Geisha

In the early stages of Japanese history, there were female entertainers: Saburuko (serving girls) were mostly wandering girls whose families were displaced from struggles in the late 600s. Some of these saburuko girls sold sexual services, while others with a better education made a living by entertaining at high-class social gatherings. After the imperial court moved the capital to Heian-kyō (Kyoto) in 794 the conditions that would form geisha culture began to emerge, as it became the home of a beauty-obsessed elite.[7] Skilled female performers, such as Shirabyōshi dancers, thrived.

Traditional Japan embraced sexual delights and men were not constrained to be faithful to their wives.[8] The ideal wife was a modest mother and manager of the home; by Confucian custom love had secondary importance. For sexual enjoyment and romantic attachment, men did not go to their wives, but to courtesans. Walled-in pleasure quarters known as yūkaku (遊廓、遊郭) were built in the 16th century,[9] and in 1617 the shogunate designated "pleasure quarters", outside of which prostitution would be illegal,[10] and within which yūjo ("play women") would be classified and licensed. The highest yūjo class was the geisha's predecessor, called tayuu, a combination of actress and prostitute, originally playing on stages set in the dry Kamo riverbed in Kyoto. They performed erotic dances and skits, and this new art was dubbed kabuku, meaning "to be wild and outrageous". The dances were called "kabuki", and this was the beginning of kabuki theater.[10]

Ukiyoe depicting a Gion geisha, from between 1800 and 1833

Ukiyoe print by Yamaguchi Soken of a Kyoto geisha

These pleasure quarters quickly became glamorous entertainment centers, offering more than sex. The highly accomplished courtesans of these districts entertained their clients by dancing, singing, and playing music. Some were renowned poets and calligraphers. Gradually, they all became specialized and the new profession, purely of entertainment, arose. It was near the turn of the eighteenth century that the first entertainers of the pleasure quarters, called geisha, appeared. The first geishas were men, entertaining customers waiting to see the most popular and gifted courtesans (oiran).[10]

The forerunners of the female geisha were the teenage odoriko ("dancing girls"):[11] expensively trained as chaste dancers-for-hire. In the 1680s, they were popular paid entertainers in the private homes of upper-class samurai,[12] though many had turned to prostitution by the early 18th century. Those who were no longer teenagers (and could no longer style themselves odoriko[13]) adopted other names—one being "geisha", after the male entertainers. The first woman known to have called herself geisha was a Fukagawa prostitute, in about 1750.[14] She was a skilled singer and shamisen player named Kikuya who was an immediate success, making female geisha extremely popular in 1750s Fukagawa.[15] As they became more widespread throughout the 1760s and 1770s, many began working only as entertainers (rather than prostitutes), often in the same establishments as male geisha.[16]

Tokyo geisha with shamisen, circa 1870s

The geisha who worked within the pleasure quarters were strictly forbidden from selling sex in order to protect the business of the oiran who held high status in society at the time. Geisha were forbidden from wearing particularly flashy hairpins or kimono, and if an oiran accused a geisha of stealing her customers and business, an official enquiry would be opened and an investigation held.[17] At various points throughout the Edo period, geisha found themselves affected by various reforms aimed at limiting or shutting down the pleasure quarters, leading to geisha being confined to working within various "red light" districts at times, such as Shimabara in Tokyo. However, these reforms were often not consistent, and were at various times repealed.

By 1800, being a geisha was understood to be a female occupation (though a handful of male geisha still work today). Whilst licensed courtesans existed to meet the sexual needs of men, machi geisha (town geisha) began to carve out a separate niche as artists and erudite, worldly female companions. The introduction of various edicts on dress in the 1720s onwards, coupled with the rise of iki saw geisha enjoy a rise in popularity. Eventually, the gaudy oiran began to fall out of fashion, becoming less popular than the chic modern geisha;[10] this was a trend that continued until the eradication of legal prostitution in Japan.

By the 1830s, geisha were considered some of the leaders of fashion and style in Japanese society, and were emulated by women of the time.[18] Many trends that geisha started became widely popular and continue to this day; the wearing of haori by women, for example, was begun by geisha in the Tokyo hanamachi of Fukugawa in the early 1800s.

