Teika’s Ten Styles of Japanese Poetry

Teika’s Ten Styles of Japanese Poetry

Unidentified

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Two types of poetry cards—shikishi, almost square, and tanzaku, tall and narrowly rectangular in shape—have been used to transcribe waka poems since ancient times. The unusual examples here are paired on gold-leaf-backed leaves of a large album. Most remarkably, the borders of the tanzaku have colorfully painted floral motifs meticulously cut out to create vibrant eye-catching “frames.” Eight of the pairs have the same waka inscribed—by different hands, in different styles—on both cards. The poems selected for this album categorizedwaka according to the distinctive styles advocated by the early medieval courtier-poetand literary arbiter Fujiwara no Teika (or Sadaie, 1162–1241).

Asian Art

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Teika’s Ten Styles of Japanese PoetryTeika’s Ten Styles of Japanese PoetryTeika’s Ten Styles of Japanese PoetryTeika’s Ten Styles of Japanese PoetryTeika’s Ten Styles of Japanese Poetry

The Met's collection of Asian art—more than 35,000 objects, ranging in date from the third millennium B.C. to the twenty-first century—is one of the largest and most comprehensive in the world. Each of the many civilizations of Asia is represented by outstanding works, providing an unrivaled experience of the artistic traditions of nearly half the world.