Ainu architecture is by no means elaborate, let alone beautiful; but though it is so simple, it is to a certain extent varied, differing according to the exigencies of climate and locality. Huts of one district vary from those of another not only in small details, but also in the whole shape; or if the shape is the same, the materials are different.
The principal characteristics of the Volcano Bay and Saru River huts is, that they have angular roofs and are thatched with tall reeds and arundinaria, while the huts up the Tokachi River are more often covered with bark, though in form they are almost identical with those others.
On the Kutcharo Lake, again, the huts are thatched with tall reeds like those of Volcano Bay, but the building itself has a totally different shape. The roof is semicircular, and each hut is in appearance like the half of a cylinder lying on its rectangular base.
On the north-east coast the huts have either roofs similar to the Kutcharo ones, or else the angle is very obtuse instead of being sharp, as with the Piratori or Volcano Bay huts.
In the Kuriles, at Shikotan, the Ainu have houses exactly similar to those at Piratori.
Setting aside the varieties of form, we shall now consider how the huts are built. A frame is first made by horizontally lashing at short intervals long poles to others at the angles of the roof. Often the roof is made first and lifted up bodily on the forked poles on which it rests. Then long reeds and arundinaria are collected in sufficient quantity to thatch the frame thickly on each side. Other poles or rafters are then placed over these reeds, and through them lashed tightly to the under frame, thus preventing the thatch from being blown or washed away. Care is taken to leave an opening for the door; and the small east window—usually the only one in Ainu huts—is cut out afterwards by means of a knife. Ainu huts have never more than one storey and never more than one room and a small porch. In districts where the climate is less severe the porch is often dispensed with. In building their habitations the hairy people make no attempt whatever at symmetry or beauty; all they aim at is to make themselves a shelter and nothing more.
There are no more professional architects than professionals of any other kind in the Ainu country. Each man is his own architect, builder, and carpenter. He may occasionally receive the help of a neighbour when he is building his hut, if all hands in the family are not sufficient to carry him through his work.
Each family has its own hut, which is used day and night by all the members. If one of the sons gets married he sometimes brings his bride to live in his father's hut, or else he goes to live in his bride's hut; but as the "hairy mother-in-law" is no better than other "mothers-in-law," the end of this arrangement is that generally the bridegroom has to build a habitation for himself and his better-half. Fortunately for him, he has to pay no ground-rent; nor has he to take a lease, nor pay the lawyer for an agreement, nor yet to buy the ground nor the materials on which and of which his not too luxurious abode is to be built. He chooses the site which is most suitable to him, and there he builds his hut as best he can; and no one is any the worse or the wiser for it. The "furnishing" is a matter of no consideration with the Ainu, as he prefers to live in an "unfurnished house." By instalments, however, as he finds his floor becoming rather damp, he provides himself with a few rough planks, which afford him comfortable sleeping accommodation; and during the winter, when fishing is not practicable, and he spends most of his day at home, he roughly carves for himself a moustache-lifter (the Kike-ush-bashui); a small paddle, the Hera (which is used both to stir the wine and as an implement in weaving); a pestle and mortar carved out of the trunk of a tree; and, if he be a very ambitious person and fond of his wife, he will probably make her a weaving loom as well as two or three "water-jugs" if we may call them so—vessels made of bark bent into shape, and lashed so strongly as to be water-tight, and used for carrying water as needed.
A few wooden bowls, a wooden hook, which is suspended over the fire when bear-meat is smoked, occasionally a Kinna (a mat), and a skin or two, are all the articles of furniture of Ainu manufacture which an Ainu can possess, though few of them possess so many. The Ainu hut has a fire-place in the centre, or rather, a fire is lighted in the centre of the hut. The fire is lighted with a flint and steel—a method learned from the Japanese—or by the friction of two sticks. The more civilised Ainu have now adopted matches. A hole in the angle of the roof acts as chimney, but unfortunately more in name than in practice.
Chairs, stools, sofas, beds, tables, etc., are all things unknown to the Ainu. While inspecting the hut it may be as well to see how the weaving-loom, the most complicated article of the Ainu household, is made and worked. There is a "yarn beam" (the Kammakappe), on which the "warp" of unwoven thread is wound and kept separated, and another "roll" by which the warp threads in the process of weaving are kept in tension between the two gratings. There then is the Poro-usa (the "large grating"), through the intervals of which the warp threads pass, and the Usa, a similar but smaller grating placed on the other side of the roll.
The cloth is wound round a stick which rests on the lap of the weaver, and is kept in tension by means of her wrists; and at the same time the Ahunkanitte (the "shuttle"), is passed between the two sets of warp threads carrying the transverse thread, or "woof," from one side of the cloth to the other and back again. This is then beaten up by means of a long shuttle like a netting mesh, which first draws the weft into its place, and is then used to beat it up. In some ways this form of loom is similar to that of India. The "netting mesh" is called Atzis-Hera. Finally, the Pekoatnit is a bi-forked instrument for separating the threads.
It is needless to say that with this primitive and homemade loom it takes a very long time to weave a very short piece of cloth; but as time is not money with Ainu women, and patience is one of their virtues, it answers their purpose, and they wish for nothing better.