There were many different classifications and ranks of geisha, not all of them formally recognised. Some geisha would have sex with their male customers, whereas others would not. Various terms arose to describe the distinctions; kuruwa geisha, for example, described geisha who slept with customers as well as entertaining with their skills in the performing arts. This differed from yujō (prostitute) and jorō (whore), who only slept with customers, and from machi geisha, who were exclusively entertainers (though some machi geisha still slept with the men they entertained).[19]

Prostitution in Japan was legal until the 1957 Prohibition of Prostitution Law (売春防止法, Baishun Bōshi Hō) was passed, and so was practiced legally throughout Japan until this point, though various edicts up until this point had gradually restricted and changed the way that prostitution was legally conducted and regulated.

Before this time, World War II had brought a huge decline in the number of practicing geisha. In the years leading up to 1944, geisha had seen a decline in customers and income due to the war effort, though they themselves had contributed through the efforts of the various Geisha Associations throughout the country. In 1944, all geisha districts were closed, and geisha themselves conscripted into the war effort proper. Many geisha found themselves working in factories, or found work elsewhere through customers and patrons.

During and after the war, the geisha name lost some status, as some prostitutes began referring to themselves as "geisha girls" to members of the American military occupying Japan.[17]

In 1945, the karyūkai saw restrictions on its practices lifting, with teahouses, bars and okiya allowed to open once again. Though many geisha did not return to the hanamachi post-war, having found stable work elsewhere, it was evident that work as a geisha was still lucrative; geisha numbers began to pick up quickly, with the largest population of geisha (35% of the total) being aged 20-24, with many retiring from the profession in their mid-twenties - a trend carried over from the pre-war hanamachi:

I showed the mother of the Yamabuki [okiya, in 1975] some statistics on the age distribution of the geisha population in the 1920s. She remarked on the big dip in figures when women reached the age of twenty-five. "In those days, when you found yourself a patron you could stop working. If you were lucky you would be set up in your own apartment and have a life of leisure, taking lessons when you wanted to for your own enjoyment...I think it's pretty unusual nowadays for a geisha to stop working when she gets a patron."[20]

The status of geisha in wider society underwent a drastic change post-war; having once been arbiters of change and fashion, the 1920's and 30's had seen a great deal of discussion surrounding the place of geisha in a rapidly Westernising Japanese society. Some geisha had begun to experiment with wearing Western clothing to their engagements, experimenting with Western-style dancing and serving cocktails to customers instead of sake. The image of "modern" pre-war geisha had been viewed by some as unprofessional, or a betrayal of the profession's image; however, the incumbent pressures of the war rapidly turned the tide against Westernisation, and such experiments were abandoned.

Post-war, geisha unspokenly rejected Western influence, reverting unanimously to wearing kimono and keeping the more traditional arts of playing the shamisen, singing and dancing. Nonetheless, this had the knock-on effect of dealing the final blow to the profession's reputation as fashionable in the wider societal sense, instead rendering their image "protectors of tradition" in terms of their methods of entertaining customers.[17]

After Japan lost the war, geisha dispersed and the profession was in shambles. When they regrouped during the Occupation and began to flourish in the 1960s during Japan's postwar economic boom, the geisha world changed. In modern Japan, girls are not sold into indentured service. Nowadays, a geisha's sex life is her private affair.

— Liza Dalby, Do They or Don't They?[21]

Post-war geisha experienced a greater benefit in rights within the profession and in wider society, with the introduction of the Prostitution Prevention Law in 1956 at least serving to benefit geisha through the outlawing of mizuage, a practice undergone, willingly, coercively or through force, by some maiko in pre-war Japan.[17]

Post-war misconceptions of mizuage being a common practice pre- and post-war mostly stem from American GIs encountering genuine prostitutes, not geisha, labelling their services as "mizuage" and themselves as "geisha". Having little previous experience with geisha culture, it is likely that foreign forces were unable to tell the difference between a geisha and a prostitute, as both commonly wore kimono when working; this misconception continues into the present day.[22]

From the 1930s onwards, and particularly within post-war Japan, the rise of the jokyū bar hostess began to overshadow geisha as the premiere profession of entertainment at parties and outings for men.[20]^:84 In 1959, the Standard-Examiner reported the plight of then-contemporary geisha culled from an article written for the magazine Bungei Shunju by Japanese businessman Tsûsai Sugawara; Sugawara stated that girls now "prefer[red] to become dancers, models, and cabaret and bar hostesses rather than start [the] training in music and dancing at the age of seven or eight" necessary to become geisha at the time.[23]

