Tengu

(天狗)

Publisher: Echizen-ya Heizaburô

c. 1842

Tengu are forest-dwelling creatures that are usually portrayed either as human-like with wings and long noses or bird-like. In this series of comic prints the tengu appear human, except for their long noses. The series is not listed in Kuniyoshi by Basil William Robinson (Victoria and Albert Museum, London, 1961). The images are each about 7 by 10 inches (18 by 25 centimeters), a size known as chûban. Two images were printed on a sheet of paper about 14 by 10 inches (36 by 25 centimeters), a size known as ôban. I am grateful to Robert Pryor for his contributions to this section.

	Title: Crazy Picture of the Blessing of the Gods for the Tengu (Kyôga tengu no gorishô, 狂画 天狗のごり生) NOTE: Gorishô was a ‘performance’, basically a begging mechanism, where an Inari fox mask on an expandable tube was stretched out through an image of a shrine entrance’s torii gate. The word gorishô is a pun, means both a blessing or the male genitals. Title: Crazy Picture of Tengu Fish-porters (Kyôga tengu no karuko, 狂画 天狗のかるこ)
	Title: Tengu in a sudden summer storm (Tengu no yûdachi, 天狗の夕立) Title: Tengu with Big Noses Visiting a Shrine (Tengu with lanterns (Tengu no hanakamairi, 天狗のはなかまいり) NOTE: This image is based on a pun on hadakamairi (裸参 り) meaning naked shrine visit.
	Title: Tengu on the Road at Night (Yorumichi tengu, 夜道天狗) Title: Tengu Coming and Going on the Street (Tengu no ôrai, 天狗のおふらい) Description: A woman with a hozuki ring, a boy with sake bottles, and a blind masseur using his nose as a cane
	Another state of the above design
	Title: Tengu Warrior with a War Club Nose (Tengu musha hanatekobô, 天狗武者はなてこぼう) NOTE: The tengu with a war club nose strongly resembles the warrior Benkei. Title: Tengu Fishing (Tengu no tsurishi, 天狗のつりし)
	Title: Tengu Practicing Asceticism (Tengu no shugyôsha, 天狗の修行者) Description: A tengu komusô monk wearing a tengai and playing his nose as a shakuhachi, a tengu monk with a mokugyo woodblock, and a monk with a kasa, gong and bucket. The tengu woman to the rear is using her nose propped on a monk’s shakujô as a line for drying a yukata and gourd strips. Title: Tengu in a Bathhouse (Tengu no sentô, 天狗の銭湯)

CLICK HERE TO RETURN TO MAIN PAGE