The thread used for manufacturing the cloth is made of the inner fibre of the Ulmus campestris bark. At the beginning of the spring the elm bark is peeled off the trees and is put in water to soak and soften until the inner fibres can be separated, made into threads, and wound up round reeds. The material woven from these threads is very coarse and brittle, except in wet weather or when soaked in water, in which case clothes made of it cannot be worn out.
The weaving is usually plain, but sometimes a simple pattern of black parallel lines is woven in with the material. The natural colour of the elm-fibre thread is dark yellow, and the black lines are composed of the same thread stained.
The other contrivance in Ainu huts which strikes one as being simple but clever is the hook suspended over the fire. The rope is passed over a rafter. One end of it is fastened to the hook, the other, as shown in the illustration, to a piece of wood through which the hook has previously been passed.
Mat-making is closely allied to weaving, and is worked entirely on the same principle, but without the aid of any kind of machinery. The bulrushes are crossed and woven coarsely, and plaited flat. One of these mats is used in Ainu huts as a door—"the Apa Otki." A smaller one is hung over or by the window.
Naturally, Ainu huts are somewhat draughty. The imperfectness of the door and window-fittings, the large outlet for the smoke, besides the wind which finds its way through the thatched walls, make Ainu dwellings "ideal" to anyone wishing to "catch his death of cold." The Ainu do not much mind it.
The roof is low, and from it hang the winter provisions of dried salmon captured during the autumn. This gives an additional odour to the already strong scent of the hut—an "ancient fish-like smell," not redolent of the perfumes of Arabia. The smoke inside the hut is so dense when there happens to be a fire burning that one's eyes stream with involuntary tears, and one is nearly choked. When the days are short in winter the Ainu sometimes light their dwellings with a stick to which is fastened a piece of animal fat. It is hung up aloft, and when the lower end is lighted the fat slowly melting serves to feed the flame and keep this primitive lamp alight. Another mode of illumination is by firing a lighted piece of birch bark on a stick previously split at the upper end. The third way is by filling a large shell with fish-oil and burning in it a few strings of elm-fibre. None of these methods come much into use for everyday life, as, unlike the negroes, the Ainu are not fond of sitting up at night, except on extraordinary occasions; and when by chance they do sit up it is by the light of the fire only.
If a stranger stops for the night in an Ainu hut, he is made to sleep directly under the east window; but the family take good care to sleep all together on the north side, which is the most distant point from the door and the window. Occasional callers are received on the side nearest to the door.
The few Ainu who possess mats on which they sit during the day hang them up at night round the hut, probably to protect themselves from the liberal ventilation, which even those who are used to it find trying when a gale is blowing or the thermometer is very low.
There is no particular spot inside the hut set apart for meals, and the refuse is either thrown into a corner of the hut or flung outside the door and left there. It is difficult to say whether the inside or the outside of an Ainu hut is the dirtier. Heaps of stinking refuse are accumulated round the dwellings, and in summer-time these heaps are alive with vermin—mosquitoes, flies, abu, and black-flies. It is quite sufficient to move a step from the door to see a cloud of these noxious insects rise, and each one of them will have a bite at you.
Inside the house you are no better off. Taikki (fleas) are innumerable, and of all sizes, not to mention other well-known but usually anonymous enemies of the human skin.
The first night I slept in an Ainu hut, though I was provided with insecticide powder, I was literally covered with bites. With my fondness for statistics I proceeded to count them, and only from my ankle to my knee I counted as many as 220. The rest of my body and my head were covered in the same proportion, but I gave up the attempt to ascertain the exact number—the task was too overwhelming. My skin, however, got so inflamed by these bites as to produce fever, which lasted two or three days. After that time I never again suffered to such an extent, perhaps owing to the fact that no free spot was left to attack, or may be from that curious process called acclimatisation.
The Ainu huts are built entirely above ground, and are used alike in winter and summer.
In olden times the hut was always destroyed at the death of its owner, or when abandoned; but in the former case the custom is seldom practised now, and in the latter they are merely left to decay.
It is singular that migrating Ainu, coming across an uninhabited hut, never live in it, but build a new one for themselves.
The Kurilsky Ainu until quite recently destroyed their huts when migrating from one island to another. They also burnt the huts of deceased persons. It is needless to say that the Ainu have no churches, no hotels, no hospitals, and no public buildings of any kind. The huts in villages are a little way from one another, and each hut has directly in front a separate storehouse, built on piles or posts so as not to be accessible to wolves, dogs, or rats. These are small structures, the architecture of which has the local characteristics of the habitations, with the exception that they are invariably on piles, while the habitations are on the ground. Clothes, furs, mats, and winter provisions of sea-weed are kept in these storehouses, and access to them is by means of a peculiar ladder. It is a mere log of wood, six or seven feet in length, pointed at one end, and with five or six incisions, which serve as steps, and remind me of the steps cut by an ice-axe in a glacier or on frozen snow. Natives go up and down these ladders with ease, even when carrying heavy weights on their heads; and good care is always taken to remove the ladder when leaving the storehouse. Women principally look after these storehouses, and seem to have the whole care and control of them. I have often seen an Ainu girl—for a storehouse could hardly hold more than one—sitting on the tiny door working at her lord and master's Atzis robe. Hour after hour I have seen her sitting there, working patiently till the sun has set and the darkness has come. Her materials were then stowed away; the mat at the door was let down; the ladder descended and kicked away; and sadly singing in her soft falsetto voice, she retired into the dirt and dark of her habitation.
