page_title: Chūshingura
section_title: Kabuki
hierarchical_section_title: Chūshingura / Kabuki
caption_attribution_description: English: Act 10 (Judamme) from the play Storehouse of Loyalty (Chushingura). Act l0: A Night Scene outside the House of the Merchant Amakawa-ya Gihei at Sakai. Português: Pintura de Ando Hiroshige – Chūshingura 日本語: 忠臣蔵
context_page_description: Chūshingura is the title given to fictionalized accounts in Japanese literature, theatre, and film that relate to the historical incident involving the forty-seven rōnin and their mission to avenge the death of their master, Asano Naganori. Including the early Kanadehon Chūshingura, the story has been told in kabuki, bunraku, stage plays, films, novels, television shows and other media. With ten different television productions in the years 1997–2007 alone, Chūshingura ranks among the most familiar of all historical stories in Japan.
context_section_description: Sections of the following synopsis of Kanadehon Chūshingura are reproduced by permission from the book A Guide to the Japanese Stage by Ronald Cavaye, Paul Griffith and Akihiko Senda, published by Kodansha International, Japan:
  Kanadehon Chūshingura ("The Treasury of Loyal Retainers") is based on a true incident which took place between 1701 and 1703. To avoid shogunate censorship, the authors set the play in the earlier Muromachi period (1333–1568) and the names of the characters were altered. However some names sounded similar and those with knowledge knew what they were referring to in reality. For example, the real person Ōishi Kuranosuke was changed to Ōboshi Yuranosuke. The play therefore fuses fiction and fact.
  The central story concerns the daimyō En'ya Hangan, who is goaded into drawing his sword and striking a senior lord, Kō no Moronō (Note: although the furigana for Moronō's name is Moronao, the pronunciation is Moronō). Drawing one's sword in the shōgun's palace was a capital offense and so Hangan is ordered to commit seppuku, or ritual suicide by disembowelment. The ceremony is carried out with great formality and, with his dying breath, he makes clear to his chief retainer, Ōboshi Yuranosuke, that he wishes to be avenged upon Moronō.
  Forty-seven of Hangan's now masterless samurai or rōnin bide their time. Yuranosuke in particular, appears to give himself over to a life of debauchery in Kyoto's Gion pleasure quarters in order to put the enemy off their guard. In fact, they make stealthy but meticulous preparations and, in the depths of winter, storm Moronō's Edo mansion and kill him. Aware, however, that this deed is itself an offense, the retainers then carry Moronō's head to the grave of their lord at Sengaku-ji temple in Edo, where they all commit seppuku.
  Act I, Tsurugaoka kabuto aratame ("The Helmet Selection at Hachiman Shrine")
  This play has a unique opening, in which the curtain is pulled open slowly over several minutes, accompanied by forty-seven individual beats of the ki, one for each of the heroic rōnin. Gradually, the actors are revealed in front of the Hachiman Shrine in Kamakura slumped over like lifeless puppets. As the gidayū narrator speaks the name of each character he comes to life. Lord Moronō's evil nature is immediately demonstrated by his black robes and the furious mie pose which he strikes when his name is announced. He is hostile to the younger, inexperienced lords. They have all gathered to find and present a special helmet at the shrine and it is Hangan's wife, Kaoyo, who is the one to identify it. When the ceremony is over and he is eventually left alone with Kaoyo, Moronō propositions her but she rejects his amorous advances.
  Act II, The Scriptorium of the Kenchōji Temple
  When Act II is performed as Kabuki it is often given in a later version, first performed by Ichikawa Danjūrō VII (1791–1859), and entitled "The Scriptorium of the Kenchōji Temple". A performance of Act II is extremely rare, even "complete" (tōshi kyōgen) performances almost never include it. The original puppet and Kabuki scripts of Act II are similar and the story is as follows –
  The act takes place in the mansion of the young daimyō, Momonoi Wakasanosuke. His chief retainer, Kakogawa Honzō, admonishes the servants for gossiping about the humiliation of their master by Moronō at the previous day's ceremony at the Tsurugaoka shrine. Even Honzō's wife, Tonase, and daughter, Konami, speak of it. 
  Ōboshi Rikiya, Konami's betrothed and the son of En'ya Hangan's chief retainer, Ōboshi Yuranosuke, arrives with a message that Moronō has commanded that both Hangan and Wakasanosuke appear at the palace by four in the morning in order to prepare the ceremonies for the shōgun's younger brother whom they are to entertain.  
  Wakasanosuke hears the message and dismisses them all apart from Honzō. He speaks of the insults which he suffered and his determination to take his revenge. He decides to kill Moronō tomorrow even if such a rash and illegal act brings about the eradication of his household. 
  Surprisingly, the older 
caption: Act X, Amakawaya Gihei Uchi no ba – (The House Amakawaya Gihei) by Andō Hiroshige
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