Kabuki Play Kusazuribiki from the Tales of Soga (Soga monogatari)

This hanging scroll suggests a scene from a tale known as 曾我兄弟の仇討ち [Revenge of the Soga Brothers] or more simply 曽我物語 [Soga Monogatari], in which two brothers vow to take revenge for their father’s murder. In a retelling of the story, the brother 蘇我五郎 [SOGA no Gorō], in clothes that bare a butterfly pattern, is held back by “the tassets of an armor” by the warrior 小林朝比奈 [KOBAYASHI no Asahina] with the crane motif in his clothing. This iconography became known as the 草摺引 [Kusazuribiki]. In many inventive and playful works of the Edo, the iconography of the older warrior detaining the younger, more impulsive young man by tugging on his clothes―and other gender and sex configurations of the trope―can be a means by which artists explored the power dynamics between presumed lovers, and the audience’s expectations about these, from a somewhat humorous perspective.

Hanging scroll