The storehouses stand about six feet above the level of the ground, and are generally on four, six, or eight piles. Upon each pile is placed a large square piece of wood turned downwards at the sides, so as not to be accessible to rats and mice. Upon these square pieces of wood rest horizontally four rafters, forming a quadrangle about eight feet square. The small storehouse has as a base this quadrangle, and is seldom high enough to allow of an adult to stand inside.
Storehouses are thatched like all other houses. On the upper Tokachi, however, they are covered with the bark of trees.
Next in connection with Ainu habitations comes the skull-trophy at the east end of the hut. This is on a parallel line to the hut wall, and only a few yards away from it, and is made of a number of bi-forked poles, upon which are placed the skulls of the bears, wolves, and foxes killed by the owner of the hut. The Ainu is proud of this trophy, and if the number of bear skulls is very large, he commands a certain amount of respect from his hairy brethren. There is nothing that Ainu admire more than courage, and there is nothing in the world that an Ainu desires more than to be thought brave. When he has gained this character a man becomes in a certain way the "lion" of the village. He embellishes his trophy with a Nusa and Inaos (willow wands with overhanging shavings—see Chapter on Superstitions), and he always looks on it as an evidence of his manly glory. Besides this, many Ainu possess one or two live bears kept in cages. Bear hunters often secure one or more cubs, which they bring home and allow to live in the hut like one of the family or an Irishman's pig. These cubs are nursed along with and in the same manner as the children, and Ainu say that women often put them to the breast and suckle them like their own infants. Whether this is true or not I cannot say; but though I have never seen it, and therefore cannot vouch for it, it is not unlike Ainu women to do such a thing.
When the new-comers grow big and powerful enough to be dangerous, the men make a rough cage with logs of timber, THE APE-KILAI, OR EARTH-RAKE, AS USED BY PIRATORI AINU THE APE-KILAI, OR EARTH-RAKE, AS USED BY PIRATORI AINU. placing them one over the other in a quadrangular shape, and lashing them strongly together. The bear is driven into the cage, which is then roofed over; and after a couple of years of confinement, during which it is fattened, poor Bruin is killed for a bear festival. In the lower part of the cage there is a small wooden tray by which food is served to the captive.
On the north-east coast of Yezo I have also seen smaller cages, in which foxes, eagles, or other animals are kept; and I always noticed the care which Ainu took to feed up the imprisoned animals. That "charity begins at home" is true even among the hairy people; for if they are kind to animals it is only for the sake of making a good meal of them on the first occasion that presents itself.
PESTLE PESTLE. MORTAR MORTAR. It may be as well to state that the Ainu have never been known to make pottery. What they have of the kind is imported and sold to or exchanged with them by the Japanese. If I were an Irishman I should say that real Ainu pottery is made of wood. Nevertheless, large shells are often used by them as drinking vessels where wooden bowls are not obtainable. It is a common occurrence in Ainu households that one bowl is used by several individuals, and a more common occurrence still that none of the bowls are ever washed or cleaned after having been used.
The small Ainu porch which stands frequently at the entrance of Ainu huts answers the purpose of a stackhouse, and in it is stored the firewood used in the house. The wooden mortar and the long pestle are kept in a corner under the porch. In the more civilised parts of Yezo these pestles and mortars are general, as the natives use them for pounding millet.
The pure Ainu live principally on animal food—fish and meat—sea-weed, and some kinds of roots and herbs, which they find on the mountains. Metallurgy is utterly unknown to the Ainu. Until of late years they possessed nothing made of metal. Their arrows had bamboo or bone heads; tin or iron cooking utensils they had none; and the blades of their knives were and are of Japanese origin. Some of these blades are very old, and were acquired by the Ainu in the battles which they fought against the Japanese; others have been got by barter-metal exchanged for skins of animals.
Furthermore, save the weaving-loom, the Ainu possess no machinery of their own make. This too, as we have seen, is but a very rude and simple kind of machine. The application of wind or water power to economise human labour is in no way known to them; thus they have no windlasses, no pumps, no bellows, no windmills, no waterwheels; neither have they any signs of the rudest form of machinery moved by manual power which they have imagined and made for themselves. Furthermore, they are very loth to accept those mechanical means of economising labour which are employed by their neighbours the Japanese.
The Ainu are very conservative, little as they may have to preserve. They show a great dislike to change or reform their habits and customs, or to improve themselves in any way. Worse they could certainly not be. They have no ancestral attachment which makes them unwilling to discard their rude practices for more civilised ways; but, acting according to their instincts, and not by their intelligence, they preserve customs which seem inconvenient and unpractical to us, which habit has rendered familiar and pleasant to them.
