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Chinese dragon mythology is the source of Japanese dragon mythology. Japanese words for "dragon" are written with kanji ("Chinese characters"), either simplified shinjitai 竜 or traditional kyūjitai 龍 from Chinese long 龍. These kanji can be read tatsu in native Japanese kun'yomi, [b] and ryū or ryō in Sino-Japanese on'yomi. [c] Many ...
By the early 21st century, tattoos were stigmatized in Japanese culture, and many Japanese associated them with the Yakuza. [4] However, there was a movement to revive the practice as a symbol of female empowerment and of their Ryukyuan cultural heritage. [ 4 ]
Mizuchi is also the Japanese transliteration for several Chinese glyphs, [3] each glyph putatively representing a type of Chinese dragon: namely the jiāolóng (蛟竜; Japanese: kōryū) or "4-legged dragon", the qiúlóng (虬竜 or 虯竜; Japanese: kyūryū) or "hornless dragon" and the chīlóng (螭竜; Japanese: chiryū) or "yellow dragon".
Irezumi (入れ墨, lit. ' inserting ink ') (also spelled 入墨 or sometimes 刺青) is the Japanese word for tattoo, and is used in English to refer to a distinctive style of Japanese tattooing, though it is also used as a blanket term to describe a number of tattoo styles originating in Japan, including tattooing traditions from both the Ainu people and the Ryukyuan Kingdom.
The Japanese word irezumi means "insertion of ink" and can mean tattoos using tebori, the traditional Japanese hand method, a Western-style machine or any method of tattooing using insertion of ink. The most common word used for traditional Japanese tattoo designs is horimono. [8]
The name Kuraokami combines kura 闇 "dark; darkness; closed" and okami 龗 "dragon tutelary of water". This uncommon kanji (o)kami or rei 龗, borrowed from the Chinese character ling 龗 "rain-dragon; mysterious" (written with the "rain" radical 雨, 3 口 "mouths", and a phonetic of long 龍 "dragon") is a variant Chinese character for Japanese rei < Chinese ling 靈 "rain-prayer ...
The shīsā (シーサー), the stone animals that in Okinawa guard the gates or the roofs of houses, are close relatives of the shishi and the komainu, objects whose origin, function and symbolic meaning they share. [22] Their name itself is centuries old regional variant of shishi-san (獅子さん, lit. ' Mr. Lion '). [6]
Tomoe (巴, also written 鞆絵), [a] commonly translated as "comma", [2] [3] is a comma-like swirl symbol used in Japanese mon (roughly equivalent to a heraldic badge or charge in European heraldry). It closely resembles the usual form of a magatama. The tomoe appears in many designs with various uses.