Compulsory education laws passed in the 1960s also made the traditions of training from a young age to become a geisha difficult to conduct, leading to a decline in women entering the profession, the pre-requisite qualities of training in the arts becoming more difficult to come by.[24]

By 1975, the average age of a geisha in the Pontochō district of Kyoto was roughly 39, with the vast majority of the geisha population in the district spanning ages 35-49.[20] Though fewer geisha were in their fifties than in their 20s, the population of geisha over 60 was surprisingly high, roughly equivalent to younger women within the profession; this is, in part, due to the fact that geisha no longer retired young when they found a patron, and were less likely than other women of the same age to have children, grandchildren and a wider family, the karyukai instead being the closest and most familiar kin to many.

In the present day, all maiko debut roughly aged 18, with most okiya requiring a girl to finish at the very least high school before debuting. A trainee entering the profession will commonly have at least some background in the arts before this; however, it is not uncommon for trainees to have little previous experience. With the advent of social media and wider TV, documentaries and books about geisha commonly inspire young women to join the profession, with the geisha Satsuki - officially deemed the most popular geisha in Gion for a period of seven years - having been one such person:[25]

[Geisha] Satsuki first took an interest in the kagai [lit. "five geisha districts" - name for geisha quarters in Kyoto] while a middle school student in Osaka, at around the age of 14, after seeing a documentary about a maiko’s training. “I already had heard of maiko, but it was when I saw the documentary that I thought – I want to do that.”

A geisha entertaining a foreign guest

The appeal of a high-ranking geisha to her typical male guest has historically been very different from that of his wife. The ideal geisha showed her skill, while the ideal wife was modest. The ideal geisha seemed carefree, the ideal wife somber and responsible. Historically, geisha did sometimes marry their clients, but marriage necessitated retirement, as there were never married geisha.

Geisha may gracefully flirt with their guests, but they will always remain in control of the hospitality. Over their years of apprenticeship they learn to adapt to different situations and personalities, mastering the art of the hostess.[39]

Women in the geisha society are some of the most successful businesswomen in Japan. Inside the hanamachi, women, with the sole exclusions of male kimono dressers, some hairstylists and other craftspeople, run everything; new geisha are trained for the most part by their symbolic mothers and older sisters, and engagements are arranged through the mother of the house.[40][41] Without the impeccable business skills of the female tea house owners, the world of geisha would cease to exist. The tea house owners are entrepreneurs, whose service to the geisha is highly necessary for the society to run smoothly. Infrequently, men take contingent positions such as hair stylists,[42] dressers (dressing a maiko requires considerable strength) and accountants,[17] but men have a limited role in geisha society.

The geisha system was founded, actually, to promote the independence and economic self-sufficiency of women. And that was its stated purpose, and it actually accomplished that quite admirably in Japanese society, where there were very few routes for women to achieve that sort of independence.

— Mineko Iwasaki in interview, Boston Phoenix[43]

Historically, the majority of women were wives who did not work outside of their familial duties. A young geisha, however, could repay her debts, become independent and work as such after making her debut. Becoming a geisha, therefore, was one method for women to support themselves without becoming a wife.[44] Women run the geisha houses, they are teachers, they run the tea houses, they recruit aspiring geisha, and they keep track of a geisha's finances. Moreover, the geisha who has been chosen as an atotori (heir) of the Ggisha house would live there and run the business throughout her career until the next generation.[45] The only major role men play in geisha society is that of guest, though women sometimes take that role as well.[42]

Historically, Japanese feminists have seen geisha as exploited women, but some modern geisha see themselves as liberated feminists:[46] "We find our own way, without doing family responsibilities. Isn't that what feminists are?"[17]

Geisha are portrayed as unattached. Formerly those who chose to marry had to retire from the profession, though today, some geisha are allowed to marry. It was traditional in the past for established geisha to take a danna, or patron. A danna was typically a wealthy man, sometimes married, who had the means to support the very large expenses related to a geisha's traditional training and other costs. This sometimes occurs today as well, but very rarely. A geisha and her danna may or may not be in love, but intimacy is never viewed as a reward for the danna's financial support. While it is true that a geisha is free to pursue personal relationships with men she meets through her work, such relationships are carefully chosen and unlikely to be casual. A hanamachi tends to be a very tight-knit community and a geisha's good reputation is not taken lightly.