Various natives in other parts of the world show signs of an earlier state of civilisation, but the Ainu do not. They have never had a past civilisation, they are not civilised now, and what is more, they will never be civilised. Civilisation kills them. As a hog delights in filth, so the Ainu can only live in dirt, neglect, and savagery of personal habits. They are made that way, and they cannot help it. They are excluded from progress by an impassable barrier. They have many miseries in their life, but no greater misery could befall an Ainu than to be forced to lead a civilised existence. Even after they have been educated in Japanese schools, when they return home, in a short time they forget all they have learned, and discard their acquired civilisation for the old, free, untrammelled mountain life; the wild habits of the woods and sea-shore; the nakedness of summer and the stifling squalor of the one small dingy hut in winter; the uncombed hair and matted beard; the putrid flesh of salmon, and the vile compound they revel in till they get gloriously drunk and bestial.
The expression of ideas by graphic signs is utterly unknown to the Ainu. They have no alphabet, and furthermore, they have no methods whatever of writing. Hence the utter incapacity of the hairy people to record events, time, or circumstances in their history; for even the system of picture-writing is not known to them.
Thus they have neither graven records nor any form of visible history; and tradition transmitted from mouth to mouth is all they have by way of historic continuity. The nearest approach made to graphic signs is in the owner's marks, which we occasionally find on some of their implements. The moustache-lifter is the article on which this mark is most commonly found. What these marks are meant to represent I do not know for certain; but I believe that Fig. 1 is supposed to convey the idea of a house, and Fig. 2 that of a boat; Fig. 3 a bear cage, and 4 the mere result of fancy. Even these marks are only rarely found, and have probably been suggested by Japanese writing.
The illustration shows the four specimens which I found carved on moustache-lifters.
Closely allied with writing is, of course, map-drawing and ornamentations. Map drawing can be dismissed at once, like that famous chapter on snakes in Iceland, as the Ainu know nothing of it.
Rough ornamentations on bone and wooden implements are their only artistic efforts. Truthful representations of figures and animals are seldom attempted,[37] but conventionalised symbols, suggested by and based on certain forms of animal or vegetable life, are occasionally used for ornamentation.
The Ainu have no rock-sculptures, and can neither paint nor draw in any form; what they have are mere simple wood-carvings. But only a few have any aptitude for even this crude work, though of course they are not all alike. As with us we have people who are artistic and people who are Philistine, so with the Ainu, in that very humble degree which is to Western art what an acorn is to an oak.
Like all early work, Ainu art—if we may call it so—aims at a certain uniformity, especially in leaf-portraiture, so as to produce a somewhat symmetrical pattern; for at all times geometry has been the mother of design.
An Ainu does not go for his models direct to Nature, neither does he servilely copy his neighbour's work; but he gets his ideas indirectly from both these sources, and through inability to copy accurately, negligence in close study, and some amount of native imagination combined, varies the design which he has seen to such an extent as to make it in a sense original. The talent shown by different men in the art of carving varies considerably, even in men of the same tribe; while certain tribes show both aptitude and fondness for these ornamentations, whereas others have little of either.
It is the Ainu of the upper Ishikari River who chiefly excel in these carved ornamentations. The knife represented in the illustration comes from Kamikawa, and was carved with the point of a knife by the chief of the Ainu there. It took the man many months to accomplish, and it is by far the best specimen of Ainu workmanship that I saw in Yezo, though the ornamentations on it are not purely Ainu in character.
SIDE VIEW SIDE VIEW. This man was a genius as compared to other Ainu, and his ideas of form and precision were considerably more developed than in most of his race. He has ornamented the sheath with conventionalised symbols, which were apparently suggested to him by leaves and branches of trees; and the suggestion of a flower can be noticed in the upper part of the handle. A suggestion of fish-scales has been used by him to fill up small open spaces; others he filled up with parallel lines. The sheath is made of two parts, to allow the carver to cut the space for the blade inside; but these two parts are well fitted together, and kept fast by six rings of neatly-cut bark fastened on while fresh, so that by shrinking the two sides of the sheath are brought close together, and are as if made of one single piece.
The side view of the same knife shows the clever contrivance for fastening it on to the girdle without removing the latter from around the body. This knife may be ranked among the chefs d'œuvre of Ainu art.
The principal characteristics of the more usual ornamentations are interesting to study.
Art of course is only the personification, so to speak, the expression of the mind, character, and knowledge of the artist; thus, in Ainu ornamentations we have patterns which could be nothing but Ainu, taken collectively, yet which show distinctly the temperament of each individual. For instance, taking KIKE-USH-BASHUI, OR MOUSTACHE-LIFTERS. the moustache-lifters (Figs. 1, 2, 4 in the illustration). Fig. 1, with its roundish, undecided, lines, was carved by a man weak in physique and morale; Fig. 2, which is much simpler and with more decided lines, was the work of a quiet but strong and proud man; and Fig. 4, with its coarse incisions, was the outcome of a brutal mind.
Ainu designs, though slightly varied by each individual, are principally formed of simple geometrical patterns; then of coils SUGGESTIONS OF LEAVES. and scrolls; and, rarest of all, because the highest attainment of all, of conventionalised representations of animal or vegetable forms. Of the representations from animal forms the fish-scale is the only one adopted by the Ainu, but suggestions of leaves may not infrequently be found in these designs. Some of these are long and narrow; others are short and stumpy.
The above are, to my mind, the models which the Ainu have chiefly taken for their leaf patterns, following nature at a long distance indeed!
