Tenugui Japanese to English translation

Gavin

Registered

12 Jul 2017

3

0

• 12 Jul 2017

• #1

Hi guys, I'm looking to buy a small gift, a tenugui, for my Aikido sensei, but I'm not sure what is printed on it. The site I'm buying from doesn't give much information.

Can anyone please translate, or give me an idea of what it says?

Thank you in advance. I hope I've posted this correctly.

 

joadbres

八方凡人

19 Sep 2016

733

277

• 12 Jul 2017

• #2

This website:

Tenugui - Shoubu

says that the large characters are read as "shou bu", and mean "respect for the martial arts".

In that case, the characters would be 尚武, read from right to left.

 

Gavin

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12 Jul 2017

3

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• 12 Jul 2017

• Thread starter
• #3

joadbres said:

This website:

Tenugui - Shoubu

says that the large characters are read as "shou bu", and mean "respect for the martial arts".

In that case, the characters would be 尚武, read from right to left.

Click to expand...

Thank you joadbres. Any idea what the smaller characters down the left say?

 

joadbres

八方凡人

19 Sep 2016

733

277

• 13 Jul 2017

• #4

The first four of these characters appear to be:
藤田彪斌,
which appears to be a reference to the scholar Fujita Toko, also known as Fujita Takeki. (藤田彪 is read as Fujita Takeki.) The character 斌 is part of another name he went by.
Here is some info about him:
FUJITA TOKO (May 3, 1803 — November 11, 1855), Japanese scholar | Prabook

The only association I could find with him and the expression 尚武 was on this page: 〈出展作品紹介〉藤田東湖の書: 日本文化「英傑の書」展覧会 He used the expression in one of his short writings, depicted on the vertically-written scroll on that page. If you look at the bottom left of that scroll, you can see that his signature is quite similar to that on the tenugui.

That is all the investigative time I wish to spend on this matter. If you still desire more info, someone else on this site should be able to help you.

 

Gavin

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12 Jul 2017

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• 14 Jul 2017

• Thread starter
• #5

Thank you so much for taking the time to find that. It's greatly appreciated, thank you.

 

Majestic

先輩

Ten-year veteran

12 Oct 2013

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5,023

• 14 Jul 2017

• #6

I would say this is a reproduction of calligraphy done by Fujita Tōko, who was an advocate of martial arts, and calligraphy, and the last character is probably 書 (meaning: written by).

Joadbres, well done in figuring that out. I tried but didn't get very far. Did you just know 彪 by looking at it, or did you use some other avenue to figure it out?

(I was thinking 魁 or 龍, but was getting nowhere...Didn't even know that 彪 existed.)

 

Toritoribe

松葉解禁

Moderator

Fifteen-year veteran

22 Feb 2008

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• 14 Jul 2017

• #7

Yeah, the last character must be 書 in cursive script.