During the period of the Allied occupation of Japan, local women called "Geisha girls" worked as prostitutes. They almost exclusively serviced American GIs stationed in the country, who actually referred to them as "Geesha girls" (a mispronunciation).[83][84] These women dressed in kimono and imitated the look of geisha. Many Americans unfamiliar with the Japanese culture could not tell the difference between legitimate geisha and these costumed performers.[83] Shortly after their arrival in 1945, some occupying American GIs are said to have congregated in Ginza and shouted, "We want geesha girls!"[85]

Eventually, the English term "geisha girl" became a general word for any female Japanese prostitute or worker in the mizu shōbai and included bar hostesses and streetwalkers.[83]

"Geisha girls" are speculated by researchers to be largely responsible for the continuing misconception in the West that all geisha are engaged in prostitution.[83]

Mizuage (水揚げ) - lit., "raising the waters" - [86] was a ceremony undergone by junior kamuro and some maiko as part of the process of promotion to senior status. Originally meaning the unloading of a ship's cargo of fish, over time, the word came to represent money earned in the karyukai[7] - one of the other names for the entertainment business being the mizu shōbai, lit. "the water business".

Alongside the changing of hairstyles from the junior maiko wareshinobu style to the senior maiko ofuku style[83] and visits conducted to sister okiya and important patrons within the karyukai, some maiko would have their virginity sold to a patron who would sponsor her graduation to geisha status monetarily. This sponsorship usually constituted a relatively high cost, and so unscrupulous okiya owners would not uncommonly sell a girl's virginity more than once, ostensibly under the pretence of a patron being the girl's "first", pocketing the money entirely for themselves.

Prostitutes, particularly during the Second World War, would often use this term to refer to their acts with customers, which led to great confusion when such prostitutes called themselves "geisha" in the company of foreign soldiers, and even amongst Japanese customers.[87] Post-1956, prostitution was criminalised within Japan, and mizuage is no longer practiced within the karyukai.[88]

The maiko Mamechiho in the Gion district. Notice the green pin on the mid-left called tsunagi-dango: this identifies her as a maiko of Gion kobu under 18.

The makeup of maiko and geisha is one of their most recognisable characteristics.

The traditional makeup of a maiko features a base of white foundation with red lipstick and red and black accents around the eyes and eyebrows. First-year maiko will only paint their lower lip with lipstick, and wear less black on the eyebrows and eyes than senior maiko. A junior maiko will paint her eyebrows shorter than a senior maiko will.[89] Maiko will also wear tonoko (a kind of blusher) on the face, usually around the eyes.[90] Young maiko often have the mother of the house or her "older sister" mentor to help apply this makeup.

The makeup of geisha does not vary much from this, though geisha will wear less tonoko than maiko. Older geisha will generally only wear full white face makeup during stage performances and special appearances. Both geisha and maiko do not colour both lips in fully, and will instead underpaint both lips, the top moreso than the bottom. The lipstick used comes in a small stick, which is melted in water.

Maiko in their final stage of training sometimes colour their teeth black for a brief period, usually when wearing the sakkō hairstyle. This practice used to be common among married women in Japan and in earlier times at the imperial court; however, it survives only in some districts. It is done partly because uncoloured teeth can appear very yellow in contrast to the oshiroi worn by maiko; from a distance, the teeth seem to disappear.

A senior maiko (on the left) wearing a long darari obi and a geisha (on the right) wearing an obi in the taiko-musubi style

Geisha always wear kimono, though the type and the style varies based on age, occasion, region and time of year.

Apprentice geisha wear highly colourful long-sleeved kimono with extravagant and very long obi. Whereas maiko in Kyoto wear kimono with relatively large, but sparse, patterns, apprentices in places such as Tokyo wear kimono more similar in appearance to regular furisode - smaller, busier patterns.

Maiko of Kyoto wear their obi in the darari (dangling) style, whereas regional apprentices and Tokyo han-gyoku wear theirs usually tied in the fukura-suzume style, amongst others. Maiko will wear a red han-eri (collar cover) with an increasing quantity of white, gold and silver embroidery as the apprenticeship progresses.