ROPE-PATTERN AND SIMPLE BANDS ROPE-PATTERN AND SIMPLE BANDS. Beside these, and much more common, are the rope-pattern and the simple bands. Often the rope-pattern has bands above and below, especially in drinking vessels.
Triangles filled with lines parallel to one of the sides are TRIANGLES TRIANGLES. frequently met with in moustache-lifters, and occasionally the annexed patterns are found: but as a rule the Ainu are not fond of merely straight single lines except for "filling" purposes. These patterns are mostly used on their graves. In articles of every-day use they prefer curves as a foundation of their ornamentations. The lozenge CHEVRONS CHEVRONS. pattern, especially one lozenge inside the other, is a favourite among their geometrical designs; also contiguous and detached circles, chevrons, double chevrons, and triple chevrons. The chevrons are mainly used by them on their graves, and they are invariably enclosed between two or four lines.
The two following patterns are elaborations of the foregoing, but are much more uncommon.
ELABORATIONS OF CHEVRONS ELABORATIONS OF CHEVRONS. The parallel incised lines and parallel lines crossing each other at right angles are met with again and again in Ainu patterns. More common still is the occurrence of a number of parallel lines meeting perpendicularly another lot of parallel lines without crossing them.
A COMMON PATTERN A COMMON PATTERN. Parallel lines have a fascination for the Ainu, as we find them in most of their designs.
Concentric circles are not often met with, neither is the plain or loop coil often found, owing to the difficulty of WAVE PATTERNS WAVE PATTERNS. execution; but the wave pattern and double wave are typical Ainu patterns; also the reversed wave.
From these may have been derived the REVERSED COIL REVERSED COIL. other two, the last of which is a mere double reversed coil.
Triangular marks are occasionally FRETS FRETS. "put in" by the Ainu in some of their more complicated designs, and finally we find that, though rarely, they sometimes attempt a kind of fret.
Other strange forms of lines which are thoroughly characteristic of the Ainu are the following.
OTHER CHARACTERISTIC DESIGNS OTHER CHARACTERISTIC DESIGNS. I never came across any Ainu wood-carvings that were coloured, but in bone-carvings—which, I must add, are very rare—black is used to assist shade, and bring out the higher lights by contrast. The Ainu have no idea of tones, semi-tones, or gradations; the contrast is merely between the strong black and strong white. Enamelling is not known by them.
The objects which bear these incised ornamentations, beside the sheaths and handles of their knives and swords and their moustache-lifters, as has been shown, are the Tchutti, or war-clubs; the Hera, or netting-mesh used in weaving; drinking-vessels, quivers, pipes and tobacco-boxes, the thread-reeds, cloth-hangers, and graves.
The modern Ainu are not a warlike people, therefore many of the weapons which were used in former days for defence and offence are rarely found now. For instance, the old war-clubs are not used by the present generation. These clubs were long and heavy, and were carried on the wrist by a piece of rope passed through a hole at the upper end. Some were plain and straight, others were curved towards the end to TCHUTTI, OR WAR-CLUBS. make them heavier. Now and again some carved all over are found. Pieces of leather or rope were often knotted round the heavier part to make the blow more severe. In some of the very old clubs a stone was inlaid to add to the weight and consequent efficiency of the weapon. These clubs are from two to two and a half feet in length, and are made of hard wood.
Ainu bows are simple, and not very powerful. They are about fifty inches in length, and made of only one piece of yew. The arrows, which are poisoned, are of bamboo or bone. The poison is extracted from aconite roots mixed with other ingredients. It is somewhat greasy owing to certain fatty TROUGH IN WHICH RESIN IS KEPT FOR FIXING ARROW-POINTSTROUGH IN WHICH RESIN IS KEPT FOR FIXING ARROW-POINTS. matters which it contains, and is smeared into the cavity in the arrow-point, which has previously been treated with pine-tree gum to fix the poison. The arrow-point is barbed, and so fashioned that when the shaft is drawn from the wound this poisoned point remains.
POISONED ARROWS POISONED ARROWS. The illustration gives two different kinds of poisoned arrows. In Figs. 2 and 3, the black part in the point shows the cavity filled with poison. Fig. 2 shows how the arrow-head is separated from the reed, and how when the arrow is drawn from the flesh the poisoned point remains inside the wound.
The arrows, when in war or hunting, are kept in a quiver, and a small Inao is hung to it to bring good luck to the owner.
Spears and harpoons of one barb are common, and some of the poisoned spears have heads similar to the arrows but of a larger size. Spears are out of date now, but harpoons are still employed in fishing.
Knives are the weapons on which a modern Ainu most relies. Some of these knives are of such length that they might pass for swords. The blade is single-edged, and is protected by a wooden sheath. Nearly every man possesses one, which he carries in his girdle when dressed; when naked, he carries it in his hand. The illustration shows knives of different sizes, and with different patterns worked on them. From an artistic point of view the sheaths of knives are the most carefully wrought over, and ornamented to a greater extent than any other article of Ainu manufacture.
Then come the graves. The Ainu are very jealous of these places of eternal rest, and good care is taken to hide them either in the midst of a forest, on a distant and almost inaccessible hill, or in some remote spot, difficult to find or reach.
