The Kano Society

 The Bulletin - Editor’s comment

Welcome to the second edition of the 'Bulletin' For those of you who did not see issue number one—This is our on line / off line newsletter about Judo and the Kano Society - If you missed number one and would like to see it —it is still on the web site or you can write in and ask for a printed copy. We aim to produce it at regular intervals - probably quarterly and later monthly - and to publish content on line with hard copy for those who are not yet connected. Feel free to print off and distribute to colleagues and friends who you think may be interested. 

The 'Bulletin' will be a short piece to begin with and later expand hopefully into a full magazine / Journal format - but this depends on you too ... we need members to help with the expenses and we need articles and contributions. This may be in the form of news, interesting bits and pieces, photographs or reminiscences and historical material. Send in by email or post to Publications Department— 7 High Street Penge, London SE20 7HJ England

Eventually this will grow into an archive of Judo material which will be thus preserved for the future. If you have any material which could be added to this archive please let us know—thank you I do hope you will enjoy the 'Bulletin' and bear with us during early teething stages.

Have a great festive season and join us in the Kagami-biraki and Kangeiko in the new year—Those of you who are nearby in body and others in ‘spirit’! -Regards—  Diana Birch

You are invited to join us for Kagami-biraki on Sunday 14th January 2001. Kagami-biraki is an ancient ritual with complex historical roots.

When I first heard of it I was told that it was a time when in old Samurai households the men of the household would be given new armour which was placed on the mirror table—this was the shrine of the home following the principle that the mirror harbours the soul and hence at certain times the mirror would be covered to prevent spirits from being drawn in. So at the Kagami-biraki the mirror was uncovered, the men got new armour and the Samurai women ate mochi rice cakes which it is rumoured, often choked them! All this seemed hardly fair—further research was required!

The information which follows was provided by John Cornish -

If you consult a dictionary it will probably say, like mine, Kagami-Biraki is “The cutting of New Year’s rice cakes”.

On the face of it this seems simple but like a lot of these things Japanese, the more you delve into it the more complex the subject gets. Even one word leads on to looking up another three or so and you can only give up when you decide you are overwhelmed by the seemingly inexhaustible things connected to the subject. The rice cakes mentioned are not the sweet baked things I originally thought they would be. This was in the days when you could not just go to a shop, buy and try one. These cakes are made from steamed rice pounded until it changes its structure and is then known as mochi. When it sets it looks like white hard toffee, and like toffee when it is warmed up it becomes a gluttonous mass. If you were to “cut it” I think you would need a hack-saw. It can be broken by hand or can be hit with a mallet

Even the “New Year” part of the explanation is not straight-forward. The 11^th of January is the date often thought about for Kagami-Biraki. A date used in former times was the 20^th of January.

The purist will remind us that any date would be reckoned under the old lunar calendar so they should be some time later in the year. These dates in February are still used in the country, by some people. Another time I’ll have to look up how the Chinese New Year works in with the Japanese one. I bet that one is not straight-forward either. A reason for a date in February could be the Founding of the Japanese Empire by Jimmu Tenno on the 11^th February 660 BC, so the date then could simply be an anniversary of this event

A look at the characters used for Kagami-Biraki will show that Kagami is a mirror and Biraki is really the word Hiraki (from the verb Hiraku to open). This kind of thing is open to the Japanese play on words where real mirrors can be opened or uncovered. The mirror here is really the round, flattish mirror like rice-cake (mochi). There is a normal, non-mirror shape, mochi about the size of a scoop of ice-cream, so is an individuals amount and saves the cutting of a larger one.

Samurai curse?

Each year fatalities are reported in Japan from people choking on mochi ...

The mirror is one of the Imperial Treasures given to Jimmu Tenno by his great grandmother, the Sun Goddess Ameterasu. Let us not go into how she was enticed from the cave by the mirror. The ceremony, rather than the festival, was carried out by the Bu-ke. The West would call Bu-ke the Samurai Class, Clans, Families, etc. Again the words can lead us on a tangent, from what we are looking up.In modem times the folks in town can make Kagami-biraki into a merry occasion. The mirror shaped mochi is put on the Kami-dana for a while. The Kami-dana is the family’s Altar.The family Altar or where the mochi is placed would be one we can call Shinto. Though all sorts of variations can be seen in people’s. homes. Shinto itself can be mixed up with other religions, mostly Buddhist but even Christianity can be seen mixed in with Shinto. One of the safe things that can be said about pure Shinto Shrines, is they have unpainted wood throughout. So any Box the mochi is put on would be a plain wooden one. With the box, there may be the symbols of long life, strength, prosperity, constancy, virtue etc. These symbols are in the form of bamboo, pine, oranges, a lobster etc. Many of these are used because of the pun on the words for these things.

Above all these things, there may be a pure white rope with zigzag bits of white paper hanging down from it. This is the Yoko-zuna. Less expensive is the use of the zigzag papers alone.

A pure white rope the Yokozuna hangs above the altar and gives it’s name to the top rank of Sumo Wrestlers.

By the way, the Top rank Sumo wrestler gets the rank name from this rope as he has to wear one around his waist when the “Dezuiri” ceremony is carried out.

When eventually the Kagami mochi is eaten it is usually put into a soup named Zoni (literally “boiled mixture”) and this is often very sweet … But as with every thing above, there may be variations.

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Bulletin 17 Part Two