Geisha tend to have a more uniform appearance across region, and wear kimono more subdued in pattern and colour than apprentices. Geisha always wear short-sleeved kimono, regardless of occasion or formality. Geisha wear their obi in the nijuudaiko musubi style - a taiko musubi (drum knot) tied with a fukuro obi; geisha from Tokyo and Kanazawa also wear their obi in the yanagi musubi (willow knot) style and the tsunodashi musubi style. Geisha exclusively wear solid white han-eri.

Both geisha and maiko will wear susohiki (trailing skirt) kimono to formal events, banquets and performances; some regional geisha and maiko may not wear susohiki.

Geisha wear either geta or zōri, while maiko wear either zōri or okobo - a high-heeled type of geta roughly 10-12cm tall. Both will wear tabi, whether wearing shoes or not.

Mamechiho as a geiko

The hairstyles of geisha have varied through history. In the past, it has been common for women to wear their hair down in some periods and up in others. During the 17th century, women began putting all their hair up again, and it is during this time that the traditional shimada hairstyle, a type of chignon worn by most established geisha, developed.

There are two major types of the shimada seen in the karyukai: the Taka Shimada, a high mage (high section) usually worn by young, single women and the Tsubushi Shimada, a more flattened mage generally worn by older women Additional hairstyles for maiko include Wareshinobu, Ofuku, Katsuyama, Yakko Shimada, and Sakkō. Maiko of Pontocho will wear an additional six hairstyles leading up to Sakkō, including Oshidori, Kikugasane, Yuiwata, Suisha, Oshun, and Osafune.

These hairstyles are decorated with elaborate hair-combs and hairpins (kanzashi). Beginning In the seventeenth century and continuing through the Meiji Restoration period, hair-combs were large and conspicuous, generally more ornate for higher-class women. Following the Meiji Restoration and into the modern era, smaller and less conspicuous hair-combs became more popular.

Maiko sleep with their necks on small supports (takamakura), instead of pillows, so they keep their hairstyle perfect.[42] Even if there are no accidents, a maiko will need her hair styled every week. Many modern geisha use wigs in their professional lives, while maiko use their natural hair.[91] Either must be regularly tended by highly skilled artisans. Traditional hairstyling is a slowly dying art. Over time, the hairstyle can cause balding on the top of the head.

Sakkō (先笄) is a Japanese hairstyle. It is worn by maiko today, but was worn in the Edo period by wives to show their dedication to their husbands. Maiko wear it during a ceremony called Erikae, which marks their graduation from maiko to geiko. Maiko use black wax to stain their teeth as well. Crane and tortoiseshell ornaments are added as kanzashi. The style is twisted in many knots, and is quite striking and elaborate.

• Sisters of the Gion (1936)—Dir. Kenji Mizoguchi
• The Life of Oharu (西鶴一代女 Saikaku Ichidai Onna) (1952)—Dir. Kenji Mizoguchi
• A Geisha (祇園囃子, Gion bayashi) (1953)—Dir. Kenji Mizoguchi
• The Teahouse of the August Moon (1956)—Dir. Daniel Mann
• The Barbarian and the Geisha (1958)—Dir. John Huston
• The Geisha Boy (1958)—Dir. Frank Tashlin
• Late Chrysanthemums (Bangiku) (1958)—Dir. Mikio Naruse
• Cry for Happy (1961)—George Marshall comedy
• My Geisha (1962)—Dir. Jack Cardiff
• The Wolves (1971)—Dir. Hideo Gosha
• The World of Geisha (1973)—Dir. Tatsumi Kumashiro
• In the Realm of the Senses (1976)—Dir. Nagisa Oshima
• Ihara Saikaku Koshoku Ichidai Otoko (1991)—Dir. Yukio Abe
• The Geisha House (1999)—Dir. Kinji Fukasaku
• The Sea is Watching (2002)—Dir. Kei Kumai
• Zatoichi (2003)—Dir. Takeshi Kitano
• Fighter in the Wind (2004)—Dir. Yang Yun-ho
• Memoirs of a Geisha (2005)—Dir. Rob Marshall
• Wakeful Nights (2005)—Dir. Masahiko Tsugawa
• Maiko Haaaan!!! (2007)—Dir. Nobuo Mizuta
• Lady Maiko (2014)—Dir. Masayuki Suo

Total War: Shogun 2 (Used as agent to assassinate or seduce enemy clans)

Battle Realms (Used as healers by Dragon Clan And Serpent Clan)