Vocabulary

purlin (structural beam in a roof); purline

northern side house (to the rear of a main residence; often home to one's wife)

Chinese (language)

roofed corridor connecting two buildings (in traditional palatial-style architecture)

western side house (in traditional palatial-style architecture)

sour kombu prepared with black vinegar

eastern side house (in traditional palatial-style architecture)

roofed path (lacking walls) connecting the main residence and the side houses (in traditional palatial architecture)

grounds south of a building; southern garden

exquisitely decorated pleasure boat

rickshaw man

playing with something with one's fingers

boiling something whole (e.g. vegetable, fish); cooking something whole

type of fast military boat used from the Warring states period until the Edo period

large warship of the Muromachi and early Edo periods

fast-moving rowboat

planking (on a wooden ship)

type of oar

mythical spirit residing in a person's body that generates a desire to drink (also said to turn water into alcohol)

threshing floor; place for threshing wheat

appearance; figure

old and strange

go or shogi board

song sung door-to-door

foreign priest; Western priest

stick used to drive off birds (during the New Year's procession)

song sung by children during the New Year's bird-driving procession (later adopted by door-to-door musicians)

Taoist sexual alchemy (supposed to prolong the practitioner's life)

Taoist sexual alchemy (supposed to prolong the practitioner's life)

long illness that will not heal

buildings on the east and west side of the southern pond (in traditional palatial-style architecture)

mud wall with a roof

latticed shutters (in traditional Japanese and Chinese architecture)

curtain separating a central room from the aisles around it (in palatial-style architecture)

urine sampling; urine collection

one's own Buddha statue

hall or room where a private Buddha statue or ancestor tablets are kept

building on the greater palace grounds used by the emperor for viewing horse racing, horseback archery, etc.

room with a sunken hearth

building for observing horse racing, horseback archery, etc. (sometimes specifically that used by the emperor on the greater palace grounds)