My wish is to one day see this ancient treasure in person in Kyoto. The only image available online, on the Kyoto City website, is very low resolution.

The original embroidery still exists as a hanging scroll. It replaced another textile – a ‘Sennin-zu’ (hermit picture) created in China during the Ming Dynasty (1368-1644). The 1798 embroidery is considered the earliest datable Japanese copy of a Chinese tapestry (Yoshida 2018). This helps explain some of the debates around the identity of individuals with this prominent feature. Several deities in Japan and China have large bald heads, symbolising wisdom. Both Fukurokuju and Benzaiten are Japanese deities, with origins in China and India respectively, and represent two of the Seven Lucky Gods. Many sites on the internet, particularly in Japanese, describe the textile as depicting Fukurokuju (the gentleman with the bald elongated head) and Benzaiten (the woman holding the child) with Karako and his friends (Tang Chinese children). The tapestry on the back of the Hoshoyama float is 2.03 x 1.59 m in size. It is called, she tells me, the ‘Congratulatory/longevity star chart brocade’ (“寿星図綴錦”, Toshiseizu tsudzure ni shiki or ことぶき　せいずつづれ　にしき). If readers are aware of earlier examples of the yin-yang symbol in Japan I would love to hear about them.Ĭatherine Pasawarat, a member of Writers in Kyoto and author of the first comprehensive book in English about the Gion Festival (Pasawarat 2020), has generously shared this image of the Hoshoyama embroidery. It is part of a very large embroidery created in Kyoto in 1798 (Kansei 10) that is displayed on the back of the Hoshoyama float at the famous Gion Festival. The oldest example of a yin-yang symbol I’ve discovered to date in Japan was hiding in plain sight. Even after that date there appears to be no widespread or systematic use of the iconic symbol to represent in-yo in Japan. Yet extensive searches for the symbol have uncovered only a few unrelated examples in the pre-Meiji period that is, prior to 1868. One might imagine that the two-tone interlocking representation of yin-yang, created in the late 14th century in China and now recognised worldwide, was likely to be adopted in Japan. in-yo) was formally introduced into Japan in the 6th century AD and still permeates contemporary culture. Identifying the oldest yin-yang symbol in Japan has been an ongoing passion of mine.

History of yin yang symbol