Is Gold born from Gold? Part.2

Now, continuing from the previous article.

I’m worried about what will happen to the pilgrim travellers who have entered a temple they are not supposed to enter by any stretch of the imagination… but apparently, it’s going to be an unexpected turn of events…

(Notes for this article: RaccoonDog=Tanuki, testicles=Kin-Tama)

 

A traveller who had been warming up for a while, remembered that his Half Pants had been torn.

‘I have some candlelight, so I’ll take this opportunity to sew them back on…’

He found a needle and thread in his furoshiki wrapper, took off his Half Pants and started sewing.

When he had finished sewing one side, he stuck the needle into the tatami for a moment to turn the Half Pants inside out.

At that moment…

 

「Huh…?」

The face of the Jizo standing in front of me seemed to twitch…

「Huh…Huhoo…?」

It’s strange… When I look into the Jizo’s face again, nothing has changed. He has a very cool look on his face.

(Well, this is strange…)

This time, while looking at Jizo’s face carefully, I stuck the needle into the tatami.

「!」

I knew it, Jizo-san, your face is all scrunched up.

 

(This is suspicious. Maybe…)

He now picks up the burning coals from the brazier with his tongs and places them on the tatami…

 

Immediately!  With a shrill cry, the area went completely dark…

When he came to, there was no Jizo, the temple had disappeared and he was left in the middle of a field …

Then he remembered.

(Ah, surely that was the eight-mat mats…)

 

ーー
Stories of pranks by raccoon dogs that mislead humans. This is a standard form of Japanese folk tale, but there are probably similar stories overseas.

As in the last words of the pilgrim traveller, in this story raccoon dog spreads his ‘testicle bag’ out on the eight-mat floor to create the illusion of a temple hall.

It was good until he lured the travellers in, but whether it was bad timing or the careful preparation of even a brazier that backfired, he was left to suffer one-sidedly with little to do… (^o^;)

The raccoon dog in Japanese folklore is often depicted as having a slightly dopey side. For this reason, they are also recognised as carefree and loved by humans, compared to the foxes, who have a clever but cunning image.

 

This attachment to the raccoon dog may also have influenced the first mentioned replacement song “Tanuki no kin-tama / Testicles of raccoon dog”…

 

Attachment to “raccoon dog / Tanuki”. The “Shigaraki ware Tanuki” is well known as an expression of the raccoon dog’s peculiar ridiculousness. Visitors to Shiga Prefecture and people interested in Japanese antiques and pottery may be familiar with this.

Shigaraki ware has such a long history of pottery production that it was originally known as one of the ‘Six Old Kilns of Japan’. It is characterised by a rustic style that values the texture of the clay over smart beauty, and attracts many pottery enthusiasts.

The history of the first appearance of “Shigaraki ware Tanuki” in this context is rather short: 1951. It was when Emperor Showa visited Shigaraki in Shiga Prefecture.
Tetsuzo Fujiwara, a local potter, made dozens of “Ware Tanuki hold the national flag” and laid them out on the street to celebrate the Emperor’s visit.

The emperor was so pleased when he saw it that he left it in a poem, which was reported nationwide, and since then “Ware Tanuki” has been recognised as a “lucky charm” and has become a representative of Shigaraki ware.

Originally Shigaraki ware was known for its ceramic tableware, but since “Shigaraki ware Tanuki” became famous the impression of “Shigaraki = Ware Tanuki” has become stronger and Tanuki figurines themselves are sometimes called Shigaraki ware.

Due to the great popularity of Shigaraki ware Tanuki, a hands-on sales facility ‘Raccoon Village’ has been built in Shigaraki Town and attracts many visitors.

『Shigaraki Toen Tanuki-mura』 Official website Link

Inside the museum, there is a “Shigaraki pottery making experience (reservations required)”, a “restaurant using local ingredients” and “sales of ceramics only available here”. If you visit Shigaraki, drop in and have a good time.

 

Now, if you look closely at the “Shigaraki ware Tanuki”, you will see that its crotch has been sculpted into some kind of large bulging shape*. This is probably a reference to the “testicles of the eight tatami mats” described in this article. (* There are several variations of “Shigaraki ware Tanuki”, e.g. the female Tanuki’s crotch is often hidden by leaves.)

So, to conclude this article, “Why are RaccoonDog(Tanuki) testicles considered large in Japan?” to unravel the mystery. You should also be able to reach the meaning of the title of this article.

 

The actual testicles of the RaccoonDog, like those of other foxes and dogs, are not that large. Nor do their sacks spread out to the size of a living room, let alone eight tatami mats.

The reason for this folklore, then, is due to the characteristics of the RaccoonDog’s hide and the work that was done with it in the past.

That job was a goldsmith. In olden times, RaccoonDog skins were used to make “gold leaf”.

Gold leaf is made from an alloy of gold with very small amounts of silver or copper added, which is then stretched by beating.

Each piece of gold leaf is an amazing 1/10,000th of a millimetre thick. In other words, the “spreadability” is so great that from 1 cubic centimetre of gold, approximately 10 square metres of gold leaf can be produced.

As very wide gold leaf can be produced from small quantities of gold, it has long been prized as a decorative material.

It is also used, to a very limited extent, as a decorative element in food, there is a sake that contains gold leaf crushed into leafs of 2-3 mm. Gold is not decomposed in the body, so it has no benefits and no malignant effects… in short, it is a gorgeous presentation.

 

Today, the work of stretching the gold leaf thinly is done by machine, but in the Edo period it was done by hand by craftsmen using hammers.

Gold is very soft and brittle as a metal and will tear quickly if it is struck with a hammer as it is. So we wrap them in cushioning material and beat them.

The buffer material that sandwiches the gold is mainly paper, which has a very special composition with a high flatness. After a certain amount of use for stretching, the performance will deteriorate and must be replaced.

In the Edo period, when even ordinary paper was very precious, it was impossible to consume large quantities of paper, even for work, and “Raccoon Dog skins” were used instead of paper until a certain level of thickness was reached.

Raccoon dog skins are said to have been very suitable for making gold leaf because of their resistance to impact and their excellent spreading properties.

The more you hit them, the more they stretch and spread out “Raccoon Dog skins”. Their strange nature and spectacle must have seemed strange to people at the time, and left a lasting impression. (Of course, they don’t stretch to eight tatami mats…(^_^;)

 

Finally… The “Raccoon Dog skins” used for making gold leaf are “Raccoon Dog skins” and not “Raccoon Dog testicles skins”.

Why is it that people say things like ‘raccoon dog’s bag of gold balls is eight tatami mats’…?

Perhaps it is because the actual male testicle pouch (including human males) has a certain elasticity. Male testicles involuntarily move slightly depending on body temperature, stimulation and mental state, causing the testicular pouch to stretch and contract.

Could it be that the old-timers superimposed the strangeness of the actual testicle pouch on the strangeness of the “Raccoon Dog skins” used in making gold leaf and reworked it into interesting folklore?

In our previous article, we wrote: “‘testicles’ are called ‘kin-tama’ (Gold-Ball) in Japanese.”I wrote.

The curiosity created around the gold leaf was incorporated into the characteristics of the raccoon in old tales and passed on. Finally, it became the name for the male testicles and gave them a golden glow.

People’s interest and imagination, combined with the passage of time, sometimes lead to staggeringly strange results…(^^)

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