Each village has its own semi-secret graveyard, in which all its dead are buried. Occasionally, when the site of a graveyard has become known to others than these local Ainu, the place is deserted, and a fresh place of sepulture is chosen. The manner of burial is as follows. The body, wrapped up in a Kinna (mat), is fastened to a long pole and carried to the grave by two men. All the villagers follow, each carrying some article which was owned by the deceased. A grave is dug, wide and long enough to hold the body laid flat. In it are placed the bow and arrows with their quiver, the knife—from which, for the sake of economy, the blade has been previously removed—and the drinking-vessel which belonged to the deceased, if he were a man. Women are usually buried with some beads, earrings, and furs. All these articles, carried by the mourners, are broken before they are laid in the grave with the corpse; a few boards are then placed over the body, and earth is thrown over these till the ground is level again.
The grave is generally so shallow that the body is only a few inches underground—sometimes not more than four inches. The body lies flat on its back. Close to its head is erected a monument. For men it is the trunk of a tree, about six feet in length, from which the bark has been peeled off, and whereon certain ornamentations are cut. A short branch is left on one side. The top of the tree-trunk and the end of the branch are cut either in the shape of a lozenge, a hexagon, or a semicircle; and a hole is made through it. At the branch end, the cloth-earrings or the head-gear of the deceased are hung and left to decay.
Women have simpler graves; they are flat instead of round, and are cut into the shape of a canoe-paddle. The chief of a village has a more elaborate tomb than others if he has been liked by the villagers. At Raishats, on the Ishikari River, I saw a really imposing monument put over the grave of the chief who had recently died. It was of very large size, and well carved—in the same patterns as those shown in the illustration. Its chief peculiarity was that the body, instead of being covered by earth, was covered by what appeared to be a canoe or "dug-out" turned upside down, the bottom of which had been laboriously carved. On each of the two sides, at the head and foot of the grave, was stuck into the ground a wooden blade twenty-one inches in length, resembling WOODEN BLADE WOODEN BLADE. in shape the blade of a sword. Each of these four blades was carved alike, and had a strange design resembling the number 88. Whether a meaning is attached by the Ainu to this design I cannot say, and the curious circumstance, as my readers will remember, through which I came into possession of one of these blades, did not permit me to ask many questions on the subject. I often wondered whether it meant that life begins, goes its way round, and ends where it began? It is more likely, though, that no meaning whatever is attached to those lines, for such deep thoughts would hardly harmonise with the Ainu philosophy—such as it is. The Ainu do not stop to mourn or pray or trouble themselves about a grave when the body is once buried. Those who have touched the body wash their hands in a tub of water which has been brought for the purpose; afterwards the water is thrown over the grave and the tub is smashed. The Ainu seldom visit their graveyards except when some one has to be buried. They hate their dead to be disturbed, and nothing makes them more angry than to know that a stranger has been near their burial-ground. When a man is dead they try to forget all about him and his doings, in which they generally succeed to perfection. This naturally is not conducive to anything like continuity in the history of the country, and may partly account for their having none. Moreover, none of the tombs bear the name or the mark of the person to whom it was erected. Tombs of children are of similar shape to those of adults, only smaller in size. When carrying the dead—or, as we should say, going to a funeral—the Ainu put on their best clothes, and when the burial is over they all get helplessly drunk to make up for the loss of the departed friend.
To leave this somewhat grim subject and to return to every-day art, it may be well to mention that the designs for embroideries differ in no way from the wood-carvings. They are often more accurately finished, owing to the greater facility of materials, but the lines and all the characteristics of the patterns are the same. In the tattoos the lozenge pattern and bands are the two more commonly used. The Egyptian cross is sometimes met with ( Egyptian Cross ), and also a kind of reversed fylfot, or svastika. Moreover, the St. Andrew's cross with an additional line is not uncommon(X|). In the present volume this is all I have to say on Ainu art. I may, however, add that their ornamentations could not be more primitive, but their frequency on weapons, clothing, implements, and graves shows us that art, though not understood by the Ainu, has a certain fascination, which, in their ignorance, they cannot explain. They know art without knowing what art means. Certain lines and simple designs which are familiar to them appeal to their taste, else they would not ornament all their articles with them. But this does not show any great intellectual activity, for beyond that point the Ainu brain cannot go. As art in its natural state is merely the pictorial outcome of what the brain has grasped, we have in these crude beginnings another strong proof that the brain-power of the Ainu is indeed very limited, and their inability to represent animal form seems extraordinary in view of what other savages have done; but of course superstition may have something to say to the omission. The Ainu rank very low in the scale of civilisation; they are probably below the Australian blacks and the tree-dwellers of India, who are supposed to be among the lowest races in creation. The Terra del Fuegians and certain African tribes run them hard; but, taken all in all, the Ainu are the furthest behind in the great race of human development.
The faces of the Ainu are far from ugly, and their heads are singularly picturesque, though of course there are the finer types as there are the meaner; by which we come to gradation and comparison. The general idea that all Ainu are hideous has arisen from the accounts of the few who have travelled in the more civilised parts of Yezo, and have seen and studied only a limited number of half-breeds and actual Japanese, mistaking them for Ainu. In one of the last publications on the Ainu, photographs of Japanese and half-breeds are given as typical specimens of the Ainu race; and one or two real Ainu are given as phenomena and exceptions. That the Ainu are disgustingly filthy is undoubted; that in many ways they are monkey-like is certain; but also that on a close examination many are not devoid of good features is undeniable. As regards looks, it is a great mistake to compare savages with ourselves, and to judge of them from our own standpoint. This is no more fair than to compare a thoroughbred fox-terrier with a thoroughbred poodle-dog, to the disadvantage of the one or the other. Passing off half-breeds as pure types of course makes things ten times worse, and complicates matters for those who care for accuracy, and are interested in anthropological researches.
