Tanabata Folklore - Shinobu Orikuchi's Perspective
Tonight, July 7th, is 七夕(Tanabata), the Star Festival in Japan. Here, it’s customary to write wishes on slender strips of colored paper called 短冊( tanzaku) and hang them on bamboo branches. As you can see in the photo below, supermarkets across Japan set up Tanabata displays as early as June, allowing anyone to freely write a wish and decorate the bamboo with their own tanzaku . In this post, I’d like to explore the folklore of Tanabata, drawing on the work of the renowned scholar Shinobu Orikuchi. The True Face of Tanabata — Japan’s Star Festival Through the Lens of Shinobu Orikuchi This post summarizes and selectively quotes the folklorist 折口信夫 Shinobu Orikuchi (1887‑1953) and his 1931 essay “ Tanabata and the Bon Festival ,” rendered into modern English for today’s readers. 1. Wasn’t Tanabata on the Night of July 7th? When we picture Tanabata we imagine writing wishes on colorful slips, hanging them on bamboo the evening of July 7th. Orikuchi, however, notes that the original fes...
