musicians, drinks and food, new futons and pillows, library of entertainment, miscellaneous items for the client like toothpaste, perfume and even toothpicks. Of course everything was of the highest quality, all of it curated by the Tayuu for her new favorite Danna, all of it kept the artisans in Shinmachi working like a beehive around their queens.
The new bedding suggests somewhat exclusive arrangements with individual men. I mean, how many futons can a Tayuu keep reserved in her quarters, right? It is well known that as a Danna to a Tayuu, the gentleman was bound to her only, while she was free to have as many sponsors as she deemed worthy. Actually binding yourself to a Tayuu was a big deal, with contracts and witnesses akin to getting married. An option only for those who could afford to shrug off people whispering behind their backs. A gentleman of certain standing would certainly get a hint or two by his superior, if he was rumored to be recognized in the pleasure quarters i.e. a frequent visitor. For nobles, discretion was vital. For people of lower status however, socializing in the Yuukaku was perfectly acceptable and might only raise a brow if the wife made a fuss about the spendings. If you have to ask if you can afford it, you can't afford it. Now, some Shimabara Tayuu might have turned their noses up at the thought of having a lowly shop owner as patron but in Osaka this was not uncommon. As always it came down to how far a brothel would push their reputation to make money.
Some Tayuu got away with having poor lovers in secret, as recounted in many Kabuki plays, risking their reputation and livelihoods for love. But this was fantasy, even if it might have come true in very rare cases. A savvy Tayuu was interested in the long game of finding the man to bail her out of her contract and pay her way exclusively. And this was a gamble on the brothel's side too: They wanted a Tayuu to debut early, get as much mileage out of her as possible and then marry her off for a huge profit just before she was starting to fade in her mid twenties. Most of them didn't even consider the possibility she might be able to pay off her debt by 26 as per her contract.
In Osaka, where in all probability all Tayuu came out of poor households themselves, the prospect of living a modest life wasn't as bad as it might have been to a noble girl in Shimabara's Okiya. If a girl was born in the Yuukaku, what was she to loose if she got the chance to flee with a merchant man and get her out of this vale of tears.
And i don't want to be the bearer of bad news but even Yuugiri didn't make it. It's sad irony that even THE legendary Yuugiri, the ideal Courtesan, the Tayuu closest associated with Shinmachi, didn't reach that ultimate goal of getting out. Rather, her end was tragically common. Ravaged by sickness, she died after (allegedly) being provided the best care her brothel owner could provide.
Yuugiri's status as a living legend might have been the exact reason why she didn't find a buyer of her contract. She was probably way too famous and lucrative to let go, so her brothel must have asked for an exorbitant amount of any genuinely interested suitor. It's cruel to think that being an excellent Tayuu didn't do anything to save her from her life in the pleasure quarters. Specially since she was so known for her gentle heart, generosity and kindness to people of all walks of life, throughout all the sorrow she must have experienced.
Her contemporary Chikamatsu Monzaemon immortalized her 1712 in "Yuugiri Awa No Naruto", later adapted as "Kuruwa Bunshou" for Kabuki in 1808. The visual traditions of Shinmachi Tayuu are carefully kept alive in these plays and ensures that at least here, they are not mashed in with Oiran or Shimabara's Tayuu.
Some numbers: Osaka's population around 1650 was estimated at 220'000 (Seiji Saito, Wikipedia) while the samurai class ranged from 5% to 10% of total Japanese population. Osaka castle was one of the hubs for samurai families, as was custom to settle near the lord that granted their stipend so most nobles' estates could be found in that area. Tayuu were famously allowed to leave the quarters to entertain at their patron's estates so certainly there was at least a niche market for high class Tayuu. The ruling classes saw it naturally fit to have Tayuu on hand in the vicinity as a service provided to them. But still, merchants made up a whopping 90% of inhabitants in Osaka, so it doesn't seem as if the Tayuu would prosper here in a significant way.
With passing time, this almost homogenous demographic grew into their own, molding the city's cultural climate to suit their tastes. Subsequent generations of merchants, still subjected to sumptuary laws and censorship, created their own quiet luxuries: Silk inner linings of otherwise modest Kimono, intricate patterns and elaborate embroidery in place of jewels. Some laws were simply ignored, some even relaxed if the grumblings got too loud. Simultaneously, the higher ups of the pleasure quarters implemented more and more intricate financial hurdles for their wealthy patrons. Ranging from expensive gifts, proclaimed essentials for the girl like a new set of drawers filled with obi, to invented holidays, spanning multiple days and nights. The bills going to the patron of course. Clearly, all these new rules were not only meant to increase income. It was just another sumptuary law designed to keep the common man in his place. A dance on the volcano, as the weeding out of patrons was slowly draining the Tayuu's elite client pool.
