chonmage

File:Samurai hand colored c1890.jpg with a {{Transliteration|ja|chonmage}}]]

The {{Nihongo||丁髷|chonmage}} is a type of traditional Japanese topknot haircut worn by men. It is most commonly associated with the Edo period (1603–1868) and samurai, and in recent times with sumo wrestlers. It was originally a method of using hair to hold a samurai kabuto helmet steady atop the head in battle, and became a status symbol among Japanese society.

In a traditional Edo-period {{Transliteration|ja|chonmage}}, the top of the head is shaved. The remaining hair was oiled and waxed before being tied into a small tail folded onto the top of the head in the characteristic topknot.

History

File:Two Japanese barbers; to the left, one is shaving his client Wellcome V0029727.jpg

The origins of the {{Transliteration|ja|chonmage}} can be traced back to the Heian period (794–1185). During this period, aristocrats wore special cap-like crowns as part of their official clothing. To secure the crown in place, the hair would be tied near the back of the head.{{citation needed|date=March 2022}}

Between the 1580s (towards the end of the Warring States period, 1467–1615) and the 1630s (the beginning of the Edo period, 1603–1867), Japanese cultural attitudes to men's hair shifted; where a full head of hair and a beard had been valued as a sign of manliness in the preceding militaristic era, in the ensuing period of peace, this gradually shifted until a beard and an unshaven pate were viewed as barbaric, and resistant of the peace that had resulted from two centuries of civil war.{{cite book |last1=Toby |first1=Ron P. |title=Engaging the Other: 'Japan' and Its Alter-Egos, 1550-1850 |date=2019 |publisher=BRILL |series=Brill's Japanese Studies Library |isbn=978-9004393516 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=dZGFDwAAQBAJ&q=tonsorial+difference++edo&pg=PA217}}{{rp|217}} This change was also enforced during the Japanese invasion of Joseon (1592–1598), where some Japanese commanders forced the submitted Koreans to shave their heads to this hairstyle, as a method of converting their identities to that of Japanese.{{rp|222}}

A shaven pate (the {{Transliteration|ja|sakayaki}}) became required of the samurai classes by the early Edo period, and by the 1660s, all men, commoner or samurai, were forbidden from wearing beards, with the {{Transliteration|ja|sakayaki}} deemed mandatory. The style of the {{Transliteration|ja|chonmage}} ("topknot") was dependent on the social status of the wearer, with that of the samurai being more pronounced than artisans or merchants.{{cite book |last1=Nomikos Vaporis |first1=Constantine |title=Samurai: An Encyclopedia of Japan's Cultured Warriors |date=2019 |publisher=Bloomsbury Publishing |location=United States |isbn=9781440842719 |pages=124–127 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=0BjHEAAAQBAJ&dq=chonmage&pg=PA125}} Ronin, samurai who did not serve a Lord, were not required to shave their heads. This became an easy way to identify such men.{{rp|211}}

Under the Meiji Restoration, the practices of the samurai classes, deemed feudal and unsuitable for modern times following the end of {{Transliteration|ja|sakoku}} in 1853, resulted in a number of edicts intended to 'modernise' the appearance of upper class Japanese men. With the Dampatsurei Edict of 1871 issued by Emperor Meiji during the early Meiji Era, men of the samurai classes were forced to cut their hair short,{{Cite journal |last1=Ericson |first1=Joan E. |last2=Matson |first2=Jim |date=2004 |title=Lessons of The Last Samurai |url=https://www.asianstudies.org/wp-content/uploads/lessons-of-the-last-samurai.pdf |journal=Education About Asia |volume=9 |issue=2 |pages=13–30}}{{Cite book |last1=Maidment |first1=Richard A. |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=EKJlAgulU3AC&dq=chonmage&pg=PA51 |title=Governance in the Asia-Pacific |last2=Goldblatt |first2=David S. |last3=Mitchell |first3=Jeremy |date=1998 |publisher=Psychology Press |isbn=978-0-415-17276-9 |language=en}} effectively abandoning the {{Transliteration|ja|chonmage}}.{{cite book |last=Scott Pate |first=Alan |title=Kanban: Traditional Shop Signs of Japan |date=9 May 2017 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=a4ofDgAAQBAJ&dq=Dampatsurei+Edict&pg=PA149

|location=New Jersey |publisher=Princeton University Press |quote=In 1871 the Dampatsurei edict forced all samurai to cut off their topknots, a traditional source of identity and pride. |isbn=978-0691176475}}{{rp|149}}

Sumo

Image:Tochiazuma Daisuke.jpg with an {{Transliteration|ja|ōichō}}-style {{Transliteration|ja|chonmage}}]]

In modern Japan, the only remaining wearers of the {{Transliteration|ja|chonmage}} are sumo wrestlers and kabuki actors.{{cite news|url=https://www.asahi.com/ajw/articles/13941587|title=The few good men who prop up sumo's topknot a dying breed|newspaper=The Asahi Shimbun|date=2020-11-18|access-date=2023-04-09|quote=With declining orders for samurai movies and TV dramas, about the only people now buying motoyui are sumo wrestlers and Kabuki actors.}} Given the uniqueness of the style in modern times, the Japan Sumo Association employs specialist hairdressers called {{Transliteration|ja|tokoyama}} to cut and prepare sumo wrestlers' hair.

The sumo style of the {{Transliteration|ja|chonmage}} is slightly different, in that the pate is no longer shaved. However, the hair may be thinned in this region or the crown of the head shaved, called {{Transliteration|ja|nakazori}}, to allow the topknot to sit more neatly.{{cite AV media|title=THE REAL SECRET OF RIKISHI'S TOPKNOT|medium=web video |url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JemFsoiwSeM |publisher=Sumo Prime Time |date=2023-04-07|access-date=2023-04-09}} This is done around once every three months.

All professional sumo wrestlers wear a {{Transliteration|ja|chonmage}} as soon as their hair is long enough to do so. Sumo wrestlers with {{Transliteration|ja|sekitori}} status are required on certain occasions, such as during a {{Transliteration|ja|honbasho}}, to wear their hair in a more elaborate form of topknot called an {{Transliteration|ja|ōichō}}, where the end of the topknot is splayed out to form a semicircle, resembling a ginkgo leaf.{{cite news|author=Gunning, John|author-link=John Gunning (journalist)|url=https://www.japantimes.co.jp/sports/2018/09/14/sumo/sumo-101-topknot/|title=Sumo 101: The Topknot|newspaper=The Japan Times|date=2018-09-14|access-date=2023-04-09}}{{cite AV media|title=The Hairdresser to Japan's Sumo Wrestling Elite|medium=web video |url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m28Qme-XhbM|publisher=Great Big Story |date=2019-11-07|access-date=2023-04-09}}

The {{Transliteration|ja|chonmage}} is of such symbolic importance in sumo that snipping it off is the centerpiece of a wrestler's retirement ceremony. Dignitaries and other important people in a wrestler's life are invited to take one snip, with the final one taken by his trainer. For most wrestlers who never reached a {{Transliteration|ja|sekitori}} rank, his retirement ceremony will be the only time he wears the more elaborate {{Transliteration|ja|ōichōmage}}.{{citation needed|date=April 2024}}

References

External links

{{commons category-inline}}
{{Wiktionary-inline}}

Category:Sumo terminology

Category:Hairstyles

Category:Samurai

Category:Japanese fashion

Category:2010s fashion

chonmage

History

Sumo

See also

References

Further reading

External links