Tsujigahana Stitch-resist Dyeing in Muromachi-Momoyama Period in Japan

摘要

The antique Japanese textiles,known today as Tsujigahana,are fabrics produced from the late Muromachi to the early Edo period (16th to early17th century).Tsujigahana are characterized by motifs in stitch-resist dyeing.Upon examining remaining records from the time when tsujigahana textiles were in use,however,I find no evidence that it was produced using stitch-resist techniques.As far as I reinterpret those records,tsujigahana were summer garments worn by women or young boys.They were dyed by paper stencil or pasteresist dyeing and designed with red peony flowers.The identification of tsujigahana as stitch-resist dyeing emerged in the Taisho to the early Showa periods (late 19th to early 20th century) and became established among folk culture historians and antique textile collectors.They regarded fragments of kosode (kimono) for lower female workers in stitch-resist dyeing as tsujigahana.What we presently understand as tsujigahana includews garments worn by renowned Daimyo(Japanese feudal load) and the Keicho-era nuihaku costumes (with designs in not only stitch-resist dyeing but embroidery and gold and silver leaf) of daimyo-class women.The recovered fragments fascinated Japanese textile collectors; today,one small piece of tsujigahana fragment costs $50,000.The design of tsujigahana is also popular in modern kimono.In this paper,I will trace the interesting movements of tsujigahana from the late 19th century to today.