So to keep new patrons coming in, more and more Tayuu accepted lower ranking samurai and even modestly wealthy merchants, on behest of their bosses. Around 1720 some brothels started implementing the "No Refusal" rule for their Tayuu, though it's arguable that these groomed girls ever had any choices. A new type of patron that wasn't really into the Chinese classics, wasn't willing to pay for handful of meetings before he got his futon and certainly wasn't going to buy out that Tayuu after he was done with her. I'm sure he loved to boast to his friends about it too. A new dynamic set in, that proved the survival of the Tayuu-rank unprofitable. Some of the last Tayuu vanished naturally into their new lives as mistresses or lesser whores, or simply died a hopefully merciful death after sicknesses like Syphilis and Tuberculosis spread. And the nail in the coffin in form of an obvious question: Why invest in the education of a new girl, if she was only to sit pretty under all her regalia anyway. Now the new hotness was the Oiran, who welcomed the merchant with cash easy-peasy. The timeline fits with all the Ukiyo-e of Osaka Tayuu popping up as the lines between the two ranks were getting blurry.
While this tragic and sharp downwards spiral was underway, the common classes had established their preferences for Iki. In the span of two generations, Shinmachi had seen the arrival of "The first Tayuu" to their desperate decline. The great fire of 1724 set in motion the building of more gates, as a new safety measure but it also made controlling of the masses into the district impossible. This change affected all establishments and offered a new "openness" to the patrons as well as businesses. The exploitation took up pace. To get on top of the influx of visitors craving cheap thrills, more manpower was needed, and this is where the female Geisha saw their chance to step in to fill the artistic void left by Tayuu. The high-end ageya and specialized okiya who could afford to close with their legacy still intact, did so quietly when they got rid of their last girls. The great Shinmachi fire of 1890, that had started in a brothel, gave others an unfortunate out. The last houses standing kept on lowering their services to obscure ranks to keep in business. But the damage was done.
A lot of history in between sees the rise and fall of the Oiran and the Geisha as well. Until the hellscape that was the 1945 bombings marked the sudden end of all laughter in Osaka.
The Matsushima District in Osaka. Personal Collection of Gavin James Campbell, Doshisha University
What Is Left
There is no time to grieve, when there is business to be made, or so it seems. By the 1950ies Osaka had gone from loosing 60% of its population, to rebuilding to pre-war levels. Credit went to the merchant spirit of relentless ingenuity. Though urbanization and the opening up to western ideas made a comeback of the pleasure quarters impossible, certainly after prostitution was banned effectively in 1958. In Kyoto, Tayuu could rebrand as entertainers, we hear nothing along these lines from Shinmachi's Tayuu. There was nothing to rebrand. The bombs had burned down the famous cherry trees, the brothels, the ageya. But there had been nothing even before the bombs. Somewhere between the last Tayuu of the Yoshiwara in 1761 and the closing of the Sumiya-Ageya in Shimabara, Osaka lost her last Tayuu. Who was she? We don't know as there is nothing left of her.
I'm very certain, that all photos of Osaka Tayuu from after 1880 are actresses in memorial processions, akin to the Oiran Dochu in Tokyo or a little bit like the Jidai Matsuri in Kyoto. There are some woodblocks and photos of processions floating around, but there is no more mention of individual Tayuu. And how would there be? Yoshidaya, Yuugiri's legendary ageya was destroyed by the bombs. It had been the first and the last Tayuu house, though it hadn't seen a real Tayuu in decades. There was nothing left.
Osaka was never an epicenter for Tayuu anyway, even though their unique traditions make it seem so. It's still questionable if they ever had any greater significance for Osaka's cultural landscape at all. Because it was in service to absolutely no one, not for the prosperous merchants nor for the samurai, desperate to keep up appearances. Certainly not for the actual Tayuu, who should have an epitaph at least. The truly industrious workers and merchant class that built up Osaka and put their unmistakable seal on it, would go down in history as a rank of people to be rejected by the majestic Tayuu. But history is written by the victors, so the merchants had the last laugh. We are left with bits of information, the names of Yuugiri-Dayu, Ukihashi-Dayu and others, yet no context, just an ideal. We can dissect their looks, to try and identify them in photos, but most of them are dressed up actresses in parades. It's all hollow. It's all empty. There is nothing left.
"Pride goes before destruction, and a haughty spirit before a fall. It is better to be of lowly spirit with the poor than to divide the spoil with the proud" - (Proverbs 16:18-19)
Hi Geimaiko! I stumbled upon 3 photos of an Osaka Tayu. The caption from the website mentions the Yugiri Tayu memorial service of 1937. It seems Kabuki adaptations were quite spot on, and the airplane bowtie obi (which Osaka is known for) is only used during the Dochu.
https://www.ehagaki.org/category/shopping/ja-a2/ja-a2_a3/ja-a2_a3_a3/
Hello again @bahandingbulawan
Wonderful find yet again! This ask tapped into some thoughts i've been having on Osaka Tayuu for ages now. I am currently writing about it right now, so please look forward to it soon!
I do wonder though, if this isn't an actress for the parade. All i've known until now is that the last Tayuu of Shinmachi went down with the quarters after WWII. It makes me wonder if this was one of them?
To answer anon's question regarding the 'subjects' Tayu learnt, I compiled a list throught the course of my months-long reasearch! Please correct me if I am wrong and is there are any additions!
