Ornament Translation

[Jackoleary]

Hello everyone,
I have had an ornament for quite some time and has passed through my family, and i was wondering what this writing says or does anyone know what this is? Would be grateful for any responses

 

[nekojita]

新山造

Wonder if it could be Chinese - "made in Johor Bahru"

 

[AngelRayRielly]

Hard to tell from the blurred characters, but the above post is an accurate guess. Going off of the above post, the first character means "new," the second "mountain," and the third "make, construction, workmanship, or made of --." The first two characters would be pronounced "atara-yama" or "ara-yama" if it were Japanese, but there is no region, prefecture, or major city with any of those names, to my knowledge. The style of the design does indeed seem to be more Chinese than traditional Japanese.

 

[Glenn]

I thought it was にいやま つくる -- a personal name. It could also be しんやま or あらやま, apparently. "Made in Johor Bahru" is an interesting idea. I never would have thought to look for a place name. However, I'm not sure it's Chinese. I can't speak to the artwork, but in Chinese, like in Japanese, the character used for "made in..." is 製 (or 制 in simp. Chinese) as far as I've ever seen, although just today I noticed my Lenovo charger says 中國製造 on it, which was new on me. At any rate, I feel like more context and information is needed.

 

[grendel67]

It is Japanese Satsuma style 1900-1920 date range. Could be a little earlier than 1900. Probably depicting one of the seven lucky gods maybe the god of longevity. He is represented as an old man walking with a fan and a scroll under his arm. I cannot tell all the way what he is carry picture is dark. But you can Google seven lucky gods. I hope that helps.