are traditional

Japan Japan is an island country in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean off the northeast coast of the Asia, Asian mainland, it is bordered on the west by the Sea of Japan and extends from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea ...

ese decorations made for the New Year. They are a type of ''

yorishiro A in Shinto terminology is an object capable of attracting spirits called , thus giving them a physical space to occupy during religious ceremonies. are used during ceremonies to call the for worship. The word itself literally means "approach ...

'', or objects intended to welcome ancestral spirits or ''

kami are the Deity, deities, Divinity, divinities, Spirit (supernatural entity), spirits, mythological, spiritual, or natural phenomena that are venerated in the traditional Shinto religion of Japan. ''Kami'' can be elements of the landscape, forc ...

'' of the harvest. ''Kadomatsu'' are usually placed in pairs in front of homes and buildings.

Construction and placement

Historically, ''kadomatsu'' was often made with

pine A pine is any conifer tree or shrub in the genus ''Pinus'' () of the family Pinaceae. ''Pinus'' is the sole genus in the subfamily Pinoideae. ''World Flora Online'' accepts 134 species-rank taxa (119 species and 15 nothospecies) of pines as cu ...

wood, but these days bamboo is more common. The central portion of the ''kadomatsu'' is formed from three large bamboos, though plastic ''kadomatsu'' are available. After binding all the elements of the ''kadomatsu'', it is bound with a straw mat and newly woven straw rope. ''Kadomatsu'' are placed in pairs on either side of the gate, representing male and female.

Usage

In modern times, ''kadomatsu'' are placed after

Christmas Christmas is an annual festival commemorating Nativity of Jesus, the birth of Jesus Christ, observed primarily on December 25 as a Religion, religious and Culture, cultural celebration among billions of people Observance of Christmas by coun ...

until January 7 (or January 15 during the

Edo period The , also known as the , is the period between 1600 or 1603 and 1868 in the history of Japan, when the country was under the rule of the Tokugawa shogunate and some 300 regional ''daimyo'', or feudal lords. Emerging from the chaos of the Sengok ...

) and are considered temporary housing (''

shintai In Shinto, , or when the honorific prefix ''go''- is used, are physical objects worshipped at or near Shinto shrines as repositories in which spirits or ''kami'' reside.''Shintai'', Encyclopedia of Shinto ''Shintai'' used in Shrine Shinto (Jin ...

'') for ''

''. Designs for ''kadomatsu'' vary depending on region but are typically made of

bamboo Bamboos are a diverse group of mostly evergreen perennial plant, perennial flowering plants making up the subfamily (biology), subfamily Bambusoideae of the grass family Poaceae. Giant bamboos are the largest members of the grass family, in th ...

, and sometimes

ume ''Prunus mume'', the Chinese plum or Japanese apricot, is a tree species in the family Rosaceae. Along with bamboo, the plant is intimately associated with art, literature, and everyday life in China, from where it was then introduced to Kor ...

tree sprigs which represent longevity, prosperity and steadfastness, respectively. "The fundamental function of the New Year ceremonies is to honor and receive the ''

toshigami , also known as , is a Japanese kami and a part of the Shinto pantheon. Etymology The 年 (nen) kanji originally meant "harvest", which became "year" over time as harvest happened once each year. ''Toshigami'' was therefore the god of abundant ...

'' (deity), who will then bring a bountiful harvest for farmers and bestow the ancestors' blessing on everyone." After January 15 (or in many instances the 19th) the ''kadomatsu'' is burned to appease the ''kami'' or ''toshigami'' and release them.

Other information

The ''kadomatsu'' is included in

Unicode Unicode or ''The Unicode Standard'' or TUS is a character encoding standard maintained by the Unicode Consortium designed to support the use of text in all of the world's writing systems that can be digitized. Version 16.0 defines 154,998 Char ...

as the

emoji An emoji ( ; plural emoji or emojis; , ) is a pictogram, logogram, ideogram, or smiley embedded in text and used in electronic messages and web pages. The primary function of modern emoji is to fill in emotional cues otherwise missing from type ...

Gallery

File:Gate with pine branches for the New Year,kadomatsu (kanto),katori-city,japan.JPG, ''Kadomatsu'' of East Japan (

Kantō region The is a geography, geographical region of Honshu, the largest island of Japan. In a common definition, the region includes the Greater Tokyo Area and encompasses seven prefectures of Japan, prefectures: Chiba Prefecture, Chiba, Gunma Prefe ...

) File:Kadomatu18.JPG, ''Kadomatsu'' of West Japan (

Kansai region The or the lies in the southern-central region of Japan's main island Honshū. The region includes the prefectures of Nara, Wakayama, Kyoto, Osaka, Hyōgo and Shiga, often also Mie, sometimes Fukui, Tokushima and Tottori. The metropol ...

) File:小さな門松 - a small kadomatsu (25 cm) 1JAN2021.jpg, A small ''kadomatsu'' File:Minikadomatsu700en-2008.jpg, Three miniature ''kadomatsu'' being sold outside for 700 Yen each File:Pair gate with pine branches for the New Year,kadomatsu,katori-city,japan.JPG, ''Kadomatsu'' File:Minikadomatsu-store-2008.jpg, A small ''kadomatsu'' in a store File:Kadomatsu Kyoto JPN 001.jpg, A ''kadomatsu'' in Kyoto style File:Edo_Kadomatsu01.JPG, ''Kadomatsu'' in the style of the

File:Shimane Kadomatsu - various - Jan 5 2018 17 14 50 897000.jpeg, A flat topped ''kadomatsu'' in Shimane File:Kadomatsu-big-easyview-2009.jpg, ''Kadomatsu'' in

Kamakura , officially , is a city of Kanagawa Prefecture in Japan. It is located in the Kanto region on the island of Honshu. The city has an estimated population of 172,929 (1 September 2020) and a population density of 4,359 people per km2 over the tota ...

References

All about kadomatsu
''The Hawaii Herald''.

External links