STRING INSTRUMENTS (10)
Koto
Gakuso
Yamatogoto (Wagon)
Ichigenkin (Shinmachi & Shimabara)
Nigenkin (Yoshiwara)
Biwa
Gaku Biwa
Shamisen
Kokyu
Gekkin
WIND INSTRUMENTS (11)
Shinobue
Kagurabue
Ryuteki
Komabue
Nohbue
Shakuhachi
Hitotogogiri
Hichiriki
Sho
Tsuchibue
Iwabue
PERCUSSION INSTRUMENTS (11)
Tsuridaiko
Wadaiko
Shoko
Kakko
Sennotsuzumi
Shakubyoshi
Taiko
Otsuzumi
Kotsuzumi
Shou
Kagura Suzu
ARTS (9)
Kado (Ikebana)
Chado (Tea)
Chado (Incense)
Shodo (Calligraphy)
Senchado (Sencha Tea)
Gado (Painting)
Bonseki (Miniature Landscapes)
Kyomai Shinozuka
Kagura Dance
ACADEMICS (8)
Kyoto-ben
Poetry
Japanese Literature
Japanese History
Onmyodo (Astrology/Divination)
Chinese Classics
Buddhism
Shintoism
GAMES (8)
Go
Shogi
Ban Sugoroku
Kemari
Tosenkyo
Kaiawase
Hanafuda
Karuta
A Tayu should atleast be familiar with 57 artforms, and It could be more depending on each person's interest!
Hello @bahandingbulawan
Wow! What a list! I'm sure it took quite a while and some effort to get it all together. Thank you so much for sending it it and sharing.
I would love to go through all the individual points and see if i can find prints or texts describing a Tayuu practicing them. I'm a visual person to i'd love to see the individual instruments being used for example.
One thought i would like to share on the list is that some of the points i would consider general knowledge or basic education for people of the Edo period (Buddhism, Shintoism, Kyoto-Ben in Kyoto etc.). Others like Kemari and Iwabue seem a bit "off" to me for a Tayuu to practice, though i might be very wrong about that.
Amazing work! Thank you again for sharing with us!!
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Hi Geimaiko! Could I ask a comprehensive list of the types of Kanzashi a Tayu has? Im having a particular problem finding the name of the Bonten Kanzashi that has some birabira/tail on it... I know other decorative kanzashi fall under the maezashi category though! Also it seems that the 6 additional bekko kanzashi on the backs of both Oiran and Tayu are only worn during the dochu, other old photos of them in an ochaya excludes it as is common today.
The photo below is an onna genroku with the added fan kanzashi.... what is that weaved pattern though? Kikugawa Tayu uses a cloth while Kisaragi Tayu uses agolden cord to tie that topknot...
Hello again @bahandingbulawan
Thank you for the ask. I think a comprehensive list on Tayuu kanzashi is definitely a great idea though it needs the appropriate amount of research and time. I find kanzashi specially interesting for their symbolism so i would love to go into that one day.
Bonten with Birabira attached you say? I don't really know if i have ever noticed that. Maybe you could provide a pic?
Sadly i don't know about the "basket" like strip but i do remember having wondered about it before. It's very unique. Though i do know that the checkered Ichimatsu pattern is strongly linked to the Genroku styles. The two colored checkered pattern has been used for way longer but it must have been very widespread during the Genroku period (1688 - 1704) and was popularized by Kabuki's Ichimatsu Sanogawa (佐野川 市松; 1722 – 1762) in plays set that time:
Toshusai Sharaku - Woodblock print ca. 1794-1795
The Actor Sanogawa Ichimatsu I performing the spear dance - Torii Kiyohiro, 1751–1761
So maybe this Tayuu was going for maximum Genroku-ness. Sadly i don't really know if it has a specific name (i mean it probably has) and what it might be. If anyone wants to chime in, please feel free!
Hi again on the subject of tayuu's arts you mentionned encense burning? I saw in a anime that encense could be made to have its odor evoke for a example a genji monogatari chapter etc.. is it true and could you elaborate on this for tayuu plz?
Best regards and lovely to see your blog active again!
Hi Anon
It makes sense for a Tayuu to have learned the art of incense burning as it is considered one of the three arts of refinement along with Ikebana and tea ceremony. In that sense it was considered a rather basic skill for a Tayuu to learn seeing that it was quite common practice among nobility and samurai alike.
The example of the anime you mention is referenced on the Wikipedia page about Incense burning. I don't really know much about how the game works but it sounds quite interesting and very appropriate for the socialites around nobles to play as it would showcase their learnedness and cultural knowledge as well as their olfactory sensitivity. Let's say a specific mix of scents was created to represent a chapter of Genji Monogatari and a player would not make the connection, it might just expose not only their "unrefined" nose but also that they were not versed in the classics. So might as well just reject the company right away. I would love to do this ritual more justice but i would need to do way more research.
Thank you for sending in the ask and i hope i can pick this topic up again in the future with more insight.