Ainu physiognomy is an interesting study. When seen full-face the forehead is narrow, and sharply sloped backward. The cheek-bones are prominent, and the nose is hooked, slightly flattened, and broad, with wide, strong nostrils. The mouth is generally large, with thick, firm lips, and the underlip well developed. The space from the nose to the mouth is extremely long, while the chin, which is rather round, is comparatively short and not very prominent. Thus the face has the shape of a short oval. The profile is concave and the mouth and eyebrows are prominent, though of course the nose projects more than the lips, yet without being too markedly projecting. The chin and forehead recede, as has been said, and in the supraorbital region the central boss is extremely well marked; also the brow ridges, which, however, are slightly less conspicuous than the central boss. The ears are usually large, flat, and simply-developed, with long lobes; but unfortunately, owing to the heavy weight of their enormous earrings this part of their ears is generally much deformed. Sometimes I have seen children with a hole in their lobes large enough for me to pass my finger through; with others, where the skin was not so elastic, the lobes were torn right through and the two sides hung down. In older people one does not see this so much, as their long hair entirely covers their ears. The average length of a man's ear is two and three-quarter inches; of a woman's, two and a half inches.
People have classified the Ainu as Mongolians, notwithstanding that they possess no characteristics whatsoever of the Mongolian races.
The colour of their skin is light reddish-brown, and not yellow and sallow, like that of Mongolians; they are very hairy, and the Mongolians are smooth-skinned; the features of the one race are diametrically opposed to those of the other; the mouth is strong and firm in the Ainu and weak in the Mongolian; and the Ainu eyes, the strongest characteristic of Mongolian races, do not slant upwards, nor are they long and almond-shaped, as with the Chinese or the Japanese, but with their long axes are in one horizontal plane, as in most Europeans. Indeed, the Ainu have a much greater resemblance to the northmen of Europe in their prehistoric stage than to any modern races, and least of all to the Mongolians.
But let us examine the eye more carefully. The iris is light brown, sometimes tending towards dark grey. One seldom sees black or very dark brown eyes save in half-breeds; and they are deeply set, as with Europeans. The eyelids are no thicker than those of Caucasian races, though they droop, as is common among people exposed to the full glare of the sun. The broad ridges being very heavy and prominent, cover part of the upper eyelid over the outer angle of the opening. The eyelashes are extremely long, and the eyebrows are shaggy and bushy. The eyes are full of animal-like expression and emotional warmth, a thing very rare with their neighbours the Japanese or Chinese. The long eyelashes shading the large eyes and rendering them soft, together with their pathetic and slow way of talking, make men and women singularly interesting. Like most animals, the Ainu can "speak" with their eyes.
The hair in Ainu adults is for the most part black, wavy, and easily breaking into large curls. Among children, however, one sees brown shades, which darken with years, until the hair turns quite black. Along the north-east coast of Yezo I came across several Ainu adults who had reddish hair and beard; and in the Kurile Islands, at Shikotan, several of the children had light auburn hair hanging in large loose curls and rather flaxy in texture, while the hair of adults was even darker than that of the Yezo Ainu.
The hair, which is coarse and strong, is uniformly and thickly planted over the whole scalp, and reaches well down over the forehead, where, as my readers will remember, a space is cut out or shaved off. It grows long in men as in women, but when it exceeds ten or twelve inches it is generally trimmed in the shape of a half-circle at the back of the head, and is cut off level with the shoulders at the sides. The men have a luxuriant beard, whiskers, and moustache, which grow to a great length. The hair of the beard often begins directly under the eyes, and covers all the lower part of the face. Many of the natives also have a few short coarse hairs on the nose (especially noticeable in natives of the north-east coast of Yezo). The beard, whiskers, and moustache begin to grow in the Ainu when they are fairly young. A man at about twenty can grow a good beard, and at thirty his beard is very long. Ainu women, whom nature has not provided with such a luxuriant growth of hair on the lower part of the face, make up for it by having a long moustache tattooed on the upper and lower lip, which in their idea makes them look "very manly" (see Tattoos). Baldness is not common among thoroughbred Ainu, even at a very old age, when, however, they generally turn grey and then white, which gives a patriarchal appearance to the hairy people.
The Ainu face seldom undergoes the marked changes common to civilised nations, as they are not subject to large emotions; but different expressions are as easily discernible by anyone who really knows and has studied the natives, as the different expressions in the eyes of animals by one who is familiar with them. When the Ainu is pleased he seldom wrinkles his face and draws back his mouth at the corners, as we do, but he shows it by a peculiar sparkle in the eyes and by an almost imperceptible wrinkle in his eyelids, which contract and diminish the opening. The corners of the mouth turn slightly upwards. The smile is an accentuation of this expression, with the additional lowering of the eyebrows, especially in the middle near the nose, causing the forehead to wrinkle.
Laughter Ainu know not. During my long stay among them I never once saw a real Ainu laugh heartily, for the hero of the dab of blue paint laughed less than he roared with pleasure; and I do not remember even direct crosses doing so; hence travellers have reported the Ainu to be "dull," "sad," "expressionless."
Certainly, the first thing that strikes one on coming in contact with them is, how depressed they look, and how, even in their work, their games, their festivals, sadness is greater than joy. In fact, the Ainu, with their sentimental nature, enjoy sadness.
Astonishment and surprise are expressed by a perplexed look in the wide-opened eyes, by raising the eyebrows, and by the contraction of the mouth. The hands are not raised nor directed towards the object or person causing astonishment; but if the arms be hanging down, the fingers are widely separated. With the Ainu sorrowful emotions are more marked than the more pleasing, the more joyous. Thus, when in low spirits the head is bent forwards, the eyes are staring and drooping, and the mouth is drawn downwards. In greater grief howling is added to these signs. Ainu men occasionally indulge in quiet tears without sobbing, but women weep copiously at the death of their children when these are young.
When an Ainu stands very erect, with one hand in the other in front, and, turning his head on either shoulder, throws it back and looks down at you with expressionless eyes, in the meanwhile raising his eyebrows, you may be sure that he means to show contempt. If, however, his eyes are restless and his lips quiver, if the eyebrows are rapidly brought down over the eyelids, while he opens his eyes wide showing the whole of the iris; if the nostrils are inflated and he breathes heavily; if the head is thrown forward and he is slowly arching, and, as the French say, "making a round back," you may be certain that he is in a very bad temper, and means to go for you, if he sees his way to it.
When obstinate, the pose of the arms and legs is similar to that by which he wishes to show contempt, but the expression of the face is absolutely stolid, the eyes are firm and frigid, meaning in that way to impress you with the certainty that, come what may, he will not move from his decision.
When actively angry, the Ainu sneer and snarl at one another, frowning ferociously, and showing all their front teeth, but specially uncovering their fangs or dog teeth; the arms are stretched out, but always with the fist open—if no knife or other weapon be held in the hand. Shame and disgust are two expressions which one does not often see on Ainu faces. The former I cannot describe, for I never saw an Ainu who was ashamed of anything he had done; the latter is manifested by an upward movement of the corners of the lips, and a curling of the nose, with a sudden expiration almost like a snort.
Shyness, which is the nearest approach to shame, is shown by women when meeting a stranger, and gives them a submissive look. They bend their heads and look down until the first emotion has passed, when they gaze at the new-comer with a certain restlessness and curiosity, again, as in so many of their gestures and ways, reminding one of monkeys. I never found any shyness whatever in Ainu men; neither could I detect in them any signs of fear for objects, animals, or powers with which they were familiar. Things which they do not understand of course frighten them, like eclipses of the sun or moon, or as my revolver did when I was attacked by them at Horobets; and also when I appeared as a black-winged rider on the north-east coast. In the latter case, unfortunately, I was too far off to see their faces clearly, and in the former, after the attack they showed more sensible submission to the inevitable than true cowardice. What I chiefly saw then was here and there a face with wide-open, undecided eyes heavily frowning; while some of the others shrugged their shoulders and closed their eyes, waiting for the loud report of the revolver, which unpleasant noise, heard before from Japanese guns, always gives a shock to their nerves.
When an Ainu wishes to show that something cannot be done, or that he cannot prevent someone else from doing it, he neither shrugs his shoulders like a Frenchman, nor shakes his head laterally like an Englishman; nor does he throw out his hands like a Neapolitan, but, quietly standing erect, and with his head slightly bent forward, he gently lifts it up, and slowly winking his eyes, says that he cannot do it.
When children are sulky or displeased they frown and protrude their lips, making a nasal noise similar to this—"Ohim"—without any of the vowels clearly pronounced.
Our way of nodding the head vertically in sign of affirmation and shaking it laterally in negation is not known to the thoroughbred race. Those, either Ainu or half-castes, who practise it have learned it from the Japanese. The right hand is generally used in negation, passing it from right to left and back in front of the chest; and both hands are gracefully brought up to the chest and prettily waved downwards—palms upwards—in sign of affirmation. In other words, their affirmation is a simpler form of their salute, just the same as with us the nodding of the head is similarly used both ways.
It is quite enough to look at an Ainu's eyes to see at once whether he consents or not, just as it is quite enough to look at a monkey's face to know if it will accept the apple you offer it. Slyness and jealousy are well marked in the Ainu face, and the former is seen in the glittering, restless eyes, the latter in the sulky glance and protruding mouth. Slyness is a very common characteristic among Ainu men; jealousy is recognised and frequent in women.
I could give a large number of other characteristic expressions, of less ethnological importance, but in the present work I shall limit myself to the principal ones which I have attempted to describe, leaving out altogether "expressions" of half-castes, so as to avoid confusion.
I must beg my reader's forgiveness for the "dryness" of the imperfect description I have given of the Ainu physiognomy, as many will agree with me that it is a great deal easier to notice unfamiliar expressions on faces than to describe them accurately in so many words.